Making Modern Mothers: Ethics and Family Planning in Urban Greece

Making Modern Mothers: Ethics and Family Planning in Urban Greece
ISBN-10
0520937139
ISBN-13
9780520937130
Series
Making modern mothers
Category
Social Science
Pages
356
Language
English
Published
2004-02-12
Publisher
Univ of California Press
Author
Heather Paxson

Description

In Greece, women speak of mothering as "within the nature" of a woman. But this durable association of motherhood with femininity exists in tension with the highest incidence of abortion and one of the lowest fertility rates in Europe. In this setting, how do women think of themselves as proper individuals, mothers, and Greek citizens? In this anthropological study of reproductive politics and ethics in Athens, Greece, Heather Paxson tracks the effects of increasing consumerism and imported biomedical family planning methods, showing how women's "nature" is being transformed to meet crosscutting claims of the contemporary world. Locating profound ambivalence in people's ethical evaluations of gender and fertility control, Paxson offers a far-reaching analysis of conflicting assumptions about what it takes to be a good mother and a good woman in modern Greece, where assertions of cultural tradition unfold against a backdrop of European Union integration, economic struggle, and national demographic anxiety over a falling birth rate.

Other editions

Similar books