Chapter 'Thirty years behind England'? Framing 'natural' childbirth in postwar Canada

Abstract

Following the North American publication of British obstetrician Grantly Dick-Read’s Childbirth Without Fear in 1944, natural childbirth theories reached new audiences, including Canadians who were interested in what they perceived as a ‘new’ way to give birth. In newspaper columns and popular titles including Chatelaine, Canadian women and experts alike discussed their perceptions of and engagement with natural childbirth ideas. In so doing, Canadian mothers and mothers-to-be articulated a range of attitudes surrounding women’s bodies and postwar gender roles. Canadian women, like their global counterparts, conceptualised their pregnancies and childbirths in various ways, demonstrating myriad understandings of what exactly constituted a ‘natural’ birth. Many women, however, regularly drew on international comparisons to position individual experiences of pregnancy, childbirth, and motherhood as ‘modern’ or ‘antiquated’. While some women continued to pathologise both pregnancy and childbirth and emphasise the need for continuous medical surveillance, others sought to position these life events as ordinary, everyday, and routine, requiring little in the way of medical intervention. Personal histories, geographic location, class, and race shaped individual perceptions of pregnancy and childbirth, fundamentally mediating Canadian women’s broader experiences of health and wellbeing.