Críticas Limitaciones y Conflictos en los Procesos de Enseñanza basados en

3.2.1

Pregnancy

The primary research assumption I make, is that pregnancy and motherhood are social and cultural practices. More than simply a biological process, the experience of pregnancy is informed by social and cultural expectations of motherhood. In her anthropological work on motherhood, Adrienne Rich (1977) detailed the myriad ways pregnancy and motherhood have been practiced and understood in cross-cultural contexts, throughout history. In this thesis, I focus specifically on the experience of pregnancy in a Canadian context. Living in a western, industrialized nation means that Canadian women have access to a medical system that involves the routine, regulated use of ultrasound technology, as well as an economy to support a fee-for- service ultrasound industry. Therefore the experiences of pregnancy for women in Canada will undoubtedly differ from that of women in different cultural and economic positions. For this reason I am clear to situate my research within a Canadian context, and do not intend to suggest that it can be extrapolated to other cultural contexts.

Pregnancy and motherhood are seen as socially significant and important displays of women’s femininity. Pregnancy and motherhood are, as Tasha Dubriwny states “practice[s], not

instinct[s]” (2010:288). As discussed in the previous chapter, pregnancy is framed by social and cultural expectations that require women to alter their behaviour in ways that signal the care and protection of the fetus as their primary goal. As such, women are told they must change their diet, exercise routine and clothing choices. They must think more carefully about the type of products they use on themselves and in their homes, while being mindful of chemicals and toxins that might put their fetus at risk. Additionally, many women participate in pregnancy specific practices that hold cultural significance, such as the baby shower, the process of “nesting” (whereby women work to ready themselves and their homes for the arrival of the new baby) and, I argue, the prenatal ultrasound. Part of this work is accomplished by medical, diagnostic

ultrasound, due to its routine use in antenatal care. However, the elective ultrasounds that are the focus of this research, also involve another culturally significant practice relating to pregnancy; consumption. I suggest that the culture of pregnancy (and motherhood, more broadly) is such, that consumerism and materiality are valued as the markers of good parenting (Clarke, 2004; Layne, 2004; Thomson et al, 2011). Seeking and paying for the services of an elective ultrasound clinic can signal to outsiders that a woman is appropriately excited about her pregnancy, and will be appropriately excited about, and prepared for her role as mother. Currently, little research exists that identifies pregnancy as a cultural practice, (see Rothman, 1989, as an example) except to draw attention to the different ways pregnancy is practiced in western and non-western

cultures. For instance, the heavy reliance on medical intervention into pregnancy in western countries is contrasted with the widespread practice of home birth and midwifery in non-western countries. This project contributes to the growing body of research through its examination of pregnancy as a cultural practice, one that is specifically influenced by neoliberalism and the privileging of consumption as a display of maternal identity.

Although I interviewed women about their experiences with the same practice, I heard very different accounts of how elective ultrasound was experienced by each woman. This speaks to the argument made by Amy Mullin, (2005) and others, (Ruddick, 1990; Rothman, 2000) that there is no one single experience of pregnancy. Every pregnancy is influenced by social, cultural, situational and bodily forces that are both temporal and relational. In other words, pregnancy is a common, yet highly individualized experience, with many contributing factors. As such, my research project was designed to locate individual experiences of pregnancy at particular times and places, while also creating space for common experiences to emerge, and tell us something about the broader implications of our collective understanding of pregnancy and motherhood. By focusing attention on the experience of elective ultrasound during pregnancy, I work to

contextualize the social and cultural meaning given to prenatal ultrasound and the images produced.

Also central to this project is that I view pregnancy as an active, rather than a passive process. Pregnancy is something a woman does, not simply something that happens to her. By viewing pregnancy as an active process, I acknowledge that the act of gestating a fetus is work. This work

is often undermined as a natural or instinctive process for women (Rich, 1977; O’Reilly, 2004). Amy Mullin makes the argument for pregnancy as an active process, which she refers to as “embodied labour” (2005: 49). For Mullin, this embodied labour takes two forms; physical and mental. A woman’s body is at work sustaining the fetus and supporting its growth, while her mind is at work adjusting to the changes in her lifestyle, her body, the way she sees herself, and the way others see and interact with her. Through her work on pregnancy and self-identity, Lucy Bailey notes that for many women she interviewed, “pregnancy was described as a ‘full-time’ job” (1999: 343). I approached my research with an understanding of, and respect for pregnancy as work, and I acknowledge that this belief had some effect on what I asked of my research participants, regardless of whether they shared this view of their own particular pregnancy as work. This is not to say that I disregard participants’ understandings of their own pregnancy; rather it is an acknowledgement that I approached this research not as an objective researcher, but as a subject with knowledge and beliefs that cannot be neatly separated from my work.

3.2.2

The Fetus

Another theoretical assumption I made, follows Barabra Duden’s assertion that “the human fetus, as conceptualized today” and revealed through the technology of ultrasound imaging, “is not a creature of God or a natural fact, but an engineered construct of modern society” (1993:4). This is not to suggest that neither God nor science plays a role in how we understand the fetus, but rather that the popular concept of the fetus as seen via ultrasound imaging is a discursive and visual production. The fetus comes into being through the social interactions that take place around the image. Contemporary understandings of the fetus and when it constitutes a life of its own are based on prevailing forms of knowledge such as medicine and technology, religion, and popular culture. The definitions of fetal personhood forwarded by these prevailing forms of knowledge work to decenter, or even undermine women’s embodied knowledge. Barbara Duden, among others, (Petchesky, 1987; Haraway, 1997; Taylor, 2008) described the fetal images produced by ultrasound technology as the “public fetus” (1993:51). Duden suggests,

“increasingly, the public image of the fetus shapes the emotional and the bodily perception of the pregnant woman” (1993:52). Both technically and figuratively, the fetus, as we know it today, is discursively produced. When the ultrasound technician describes the image on the screen, she is producing the fetus. When the pregnant woman shows and describes the image to friends and

family, she is producing the fetus. When friends and family comment on the image or issue projections about the future child, like which parent the child will take after, or the kinds of activities in which the child will be interested (for instance a fetus that moves around a lot in utero will become an active child) they too are producing the fetus. Each of these descriptions, or productions, is located in a particular temporal space and place that also influences how we understand the fetus. The fetal image that has become recognizable through its ubiquity in our social and cultural landscape, takes on particular meaning within the context of the ultrasound screening room. The image functions as a powerful indicator of fetal health and well-being: one that, as my research will show has become an important part of the experience of pregnancy for women in Canada.

3.2.3

Technology

The last set of assumptions I brought to this research was an understanding of technology as both productive and social. Particularly, the technology of ultrasound produces an image of the fetus, and implicates pregnant women (and their fetuses) in a specific set of social relations. This theoretical assumption is premised on the work of Dorothy Smith, (1987, 1989) particularly her discussion of the ways that “texts” produce meaning. I situate the ultrasound image as the central text which works to organize social relations between the pregnant women, her family, friends and the ultrasound technician performing the scan, as all of these interactions take place around the ultrasound image. The ultrasound procedure constitutes what Smith refers to as a “text-mediated social relation” (Campbell and Gregor, 2004:33) with the individuals in the room acting as participants in this text-mediated social relation. I follow Smith in understanding the text as an actor in social relations. However, I recognize that texts do not act independently; they require the mediation and explanation of a knowledgeable insider. Producing an image of the fetus is central to the advertising and promotion of elective ultrasound clinics and that, in a tangible sense, it is what brings clients in, what clients pay for, and also what clients take home to show and distribute among their family and friends. However, as my research will show, much more than the ultrasound image itself, it is a particular kind of experience that is being sold to pregnant women and their families. The warm and friendly atmosphere of elective ultrasound clinics, and the care and attention paid to pregnant women within the screening room, is

distinctly different from the medical ultrasound experience as articulated by participants in my study.

Drawing on Dorothy Smith’s (1989) work on text-mediated social relations, Campbell and Gregor assert that “objects become what they are to us by virtue of what we do with them and where and when and with whom they are used” (2004:28). The ultrasound image, by virtue of how it is shown, explained and taken up, makes it possible to view the fetus as a fully constituted social being. The historical and current privileging of visual representations, as discussed by Donna Haraway, (1997) gives this understanding authority over other interpretations of the image or experience. Smith suggests that texts must be activated by individuals involved in the social relation, either in the local or extra-local setting. Campbell and Gregor explain that Smith’s notion of activation “expresses the human involvement in the capacity of texts to coordinate action and get things done in specific ways” (2004:33). The text of the ultrasound image is activated by the ultrasonographer in her explanation of what (or who) the image shows. The text is activated in the local setting, and distributed extra-locally when it is given to the pregnant woman, and subsequently shown around to friends and family, displayed on fridges or work spaces, and/or posted online. In this way, the text “carr[ies] messages across sites,

coordinating someone’s actions here with someone else’s there” (Campbell and Gregor, 2004:33). The centrality of the text in this exchange in particular, is evidence of the ways that women’s embodied knowledge is undervalued or dismissed, in favor of text-mediated, visual and technological forms of knowledge. Campbell and Gregor assert that “an important shift in

knowing occurs when one moves from knowing first hand to knowing in text-mediated ways” (2004:36). For the purpose of this project, pregnant women are understood as knowing subjects, and their experiences act as the starting point to examine the way in which the text of the

ultrasound image, particularly the ultrasound images produced in elective settings, worked to organize their experiences of pregnancy.