Rediscovering Birth

by Sheila Kitzinger

• ISBN13: 9780743412735
• ISBN10: 0743412737
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2001-04-03
• Publisher: Atria

Summary

Bestselling author Sheila Kitzinger, the world's foremost birth educator and activist, explores the universal experience of pregnancy and childbirth in this splendid new book, beautifully illustrated with hundreds of photographs. With an intimate, informative style that both enlightens and engages her readers, Kitzinger looks closely at feeling and emotions in pregnancy, the physical and spiritual experience of giving birth, and the bonds that are traditionally formed between mothers and midwives. She chronicles ideas and mythologies about birth, as well as pregnancy traditions, from a magnificent array of cultures past and present -- and, with breathtaking perception and insight, explores how can we learn from them. And she focuses on the need today for vital and human connections in the birthing process, when medical procedures can overshadow the fundamental humanity of giving birth. In Rediscovering Birth, Sheila Kitzinger enables women and their partners to make informed choices about how they want to live through their own unique experiences of birth and parenthood.

Author Biography

Sheila Kitzinger is known and respected worldwide as a social anthropologist of birth and leading authority on women's experiences of pregnancy and motherhood. She is the author of twenty-three books and has been published in twenty languages. Her books include the groundbreaking The Experience of Childbirth and the classic bestseller Pregnancy and Childbirth. For more information on Sheila Kitzinger and her work, visit her Web site at www.sheilakitzinger.com.

Table of Contents

Preface	6	(2)
Introduction Searching Questions About Birth	8	(6)
A Small Miracle	14	(24)
The Journey to Birth	38	(28)
Birth and Spirit	66	(30)
The God-Sibs: Woman-to-Woman Help	96	(32)
Midwives	128	(38)
The Birth Dance	166	(32)
Birth and Touch	198	(24)
Sanctuary and Renewal	222	(22)
Can We Learn Anything From Other Cultures?	244	(7)
Notes	251	(4)
Index	255