Persisting lay midwifery in the twentieth century American South is generally attributed to insufficient medical alternatives or to lingering folk practices. This study examines state-sanctioned lay midwifery in the South, using Florida as a case study. The study finds that persisting "official" Southern lay midwifery is best understood as state policy and practice molded by a unique way of life and the complex relations of race and class in which it was grounded. Initial state recognition of the black "granny" owed much to a pragmatic national biopolitical project to improve the conditions of rural mothers and infants through state management of birth attendance. Between the wars the state made "official" lay practice a part of a public health program to normalize the state's agricultural working classes. Incorporation of the lay practice into public health does not, however, account for continuation of the state-sanctioned practice into the 1970s, after the association between midwife attendance and relevant economic and social variables disappeared. The study finds that "official" lay midwifery continued after the 1920s because the policy and practice "fit" into a way of life and a welfare system that dovetailed with the South's culture of paternalism. The racial state sustained lay midwifery by adopting unique licensure and supervisory techniques. Public health officials maintained the shrinking practice by relicensing some who no longer met official standards and by training a declining number of younger black women to serve in areas where lay attendance was "needed." "Official" lay midwifery in the South persisted for almost half a century because it was state policy and practice articulating with historically specific and slowly changing relations of class and race. Relations of race, class, and state policy were woven into the cultural fabric of the / region. Each was supported by the culture of paternalism; all were institutionalized within community roles and practices. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 51-09, Section: A, page: 3243. / Major Professor: Bruce Bellingham. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1990.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_78302 |
| Contributors | Mathis, Mary Pugh., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 155 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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