This is an amazing collection of medical anthropoligical qualitative observational studies of pregnancy and birth in many cultures of the world. The caveat of exploration of the book is to critically compare how things got to be this way in our US technological/mechanical system of birthing, and to compare this to other cultural systems. The fallicy of the safety of hospital birth is examined as well as why physicians have (what I believe is) inappropriate status and power in decision making during pregnancy and birth. Researchers describe how culture and women themselves have contributed to their own relinquishment of control over their bodies for what is supposed to be a normal physiological event with the capacity for profound meaning in family life. This book is not for the faint of heart. It will challenge all of your assumptions about how we blindly enter the arena of physican dominated decision making in birth, letting those with technological knowledge hook us up to machines and gadgets, strip us of our clothing and identity, and then tell us how our bodies are functioning based on what machines and those with power say, not what women and families say. Data will prove how midwives can deliver safer (or safer) and sensitive care while respecting womens bodies and the status of her innate knowledge during labor and birth. I highly recommend this book to childbirth educators, midwives, OB nurses, obstetricians, and consumers who want to take back power and control over their pregnancy and birth experience. However, you will see that this cannot be easily done in a hospital setting, and almost impossible with a physician as the care provider. This may sound like I am bashing doctors - this cannot be further from the truth. However this book convinced me that the arena of birth belongs with those who believe in the physiology of normal birth and can spiritually as well as emotionally support women and families experiencing this momentous occasion. The place for doctors is best modeled after the European system of care - as specialists of abnormal pregnancy and birth. The book is written on the upper college to graduate level.
