Farsi madri. L'accompagnamento alla nascita in una prospettiva interculturale

Abstract

Considering human reproduction as a bio-social phenomenon, in which the universal physiology of birth gives way to particular cultural modes, we examined some social procedures that drive pregnant women into motherhood. Far from being a petty moment of lingering, expectancy features specific relationships, ideas and activities that allow every woman to become a mother, according to precise standards collectively ascertained. The social construction of motherhood is a process taking place both in private and public sites and may be especially detected in birth care settings: family planning centers, maternity hospitals, independent associations and self-help groups.
The empirical research was carried out during 2008 in the district of Bergamo: a north-eastern Italian area marked with rising immigration, a deep-seated Catholic legacy and a recent ethnonationalist political surge. Comparing the data constructed through i. participant observation in three different prenatal courses, ii. twenty semi-structured interviews with mothers and health staff and iii. textual analysis of childbirth education records, I portrayed a dynamic picture of the local reproductive culture. Assets and setbacks of my ethnographic research are mainly due to my being a second-time pregnant woman while conducting the survey.
Analyzing women’s ritual transition into motherhood, not only ideas on mothering turned out to be plural and dissonant, although always entailing a perception of parental duty, but the personal experiences of pregnant women have shown great variance.
Growing attendance of immigrant women in birth centers gave us the chance to face other ways of managing childbirth, to access different midwifery skills, sometimes allowing both native women and health professionals to acknowledge the partiality of their own perspectives. Through the interactions observed and the narratives collected, we tried to explain how migrants place their social difference within health-care systems, between episodes of marginalization and attempts to foster community solidarity.
Not only migrants’ reproductive practices are cultural hybrids, where ethno-obstetrics compete with western clinical care, but the overall birth knowledge in our chosen area proved fluid and diverse. Even though couples resort to medicine as an authoritative tool to prevent clinical risk, the meaning of biotechnology usage is not clear-cut, but closely dependent on social actors and situations. Literally pregnant with meaning, women seem to embody culture. In particular, the mother-fetus linkage, largely shaped with ultrasound imagery, indicates how personal identities proceed through social structuring. Since each pregnancy is at once lived and represented in intersubjective spaces, uneven reproductive experiences hinge on the social and symbolic capital held by women. Yet, lay and even formal birth courses may accommodate intercultural dialogue and empower mothers in dealing with set maternal scripts.
In the wake of the anthropology of reproduction and according to some feminist debates, pregnant women bodies are seen not only as an object of social control, but also as a source of knowledge and action. The experience of motherhood finally reveals itself not so much a receptive institution of care and education, but instead an active social performance demandingly negotiated.

Keywords: motherhood, embodiment, childbirth education, ethno-obstetrics, medicalization