Women’s narratives about alcohol use during pregnancy: a narrative-discursive study

While research has explored the risk factors that contribute to alcohol use during pregnancy among South African women, such studies have mostly been quantitative in nature. There is a growing body of research that contextualises and articulates the attitudes, beliefs, and underlying motivations that influence drinking during pregnancy. However, few qualitative studies explore the cultural, economic, familial, and social contexts within which drinking during pregnancy takes place. Studies which have explored these contexts have been conducted in other geographical regions such as Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States but their findings are not generalisable to South Africa. Drawing on a feminist poststructuralist as well as a narrative-discursive approach including Foucault’s (1978) theory of power, this study sought to explore women’s narratives of the personal and interpersonal circumstances under which drinking during pregnancy takes place in terms of the discourses used to construct these narratives and the subject positions made available within these discourses. This allowed for the practice of alcohol use during pregnancy to be understood within the social and cultural narratives, practices, and discourses around pregnancy as well as gendered and social relations. Using the narrative interview method set out by Wengraf (2001), thirteen, unemployed ‘Black’ women from an area in the Eastern Cape were recruited and interviewed. Seven discourses emerged from the narratives namely, a discourse of ‘stress and coping’ ‘hegemonic masculinities’, ‘peer pressure’, ‘disablement and developmental delay’, ‘good mothering/appropriate pregnancies’, ‘culture’, and ‘religion’. These discourses informed the five narrative categories which emerged: narratives about the pregnancy, narratives about the drinking, narratives that justify/explain drinking, narratives that condemn the drinking, and narratives about the women knowing the effects of drinking during pregnancy. Within these narratives, the women mainly positioned themselves as dependent on alcohol during their pregnancies in order to cope with stress caused by various circumstances which were mainly centred on a lack of support from their partners, paternity denial, infidelity and unreliableness. As such, the women in this study mainly justified their drinking during pregnancy and in constructing this narrative, the ‘stress and coping’ discourse as well as the ‘male/masculine provider’ discourse were mainly drawn upon. In reflecting on this analysis, this study argues that alcohol use during pregnancy should be understood within the broader environmental and social context that makes a pregnancy challenging and/or difficult and thus necessitates drinking during pregnancy. Recommendations for future research include expanding the diversity of participants as well as interviewing healthcare providers and women who are currently pregnant, drinking, and part of an intervention aimed at addressing alcohol use during pregnancy so as to obtain a holistic understanding of engaging in this practice. The study makes key recommendations for interventions in practice to help work towards ensuring that the practice of alcohol use during pregnancy is not individualised, decontextualized, and stigmatised

Women’s narratives about alcohol use during pregnancy: a narrative-discursive study

While research has explored the risk factors that contribute to alcohol use during pregnancy among South African women, such studies have mostly been quantitative in nature. There is a growing body of research that contextualises and articulates the attitudes, beliefs, and underlying motivations that influence drinking during pregnancy. However, few qualitative studies explore the cultural, economic, familial, and social contexts within which drinking during pregnancy takes place. Studies which have explored these contexts have been conducted in other geographical regions such as Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States but their findings are not generalisable to South Africa. Drawing on a feminist poststructuralist as well as a narrative-discursive approach including Foucault’s (1978) theory of power, this study sought to explore women’s narratives of the personal and interpersonal circumstances under which drinking during pregnancy takes place in terms of the discourses used to construct these narratives and the subject positions made available within these discourses. This allowed for the practice of alcohol use during pregnancy to be understood within the social and cultural narratives, practices, and discourses around pregnancy as well as gendered and social relations. Using the narrative interview method set out by Wengraf (2001), thirteen, unemployed ‘Black’ women from an area in the Eastern Cape were recruited and interviewed. Seven discourses emerged from the narratives namely, a discourse of ‘stress and coping’ ‘hegemonic masculinities’, ‘peer pressure’, ‘disablement and developmental delay’, ‘good mothering/appropriate pregnancies’, ‘culture’, and ‘religion’. These discourses informed the five narrative categories which emerged: narratives about the pregnancy, narratives about the drinking, narratives that justify/explain drinking, narratives that condemn the drinking, and narratives about the women knowing the effects of drinking during pregnancy. Within these narratives, the women mainly positioned themselves as dependent on alcohol during their pregnancies in order to cope with stress caused by various circumstances which were mainly centred on a lack of support from their partners, paternity denial, infidelity and unreliableness. As such, the women in this study mainly justified their drinking during pregnancy and in constructing this narrative, the ‘stress and coping’ discourse as well as the ‘male/masculine provider’ discourse were mainly drawn upon. In reflecting on this analysis, this study argues that alcohol use during pregnancy should be understood within the broader environmental and social context that makes a pregnancy challenging and/or difficult and thus necessitates drinking during pregnancy. Recommendations for future research include expanding the diversity of participants as well as interviewing healthcare providers and women who are currently pregnant, drinking, and part of an intervention aimed at addressing alcohol use during pregnancy so as to obtain a holistic understanding of engaging in this practice. The study makes key recommendations for interventions in practice to help work towards ensuring that the practice of alcohol use during pregnancy is not individualised, decontextualized, and stigmatised

Educating learners with special educational needs in special schools: an interpretative phenomenological study of teachers’ experiences

In 2001, the Department of Education introduced a policy known as White Paper 6: Special Needs Education: Building an Inclusive Education and Training System. This policy was a response to the worldwide call for inclusive education. It aimed to ensure that all learners with special educational needs (LSEN) and who experience barriers to learning are accommodated and taught in mainstream schooling contexts. Implementation of this policy in South Africa has been a challenge, and special schools continue to exist. While research has explored the experiences of teachers who teach LSEN, such studies have focused on teacher experiences in mainstream schools. A few international and South African studies have explored teacher experiences of teaching LSEN in special schools; however, these explore specific aspects of teacher experiences and are outdated. Based on this premise and drawing on a phenomenological approach, this study sought to explore and understand the experiences of teachers who teach LSEN in special schools. Using the semi-structured interview, eight teachers teaching in special schools in a city in the Eastern Cape were recruited and interviewed. Five superordinate themes emerged from the shared experiences, namely, ‘personal commitment and the need for a balance’, ‘recognising the learner at the centre’, ‘the importance of a holistic approach’, ‘the ups and downs of teaching LSEN’, and ‘support is available but limited’. Within these themes, the teachers experienced teaching LSEN as involving more than teaching, as a role guided by the learner, as collaborative, associated with positive experiences and challenges, including an endeavour that they are adequately supported in but simultaneously require more support for. In reflecting on this analysis, this study argues that special schools are necessary; teaching LSEN in special schools is important to teachers, and they feel a responsibility for it. Recommendations for future research include repeating the present study with a different population and methodology, interviewing parents of LSEN and LSEN themselves to gain further insights into special schooling. The study makes key recommendations for special needs education to help ensure that such an educational system is sustained as inclusion is a long way from being realised.Thesis (MA) -- Faculty of Humanities, Psychology, 202

I DRANK BECAUSE I WANTED TO DEAL WITH THE FRUSTRATION”: EXPLAINING ALCOHOL CONSUMPTION DURING PREGNANCY IN A LOW-RESOURCE SETTING – WOMEN’S, PARTNERS AND FAMILY MEMBERS’ NARRATIVES

Understanding the explanatory narratives that women, partners and family members provide for consuming alcohol during pregnancy is essential in interventions. This paper reports on the stories of 25 participants in a low-resource area. Explanations included lack of partner support (not providing financially, being unfaithful, denying paternity), stress (HIV diagnosis, unwanted pregnancy, poverty), trauma (rape, death and crime), and a drinking culture (unregulated taverns, availability of liquor, peer pressure). Interventions should work with the gender norms; provide services or referrals for trauma; provide non-judgmental counselling; and target drinking in general in the community so as to reduce drinking culture

The shame of drinking alcohol while pregnant: The production of avoidance and ill-health

In this article, we examine the operation of shame in the alcohol use habits of pregnant women and the responses of their families and associated institutions. Using a narrative–discursive approach, we interviewed 13 women, living in a low-resource setting in South Africa, who had consumed alcohol while pregnant. Narratives showed how both the act of drinking and “inappropriately” timed pregnancy (early and out of wedlock) were judged to be unacceptable. Women who engaged in these activities were positioned as bad mothers or promiscuous. Their actions were seen as resulting in the suffering of others—the future child, the family, and even the community. These narratives were underpinned by cultural and religious discourses. Women managed the shame accruing to them through avoidance and concealment; families instructed women to self-exclude or distanced themselves from the women’s behavior; and institutions subtly or overtly excluded women. The shaming of these women, and the mechanisms by which such shame was managed, did little to decrease drinking or to increase maternal health and welfare. Overall, this article demonstrates how the shame of drinking alcohol during pregnancy produces avoidance behavior, concealment, and exclusion, which are not constructive in terms of maternal health and well-being. The implications for a feminist narrative approach to drinking during pregnancy are outlined: moving beyond a focus on individual behavior change to locating personal stories within the meta-narratives and social discourses that shape pregnant women’s lives