Fluid Portrayals of the Embryo: A Look at Women's Medical Guides
Buettner, Kimberly
School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University
Mentor: Maienschein, Jane; School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University
From advice from midwives to clinical prescriptions from physicians, women have received information about pregnancy and family planning for centuries. This research examines how the information provided to women about child bearing has changed. A literature review and analysis was conducted of domestic and women’s medical guides from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Preliminary analysis suggests that there has been a change in the amount of information available and in the language used to describe embryo and fetal development, contraceptives, and abortion. In the health guides from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, there is a large amount of information about embryo and fetal development, with discussions of sex determination and the effects of maternal states as well as diagrams of the different stages of human development. There is a condemnation of abortion and contraceptives throughout the medical guides studied from this time period. However, in a study of different editions of the popular women’s health book from the late twentieth century, Our Bodies, Ourselves, there are distinct differences in the information about pregnancy and family planning. In these health guides, no information is presented about embryo or fetal development, although there is a recommendation of other books that contain this information. However, there is extensive information about contraceptives and abortion throughout each edition. These differences may be attributed to changing social atmospheres. By utilizing the multidisciplinary research approach of The Embryo Project, the political, religious, public, and legal influences on information distribution can be further analyzed.