Birthing a slave : motherhood and medicine in the Antebellum South / Marie Jenkins Schwartz.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Schwartz, Marie Jenkins, 1946- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Childbirth--Southern States--History--19th century.

Childbirth.

Obstetrics--History.

Obstetrics.

Southeastern United States.

Medical Subjects:

Southeastern United States.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (414 pages)

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Massachusetts ; London, England : Harvard University Press, 2009.

Summary:

"In the antebellum South, slaveholders' interest in slave women was matched by physicians who wanted to assert their own professional authority over childbirth, and the two began to work together to increase the number of infants born in the slave quarter. In unprecedented ways, doctors tried to manage the health of enslaved women from puberty through the reproductive years, attempting to foster pregnancy, cure infertility, and resolve gynecological problems, including cancer." "Black women, however, proved an unruly force, distrustful of both the slaveholders and their doctors. With their own healing traditions, emphasizing the power of roots and herbs and the critical roles of family and community, enslaved women struggled to take charge of their own health in a system that did not respect their social circumstances, customs, or values. Birthing a Slave depicts the competing approaches to reproductive health that evolved on plantations, as both black women and white men sought to enhance the health of enslaved mothers - in very different ways and for entirely different reasons." "Birthing a Slave is the first book to focus exclusively on the health care of enslaved women, and it argues for the critical role of reproductive medicine in the slave system of antebellum America."--Jacket

Contents:

Procreation

Healers

Fertility

Pregnancy

Childbirth

Postnatal complications

Gynecological surgery

Cancer and other tumors

Freedwomen's health.

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780674257993

0674257995

OCLC:

1250082673