The Birth Project: Using the Arts to explore birth. Interim report

The aim of this study was to use the arts to interrogate birth discourses, to challenge embedded assumptions, and in this process, to stimulate mutual recovery between all those who experience and are affected by birth. The research questions are: • What role might arts engagement have to play in ante-natal and post-natal care? • To what extent are hospital practices, that are iatrogenic in nature, implicated in post-natal distress? • To what extent is ‘mutual recovery’ possible through engagement with the arts, and if so, to establish what form this may take? • What, in particular, does an arts-based approach offer in exploring birth experiences and the transition to motherhood?Part of the AHRC Consortium, Creative Practice as Mutual Recovery: Connecting Communities for Mental Health and Well-being

“Age is just a number, init?”: Interrogating perceptions of age and women within social gerontology

The article discusses social gerontology and mentions age and women. Topics discussed include social relations, self-identity and ageing. Other topics which includes women's bodies, menopause and feminism are also discussed. Ethnography, marginalization and sexual attraction towards women are also mentioned

The tyranny of expectations of post-natal delight: gendered happiness

This article explores the contested nature of childbirth practices with a historical perspective. The article discusses the modern medical/interventionist model of birth now predominant in the UK and examines the consequences of prevailing norms for women. It includes some reflections on the regulation of pregnancy and the transition to motherhood and notes some counter-cultural movements such as ‘free-birthing’

Breasts & the Beestings: Rethinking Breast-Feeding Practices, Maternity Rituals, & Maternal Attachment in Britain & Ireland

Viewing the wider collective rituals of childbirth as liminal is helpful in understanding the highly contested nature of many cultural practices. With English & Irish historical examples, this essay will argue that it has been to the advantage of women that they maintain a wide range of post-partum taboos and rituals. The themes of postpartum pollution and female power are developed in the context of wet-nursing and the withholding of colostrum. ‘Churching’, evident in the medieval period in Britain, continues to this very day, though in a simplified form. The colostrum taboo and ideas about the transmission of personality via breast milk are very ancient ideas, now entirely discredited in a British context, though to breastfeed another’s baby is now socially taboo. Ideas about how the passions of the nurse could spoil her milk and cause diseases in the child were still widespread in the nineteenth century, and there are resonances of these ideas evident today in beliefs about how pregnant women’s emotions might damage her developing foetus. Theoretically, this article illustrates how anthropological ideas can enrich our understanding of cultural history

Florence Nightingale, the Colossus: Was She a Feminist?

Nightingale displayed a particular brand of feminism that reflected the circumstances of her era. The question of women’s involvement in healthcare is addressed through an analysis of Nightingale’s most famous work, Notes on Nursing. What it is, and what it is not (1859/60). Then other key works are scrutinised with reference to ideas about female involvement in healthcare and how she addresses the position of women in general terms. Nightingale’s works, Notes on Hospitals (1859); Suggestions for Thought to the Searchers after Truth among the Artisans of England (1860); Introductory Notes on Lying-In Institutions (1871) are focussed upon illustrating her views on women’s involvement in healthcare and answering the overarching question: was and how was she feminist

Reply to Stacy Lockerbie (Review of \u3cem\u3eConception Diary: Thinking About Pregnancy and Motherhood\u3c/em\u3e by Susan Hogan)

Reply by the author regarding the following book review: Stacy Lockerbie, JIWS, Vol. 9. No. 1. November 2007. pp. 319-321. Review of Conception Diary: Thinking About Pregnancy and Motherhood. Susan Hogan

Florence Nightingale (1820–1910) – what does history say about her feminism?

Is Florence Nightingale becoming unfashionable? The UK’s largest union UNISON voted to drop the use of Nightingale’s image for their union as she was considered to be unrepresentative of modern nursing. One of those backing the motion is on record as saying, ‘All over Eastern Europe, statues of Lenin are being taken off their pedestals, dismantled and pulled off to be cut up.… It is in the same vein that we must enter the new Millennium, start to exorcise the myth of Florence Nightingale’. This paper will discuss modern attitudes to Nightingale in terms of her feminism (not a term she used of herself) and survey scholarly articles that address Nightingale in relation to the position of women. It ends with reflections on the iconography of notable women

Teaching mathematics to children with emotional and behavioural difficulties : the development of practice as a personal journey

Children with emotional and behavioural difficulties (EBD) are often characterised as 'challenging' and 'unteachable'. The purpose of this thesis is to demonstrate how one teacher's personal enquiry into her practice reveals an alternative perspective on teaching mathematics to children with EBD. If it is accepted that the mathematics classroom is challenging to the child then the role of the mathematics teacher becomes one of developing a trusting relationship with the child based on the teacher's use of empathy and 'being there'. It is important for the mathematics teacher to take risks in using mathematics to overcome the emotional and behavioural difficulties of the child. The message is that researching one's own practice is a valuable exercise for any practitioner

International Perspectives on Research-Guided Practice in Community-Based Arts in Health.

This paper discusses research-guided practice in community-based arts in health activity in Britain. This discussion is situated within an exploration of health policy and its relationship to the arts in health. It provides a summary analysis of a large body of research relevant to wellbeing and mental-health rehabilitation; it will describe how community-based arts in health activity provides the basis for a set of evidence-based actions to improve well-being. In respect to research-guided practice, this paper will argue a strong case that community-based arts in health initiatives encompass all aspects of the ‘Five Ways to Wellbeing’; furthermore, it will indicate how community arts in health activities are also significant in aiding recovery from mental ill health. The essay moves on to explore why participatory approaches are of particular value to women. In particular, the paper looks at the position of older women, with reference to the New Dynamics of Ageing Programme in Britain. It concludes with a detailed discussion of several recent projects. A description of the research inquiry will enable the partnership structures and the ethos developed in the projects’ delivery to be elucidated and discussed in order to interrogate strategies of practice. It is hoped that this frank discussion of some of the tensions between arts-based participatory practice and arts-based participatory practice for research will be of interest. Different visual methods will be articulated. Methods have included the use of art elicitation, photo-diaries, film-booths, directed photography, and re-enactment phototherapy within an overarching participatory framework. It is recognised that women are a highly diversified group with crosscutting allegiances, some of which have been acknowledged in this project.ESRC. The Representing Self - Representing Ageing initiative has been funded by the ESRC as part of the New Dynamics of Ageing cross-council research programme (grant number RES.356 25-0040)