READING THE BODY, WRITING THE BODY: WOMEN’S EXPERIENCES OF GIVING BIRTH SHARED ON THE INTERNET
Abstract
In my dissertation, I apply a reproductive justice framework to a discourse
analysis of twenty-three birth narratives from four websites. I argue that women share
their narratives of giving birth on the internet in order to find a virtual close-knit
community that they may find lacking in their physical lives; however, these
communities are complicated by the natural birth ideology that informs modern Western
conceptions of birth. Thus, I conclude that discourse communities of birth on the internet
may provide some form of connection for new mothers but are not as straightforwardly
supportive as they may at first appear.
Citation
Arnold, Lori D (2021). READING THE BODY, WRITING THE BODY: WOMEN’S EXPERIENCES OF GIVING BIRTH SHARED ON THE INTERNET. Doctoral dissertation, Texas A&M University. Available electronically from https : / /hdl .handle .net /1969 .1 /195832.