tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18629782856217939422024-02-19T07:34:06.448-05:00Barbara Katz Rothman"Birth is not only about making babies. Birth is about making mothers- strong, competent, capable mothers who trust themselves and know their inner strength." - Barbara Katz RothmanUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger58125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-60592060734938877062021-01-10T16:34:00.005-05:002021-01-10T17:03:37.515-05:00Biomedical Imperialism<p><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">For a long time I’ve been thinking about going beyond what my colleagues in sociology now routinely call ‘the biomedical industrial complex,’ and asking us to think of Biomedicine as an Imperial power, having not only enormous financial resources but also the almost-religious belief system and the governmental power of any empire. People ‘believe’ in aspects of medicine; and your citizenship, your personhood, depends on medical approval, from birth certificates through proof of competency, on to death certificates. I’m using this ‘covid moment’ to put these thoughts together in a new book, coming from Stanford Briefs in the spring. I am exploring the ways that Public Health seems to have morphed into ‘medicine for all,’ and the particular role of biomedical citizenship at ‘the gates of life,’ the management of both birth and death. </span></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-80139510418009858572021-01-09T11:22:00.000-05:002021-12-30T11:30:59.842-05:00Offline: How others see us<p> Surprisingly good review from the Editor in Chief of The Lancet. <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(21)02220-0/fulltext">Click here to read</a>.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-64957565327345982612021-01-08T15:12:00.000-05:002021-12-30T11:30:36.110-05:00The Page 99 Test does "The Biomedical Empire"<p>Fun feature on my new book, "<a href="https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=34171">The Biomedical Empire</a>."</p><p>Click <a href="https://page99test.blogspot.com/2021/07/barbara-katz-rothmans-biomedical-empire.html">here to read on The Page 99 Test blog</a>.</p><p>And a brief mention on the <a href="http://americareads.blogspot.com/2021/07/pg-99-barbara-katz-rothmans-biomedical.html">Campaign for the American Reader</a>.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-28780043548823706412018-12-30T11:24:00.007-05:002021-12-30T11:32:39.912-05:00The best books on the ever-more-timely topic of death and dying<p> A wonderful new website for books - here is my contribution. <a href="https://shepherd.com/best-books/death-and-dying">Click here to read.</a></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-39100833967046999472018-09-10T11:43:00.003-04:002021-01-10T16:41:20.895-05:00My Finnish Fulbright Fantasy<div><p class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; line-height: normal; margin: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">I was honored to be the recipient of the Fulbright-Saastamoinen Foundation Distinguished Chair in Health Sciences 2018-2019.<br /><br />This Fulbright, as a Distinguished Chair, differs from most -- it is for two separate month-long trips.<br /><br />The work I did there includes returning to a project I did in the Netherlands on a Fulbright over 20 years ago, interviewing prenatal care providers on their experience and understandings of how prenatal diagnosis affects pregnancy as a social and emotional experience. That work was published as SPOILING THE PREGNANCY (click to read </span><span lang="EN-US"><a href="https://drive.google.com/open?id=1iWORARkXUFJsWRkj7J8l7MwkKXGPEfT9" target="_blank"><span style="color: #57009b; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">here</span></a></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">) by the Dutch Midwifery Foundation. I am engaged in ongoing work with Finnish colleagues, particularly Johanna Sarlio-Nieminen and the Kone Foundation, looking at birth care and services in Finland.</span></p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-14303144548241381192018-09-09T11:48:00.004-04:002021-01-10T17:05:42.409-05:00Air rights and local politics<span face="Arial, sans-serif" lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 14.266666412353516px;">Not all of my writing is strictly sociology. I have been working with the Lower East Side “<a href="https://eastriverparkaction.org/" target="_blank">East River Park Action Organization</a>” </span><span face="Arial, sans-serif" lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 14.266666412353516px;">to save the park running alongside the East River, mostly right along a stretch of public housing, from being razed, from having 1000 trees destroyed, in an ill-advised plan for coastal resiliency.</span><span face="Arial, sans-serif" lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 14.266666412353516px;"> </span><br />
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Click <a href="https://www.boweryboogie.com/2018/06/whose-air-rights-is-seward-park-selling-op-ed/" target="_blank">here</a> to read my op-ed on air rights on <i>Bowery Boogie</i>. (Alternate link <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1qO1UDWFYnRRgXLnQpF9sIG2SgKvaJEAO/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">here</a>).<div><br /></div><div>My <i>Bowery Boogie</i> op-ed on trees can be read <a href="https://www.boweryboogie.com/2020/08/ode-to-the-doomed-trees-of-east-river-park-op-ed/" target="_blank">here</a>, and another on the East River Park Resiliency Project is <a href="https://www.boweryboogie.com/2020/06/does-anyone-actually-believe-the-east-river-park-resiliency-project-will-only-last-5-years-op-ed/" target="_blank">here</a>.</div><div><br /></div><div><u>Update</u>: An article in The Village Sun about racist rezoning in NY <a href="https://thevillagesun.com/stop-racist-rezonings-cry-community-groups-from-across-the-city?fbclid=IwAR2R65UcrX0yM4sUjRLhomZGRimfrrJsKjImB01G7HDiO8YJ7CjRV6vwm8A">here</a>.<br />
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Click <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1HZfYx-ejJfO8cs9AEZHcrKYnDfj5VoGM/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">here to read</a>.<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-49597021435388747872017-05-08T22:54:00.003-04:002017-06-08T10:27:02.793-04:00Just what was missing! Artificial wombs!<a href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.npr.org_sections_health-2Dshots_2017_04_25_525044286_scientists-2Dcreate-2Dartificial-2Dwomb-2Dthat-2Dcould-2Dhelp-2Dprematurely-2Dborn-2Dbabies&d=DwIFAg&c=8v77JlHZOYsReeOxyYXDU39VUUzHxyfBUh7fw_ZfBDA&r=FAlx5TTVAtUm7Ew7dPuiqiCl_f-qo7R17SPGizL6ZcQ&m=LHiKsBDtkucIIqtmjKZMasmgW4euUomdnV3crfSBqho&s=msfp0uIDPRvbmr6mVXfogVTnllsHI-eN_omD1uBZ4Uw&e=" target="_blank">Click here</a> to read on NPR...Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-68669451588229180172017-05-08T22:53:00.001-04:002017-06-08T10:25:45.447-04:00Comments on the endless seemingly hopeless fight for parental leave in the United States<a href="https://wallethub.com/edu/best-states-for-working-moms/3565/#barbara-katz-rothman" target="_blank">Click here</a> to read...<br />
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<u>Update</u>: <a href="http://www.gc.cuny.edu/News/All-News/Detail?id=40518" target="_blank">Click here</a> for a brief Q&A with The Graduate Center, CUNY.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-23176885796733440912017-03-20T10:54:00.001-04:002017-03-20T11:01:50.380-04:00The Cost of Medicalized Contraception: Now More than Ever<span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; font-size: 16px;">As we face the Trumpocalypse, I keep thinking of what Pauline Bart used to say: "They can't legislate away skills." We are fighting awful legislation on all fronts. Here's my response to one issue, the defunding of contraception services. I know we have to do this fight -- but I'd so much rather move contraception, and abortion, out of medical control. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; font-size: 16px;"><a href="https://www.fromthesquare.org/medicalized-contraception/#.WM_tHfnyvIV" target="_blank">Click here to read</a> my full post on the NYU Press blog.</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-9709390837357632192016-11-22T18:33:00.001-05:002016-11-22T18:33:14.355-05:00A Cynic MournsCurrent thoughts, posted on the NYU Press Blog. Click <a href="http://www.fromthesquare.org/a-cynic-mourns/#.WDTVovkrLIV" target="_blank">here to read</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-6729177694775438532016-11-21T15:32:00.000-05:002016-11-28T15:34:59.678-05:00Blog Post for "Books Combined"<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "arial";">Academics have to do a lot of writing. And I do, I like writing, I even teach a 'writing for publication' seminar for sociology doctoral students. But all the articles, the reviews, the chapters, they all fade for me compared to the books. The blog "Books Combined" asked me to write about some book that inspired or moved me.... and instead I wrote about a book memorial. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "arial";">You can <a href="https://bookscombined.com/2016/11/28/my-german-books/#more-3252" target="_blank">read the post here</a>.</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-48597674718575375122016-10-22T23:28:00.000-04:002017-10-22T23:35:05.975-04:00Contemporary Sociology Review & ResponseContemporary Sociology is my own communities journal, and this review there, of all places, rather hurt. The reviewer didn't 'get' what I was doing, but more disturbing than that, put the words of my informants into my mouth. That smarts. So here's the review, and my response.<br />
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Contemporary Sociology <a href="https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B5cvFH0n3yAuSjlnaXZ1eVFKMUE" target="_blank">review</a> and <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5cvFH0n3yAueE9PWUI3bmsxMmM/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">my response</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-8319072662901356422016-09-09T21:05:00.000-04:002017-10-22T23:21:25.361-04:00BUN ReviewsUpdated October 2017 -<br />
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<u><i>Journal of American Culture, Book Review, Summer 2017</i></u><br />
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The Journal of American Culture review can be <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5cvFH0n3yAuUFBBaVFPUFBJdWc/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">read here</a>.<br />
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<u><i>North American Dialogue, Book Review, Summer 2017</i></u><br />
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The North American Dialogue review can be <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5cvFH0n3yAuMWNNdl9Vb2Y4eVU/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">read here</a>.<br />
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<i><u>The Cresset, "An Order for Delivery," Summer 2017</u></i><br />
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The Cresset review can be <a href="http://thecresset.org/2017/Trinity/Howard_T17.html" target="_blank">read here</a>.<br />
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<u><i>Patheos, "Birth and Eating as Resistance Movements",</i> Jan 30, 2017</u><br />
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The Patheos review can be <a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/anxiousbench/2017/01/birth-eating-resistance-movements/" target="_blank">read here</a>.<br />
(Update: A longer version can be read in <i>The Cresset</i> link above)<br />
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<u><i>Feminist Collections, "Ovens & Ovaries: Reclaiming Food & Birth in a Capitalist Society",</i> Fall 2016</u><br />
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The Feminist Collections review can be <a href="https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B5cvFH0n3yAuelZib04zNWpDLTQ" target="_blank">read here</a>.<br />
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<u><i>Times Literary Supplement</i>, Sept 9, 2016:</u><br />
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This review does make me want to read the Ramaswamy book, and oh, what an interesting idea, maybe I should write a book about birth...<br />
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TLS review can be <a href="https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B5cvFH0n3yAuZzNWUXdEVlpwU1E" target="_blank">read here</a>.<br />
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<u><i>Huffington Post</i>, August 29, 2016:</u><br />
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A review of BUN by Fabio Parasecoli, Associate professor and director of Food Studies Initiatives, New School - NY can be <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/fabio-parasecoli/buns-in-the-oven-the-poli_b_11758216.html" target="_blank">read here</a>.<br />
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<u><i>PsycCRITIQUES, American Psychological Association,</i> July 11, 2016</u><br />
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The PsycCRITIQUES review can be <a href="https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B5cvFH0n3yAuYUhsNV9DN2JHUWc" target="_blank">read here</a>.<br />
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<u><i>Times Higher Education,</i> July 4, 2016</u><br />
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"A sociologist in the world of midwifery is introduced to food studies, and spots parallels everywhere with the world of birth. Her wittily named study ranges insightfully from Julia Child to natural childbirth, and from Lamaze and Pavlov to labour times, Cesareans and kale chips as she considers how 'birth and food, once so profoundly part of women's world of production, ultimately came to be acts of consumption,.. framed inside a big machine, an industrialized, medicalized, and capitalist system'".<br />
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(Can be <a href="https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B5cvFH0n3yAudWN6eGlHTk16ODA" target="_blank">read here</a>)<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-65626366415041695902016-06-22T08:36:00.002-04:002016-06-22T08:36:52.858-04:00Food, Birth, and the Future"The Future We Want: Global Sociology and the Struggle for a Better World" is a web forum intended to orient the broader debate for July's ISA forum in Vienna. They asked me to write about my ideas about the future, and I wrote about Food, Birth, and the Future.<br />
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Please <a href="http://futureswewant.net/barbara-katz-rothman-birth/" target="_blank">click here</a> for more.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-81170102180480700782016-04-12T18:03:00.000-04:002018-09-10T11:36:40.165-04:00Latest Book is Out! A BUN IN THE OVEN<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWXmWC_Os5vhzK0YHR1EEtbzhCupvbT8dyoyVyuuBj8DPKWwWcuErOq-1NI68hf44qu5NI5m4_0_xqjU0Xno0NKeenCnrsotPP_Yzo1zY4VU0UoByqsaBltwyTng2zTeSuoeU1MIEg_ZAW/s1600/Bun+in+the+Oven+-+Barbara+Katz+Rothman.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWXmWC_Os5vhzK0YHR1EEtbzhCupvbT8dyoyVyuuBj8DPKWwWcuErOq-1NI68hf44qu5NI5m4_0_xqjU0Xno0NKeenCnrsotPP_Yzo1zY4VU0UoByqsaBltwyTng2zTeSuoeU1MIEg_ZAW/s1600/Bun+in+the+Oven+-+Barbara+Katz+Rothman.jpg" /></a></div>
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For more information on BUN, click <a href="http://nyupress.org/books/9781479882304/" target="_blank">here</a>.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-42276077209565495932016-04-12T18:00:00.000-04:002017-03-21T13:54:45.234-04:00BUN Buzz<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVhSmLTdGmv5UVUQVrt8eW0WmPzZU3xu-pjyubapH1zAf4L8zMorgVi83z_G8xZb0DLyA3heMo5G4WoBR8nnzJTeXHZshOuMgEh2N8HTut2Wau2Vh_B0XnpeTOK-lxdDPHe6h4CO_bT3lN/s1600/Bitch+Media.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVhSmLTdGmv5UVUQVrt8eW0WmPzZU3xu-pjyubapH1zAf4L8zMorgVi83z_G8xZb0DLyA3heMo5G4WoBR8nnzJTeXHZshOuMgEh2N8HTut2Wau2Vh_B0XnpeTOK-lxdDPHe6h4CO_bT3lN/s320/Bitch+Media.png" width="205" /></a></div>
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Thanks to <a href="https://www.instagram.com/bitchmedia/" target="_blank">Bitch Media</a> for <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/BCQRdBhqm5B/" target="_blank">featuring</a> A BUN IN THE OVEN on their Instagram page -- and calling it delectable!<br />
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Also to Times Higher Education in the UK for calling BUN a <a href="https://www.timeshighereducation.com/books/reviews-new-and-noteworthy-7-april-2016" target="_blank">must-read</a> --</div>
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<em><b>A Bun in the Oven: How the Food and Birth Movements Resist Industrialization Barbara Katz Rothman New York University Press</b> </em><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica"; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica"; font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica"; font-size: small;"><em>A sociologist in the world of midwifery is introduced to food studies, and spots parallels everywhere with the world of birth. Her wittily named study ranges insightfully from Julia Child to natural childbirth, and from Lamaze and Pavlov to labour times, Cesareans and kale chips as she considers how "birth and food, once so profoundly part of women’s world of production, ultimately came to be acts of consumption…framed inside a big machine, an industrialized, medicalized, and capitalist system".</em></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica"; font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica"; font-size: small;"><em><br /></em></span></span>...thanks also to Dr. Rixa Freeze of <i>Stand and Deliver</i> blog, for the <a href="http://rixarixa.blogspot.ca/2016/02/a-bun-in-oven-connecting-food-and-birth.html" target="_blank">mention</a>!<br />
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<b><u>Radio Interview, WNPR, May 23, 2016</u></b><br />
<b><br /></b><a href="https://soundcloud.com/wnpr/food-and-birth-movements-and-the-resistance-to-industrialization" target="_blank">Click here</a> to listen to a WNPR interview with Barbara about BUN, if you'd like.<br />
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(The link above takes you directly to Barbara's interview - the whole program can be found <a href="http://wnpr.org/post/should-connecticut-mandate-paid-family-and-medical-leave#stream/0" target="_blank">here</a>, with the BUN portion starting at 26.50 min mark)<br />
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<b><u>Radio Interview, Whole Mother, March 19, 2017</u></b><br />
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And another radio interview on BUN, this time with Patricia Jones of "Whole Mother." You have to click on my name to hear interview. <a href="http://wholemothershow.com/2017/03/19/food-studies-with-barbara-katz-rothman-phd/" target="_blank">Click here to listen</a>.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-31428469070878783742016-04-12T17:33:00.000-04:002016-04-12T19:41:44.247-04:00Women, Birth, Food<div>
<span style="font-family: "arial";">New York University Press, the publishers of BUN IN THE OVEN, asked me to write something in honor of Women's History Month --</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "calibri";">Women’s History – Rethinking Birth and Food. <u></u> <u></u><u></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "calibri";">It’s Women’s History Month! Let’s celebrate! Honor the first woman tenured at Harvard! First woman to win the Nobel prize! First woman astronaut! First woman whose art hangs in MOMA! First woman surgeon! First woman subway car driver! First woman chef! First woman architect! First woman Obstetrician! First woman….<u></u><u></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "calibri";">Or wait a sec. Are we celebrating the first woman to DO something, or the first woman to be recognized and acknowledged for doing it? There surely were women artists before MOMA cared, women designing their homes, writing books, making dinner, catching babies… And wait another sec here – how did so many things that women do, across time and space, like catching babies and making dinner, get turned into award-winning accomplishments when men did them, and quiet back-room work when women do them?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "calibri";"><b>Click </b><a href="http://www.fromthesquare.org/?p=8023#.Vw1p34-cHmJ" target="_blank"><b>here</b></a><b> to see more.</b></span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-60133272716668603152016-04-12T16:38:00.000-04:002016-04-12T19:38:25.549-04:00PRN Radio ShowBhavani Jaroff runs <i>I Eat Green</i>, a website and a personal chef service, and a show for the Progressive Radio Network. She interviewed me about A BUN IN THE OVEN -- you can listen to the show <a href="http://www.ieatgreen.com/ieat-greens-interview-with-dr-barbara-katz-rothman-author-of-a-bun-in-the-oven-on-the-progressive-radio-network/" target="_blank">here</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-72198120425818570462015-07-05T10:59:00.000-04:002016-04-12T17:04:45.322-04:00The Eastern Sociological Society<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: "calibri";">This year I was the president of the ESS,
and set the theme for our annual meeting as</span></span><span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: "calibri";"><br /></span></span><br />
<div style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt;">
<b><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt;">My Day Job: Politics and Pedagogy in Academia</span></b></div>
<br />
<div style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 36.0pt; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 0cm; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt;">For most of us, what we present at meetings
like the ESS is our art, our life, our valued work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And what we do to pay the mortgage, put shoes
on the kids, get the money to go to meetings like this, is teach.</span></i><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt;"> </span></i></div>
<br />
<div style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 36.0pt; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 0cm; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt;">Some of us -- more and more of us -- are doing
our teaching as piece work, course by course, and as in pre-union days, without
any 'benefits.'<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As courses move online,
for some that work --like old style garment industry piecework -- is done in
our homes, one corner of our living space used for production, providing our
own supplies, laptops now rather than sewing machines. For others, luckier,
teaching is done as a full time job with full benefits, from a solid college or
university base, whether on-line, in person or both, doing our 10 community
college courses a year, or our 6 or so undergraduate courses, or even just a
lovely one or two doctoral courses, or whatever mix we've worked out for
ourselves.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But that teaching, our day
job, most often slips under the radar when we meet as professional
sociologists. </span></i></div>
<br />
<div style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt 36pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt;">At this meeting, we can and will talk about
our interesting publications and our grant-funded research and all of that --
but let us also talk about our day jobs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>While papers will be welcomed in all areas of sociology, and
mini-conferences will address a range of issues and concerns, the theme of the
conference will be our day jobs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What is
happening to universities and colleges as America becomes ever-increasingly
corporatized and privatized, as more and more of all work is outsourced, as
students and their families become 'customers' and faculty are responsible for
'product'?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How are we managing, coping,
and rising above all that?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How do we
remain dedicated to our craft of teaching, our vocation of transmitting our
sociological imagination?</span></i></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt;"><br /></span>
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt;">The meeting was a success, thanks to the hard
work of the program committee, headed by Vilna Treitler and the wonderful ESS
headquarters team headed by Emily Mahon.</span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt;">Attendance was good, about as good as it has
ever been in Boston I’m told, and the panels on the theme were thoughtful,
well-attended and addressed the issue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I’ll be working on turning my Presidential Address into an article for
our journal, SOCIOLOGICAL FORUM.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thanks
for all who came and worked on this!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt;">
<br /></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-15123372917507364142015-07-02T10:58:00.000-04:002015-11-13T12:12:28.877-05:00On Surrogacy<div class="MsoNormal">
The idea that a pregnant woman is not the mother of the baby
in her belly infuriates me, and frightens me with its implications.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So when I saw Jeffrey Kirby's article
"Transnational Gestational Surrogacy: Does it Have to be
Exploitative?" scheduled for publication in the American Journal of
Bioethics, I just had to respond.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was
published with the title "The Legacy of Patriarchy as Context for
Surrogacy: or Why are we quibbling over this?" in AJOB, April 2014, Vol.
14, #5,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>as one of their 'open peer
review commentaries.'<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><br />
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span>
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">You can access a copy of the article <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5cvFH0n3yAudTVBU1JocHdYRTA/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">here.</a></span><br />
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span>
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">The other recent piece I have done on surrogacy is another <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5cvFH0n3yAuUnpaUlVCUDBOTTQ/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">book review</a>. I reviewed Amrita Pande's WOMBS IN LABOR: TRANSNATIONAL COMMERCIAL SURROGACY IN INDIA. You can look at this one, and the older one on Teman's book listed below.</span><br />
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span>
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">And if you really want a good, insightful, and deeply (and appropriately!) critical look at Indian surrogacy, see the just published DISCOUNTED LIFE: THE PRICE OF GLOBAL SURROGACY IN INDIA, just out from NYU press.</span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-6144224162454826502015-07-01T11:51:00.000-04:002015-11-13T12:01:05.576-05:00Thoughts on the state of SociologyI've done two reviews for CONTEMPORARY SOCIOLOGY, the journal of book reviews published by the American Sociological Association, that seem to go together. They are both reviews of memoir-like compilations of work by two major senior figures in Sociology. It is rather odd, at this stage of things, to be the younger person reviewing the more senior, looking back at a life and a career. One of these was very hard to do: Peter Berger was one of the sociologists whose work shaped me, made me understand the world or maybe more accurately reflected back at me the way I was understanding the world and made that legitimate. Neil Smelser was more of a 'background' figure for me, someone whose work is clearly important in shaping Sociology, but not in shaping my sociology. All in all, reading these books has reinforced my decision never <i>ever</i> to write a memoir!<br />
<br />
The Berger review can be found <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5cvFH0n3yAuUmpLS1JDX1d6UWc/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">here</a>, and the Smelser review <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5cvFH0n3yAuVjJ0OWtwUDF6SUE/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">here</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-8957216847232487572015-06-29T11:33:00.000-04:002015-11-13T12:27:03.536-05:00Panel Discussion on Tightrope: A Racial Journey<span style="font-family: inherit;">Gail Garfield was one of my 'progeny,' a dissertation I was very
pleased to have chaired many years back. Her most recent book is
TIGHTROPE: A RACIAL JOURNEY TO THE AGE OF OBAMA. More than autobiography,
it's a fine example of 'autoethnography,' of applying the sociological
imagination to one's own life. She's my colleague at CUNY now, at John Jay
College and they invited
me to participate in a panel to celebrate the publication of the book.
I'm just a ten minute bit of this one hour panel, but listening to this may
well make you run out and read the book! So it's well worth posting
for that.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Click <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0jIv52WyGi8&feature=youtu.be">here</a> to watch the video.</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-73127483655420244112015-06-28T11:25:00.000-04:002015-07-07T11:37:04.763-04:00Decision Traps and Haunting Images: Still thinking about Prenatal Testing It’s coming up on thirty years since I published THE TENTATIVE PREGNANCY. The technology’s changed in some ways. Information comes earlier. And it’s routinized. What used to be a problem facing relatively few pregnant women -- those who were over 35 or so, those who had a family history of a genetic disorder of some sort -- is now a problem facing every pregnancy in America. Or so it would be if people faced the problem. <br />
<br />
Prenatal screening for conditions which have no solution but abortion is routine. And routinely unacknowledged. People do an ultrasound scan for the joy of ‘seeing the baby.’ But the ultrasounds weren’t introduced for fun, aren’t paid for by insurance companies for fun, aren’t done as routine medical care for fun. Ultrasound, along with maternal blood tests, are being done to diagnose conditions in the fetus, and those conditions are not treatable.<br />
<br />
Abortions following prenatal testing are nothing like abortions to get ‘unpregnant,’ abortions to just return oneself to normal after an accidental, unplanned and unwanted pregnancy. These abortions, abortions because this particular fetus should not become one’s baby, are experienced very differently. In THE TENTATIVE PREGNANCY I showed how painful this was for the women involved, women who were told how lucky they were to have choices, but often experienced themselves as horrifically trapped.<br />
<br />
Two new books cast interesting light on all this from two very different countries. Germany recognizes the eugenic underpinnings of all prenatal screening. While Americans assure me that this has nothing to do with eugenics, it’s just about having healthy babies, Germans have been forced by their history to recognize that having healthy babies, or being ‘well born,’ is what eugenics means. Silja Samerski did a book on the <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5cvFH0n3yAuSnlLU0diTVZ1LUk/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">DECISION TRAPS</a> that people are facing when they have genetic testing. She asked me to write a <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5cvFH0n3yAuOE9veC1udXdPc2c/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">preface</a>, and it’s available below.<br />
<br />
Tine M. Gammeltoft, wrote HAUNTING IMAGES: A CULTURAL ACCOUNT OF SELECTIVE REPRODUCTION IN VIETNAM, and my <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5cvFH0n3yAueTh4ZWsxZDM2aWc/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">review</a> of that book is also available below. The Vietnamese are in an interesting position because while Americans and Germans too can see ‘fetal defects’ as acts of god, of random cruelty in the world, the Vietnamese see them as war crimes, the ongoing consequences of Agent Orange, and it shapes their discussion. <br />
<br />
Context shapes everything of course. But pregnancy is also a context: the nature of pregnancy as an intimate social relationship shapes women’s experiences of prenatal testing and selective abortion that Americans, caught in an absurdly fraught discussion of abortion, cannot afford to see. Until the trap is sprung. <br />
<br />
If you missed the link to my preface in DECISION TRAPS, click <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5cvFH0n3yAuOE9veC1udXdPc2c/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">here</a>.<br />
To access my review of HAUNTING IMAGES, click <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5cvFH0n3yAueTh4ZWsxZDM2aWc/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">here</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1862978285621793942.post-11689549129132361322014-05-11T00:08:00.001-04:002014-05-11T00:10:18.977-04:00And Yet More on RiskThe Virtual International Day of the Midwife is this wonderful concept in which midwives and interested hangers-on all over the world can join together electronically. For 24 hours speaker after speaker presents work, takes comments and questions and thoughts on a live chat, and a world of midwifery is united. I was invited to present my work on "Risk" and the presentation was recorded. I encourage you to look through the program, see which presentations are of interest.<br />
<br />
To go to the general home page, click <a href="http://vidm.wikispaces.com/Virtual+International+Day+of+the+Midwife+2014">here.</a><br />
To see my presentation, click <a href="https://webinar.nordu.net/p55dyvwn6ua/?launcher=false&fcsContent=true&pbMode=normal">here.</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com