![]() ![]() ![]() This “medicalization of childbirth” has huge impacts on how society, and women themselves, see women’s bodies and safety. ![]() Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Catching Babies: The Professionalization of Childbirth, 1870- 1920.Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. The medicalized model of childbirth is a fairly recent product of a larger shift in societal acceptance of professional science over local knowledge. The media often frames this increase in home births as potentially dangerous and problematic, but women were giving birth at home long before they started going to hospitals. Kunis is just one, albeit highly publicized, instance in a larger move away from the hospitalized birthing experience to “home birth.” However, this shift is not without its conflicts, and Kunis’ statement that natural birth is “doing it right” points to deeper societal perceptions of the right way to give birth and how those perceptions of what is “natural” might be changing. Mila Kunis recently announced that she will be giving birth naturally, saying “I did this to myself – I might as well do it right.” By “natural,” Kunis means that she will be using a midwife when she gives birth and opting out of the hospitalized, medically-induced birthing experience that dominates in American society today. ![]()
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