Recreating Motherhood

Rereading Recreating Motherhood should be high up on the agenda of everyone interested in women's health. (Women & Health) Written with force, grace and great humanity. Barbara Katz Rothman's disciplined, informed, passionately careful thinking on gender and genetics makes Recreating Motherhood a sound, wise guide both to the politics of motherhood and to private moral decision-making. This is an invaluable book. (Ursula K. Le Guin) This wonderful and classic feminist text has been beautifully revised for the new millennium. Rothman's incisive analysis of the culture of motherhood is a must read for scholars, activists, policy makers, students, parents, parents-to-beùfor anyone interested in procreative and family issues. I rarely say so about sociological writing: you won't be able to put it down! - Wendy Simonds (author of Abortion at Work: Ideology and Practice in a Feminist Clinic) A lively, sensible work, connecting different aspects of women's reproductive freedom, exploring the various assaults against those freedoms, and positing feminist alternatives in a hopeful and practical manner. - Robin Morgan (author of Word of a Woman: Feminist Dispatches) Who counts as a parent? The egg donor? The sperm donor? The contractor? The surrogate mother? When can human beings in the activity of reproduction be required to ætreat' their fetuses according to legal standards? And who should set those standards? Recreating Motherhood offers a coherent feminist approach to these issues . . . A learned, tolerant, yet forceful analysis. - New York Times Book Review (which also selected Recreating Motherhood as one of its 1989 "Notable Books" and) Powerful and heartfelt book . . . eloquent in defending the dignity of motherhood and in showing how it has become devalued. (Los Angeles Times) Brilliant, compassionate, and feminist analysis of surrogacy that finally puts the volatile subject into perspective. (Chicago Tribune) A fine exploration of the issues that the new technologies present. More than that, it provides a humane, coherent, and feminist way of viewing all our concerns about birth, adoption, infertility, and abortion. . . . Rothman is clear without being too polemical or angry, and she is always focused on the human experience of nursing, caring, and kinship. (Ms.) This is a powerful, compassionate analysis . . . Rothman brilliant interweaves personal narrative with documentary evidence to create an important, perhaps vital book. (Booklist) Readers may quarrel with some of the author's convictions but they will agree with her argument that it's past time for women to restore motherhood to its proper status. (Publishers Weekly) A thoughtful, well-written analysis of contemporary issues for a wide audience. (Library Journal) A significant addition to the growing literature on the sociology of gender and technology. (Choice) This book should be read to update attitudes on motherhood. It is forcefully written with convincing honesty. (West Coast Review of Books) A perceptive analysis of how technology, capitalism, and patriarchy function in society to undermine the dignity of women, especially of mothers. (Commonweal) Engrossing and clearly written. . . . should be required reading for all students of women's studies. (Journal of Nurse-Midwifery) A riveting and well written book. It is must reading for people concerned with how all these advances are affecting human relations and the future role of motherhood. (Women's Studies International Forum) Once in a long while a book comes along that I've been waiting for, even though I hadn't known it. Barbara K. Rothman's Recreating Motherhood is such a book. Here, at last, is a discussion of today's troublesome reproductive issues that is scholarly, theoretically exciting, but also compassionate. . . . Rothman's cultural analysis helps me understand why women are in conflict, and why feminists are divided against one another over these matters. . . . a very important book. (New Directions for Women)

• Preface and Acknowledgments to the 2000 EditionAcknowledgments to the First EditionPart IIntroductionOn FamilyMothering in AmericaThree IdeologiesMotherhood under PatriarchyThe Seeds of WomenThe Genetic TiePatriarchal Ideology and New Procreative TechnologyMotherhood in a Technological SocietyThe Mechanical MotherTechnological Society and Liberal PhilosophyMotherhood under CapitalismThe Owned BodyA Child of One's OwnPart IIIntroductionAn Alternative VisionPregnancy as a RelationshipThe Physical RelationshipThe Social RelationshipRedefining AbortionThe History of AbortionConstructing the FetusThe Medicalization of AbortionReconstructing AbortionThe Give and Take of AdoptionSolving Problems with ProblemsOrphans Real and ImaginaryInfertilityInfertility as DisabilityMedicalizing MotherhoodFetal PowerMidwifery as Feminist PraxisWill the Circle Be Unbroken?Baby Doe: The Relationship ContinuesIn Defense of Mothers: A RebuttalChild CareThe Managerial MotherMotherworkerMid-revolutionary MoresFatherhoodWhat the Problem Is NotThe Capacity to NurtureFathering as a RelationshipOn ``Surrogacy''A Question of PolicyA Question of ValuesReflections on a DecadeThe Best Money Can BuyA Note on the Intersection of Infertility and Genetic ResearchSelling Choice in ProcreationGender, Race, and Class: Situating Procreative ChoiceBeyond ChoiceConverging StreamsRecreating Motherhood: Toward Feminist Social PolicyNew Technologies in Old BottlesConstructing Feminist Social Policy Regarding MotherhoodA Last Word to the New EditionNotesIndex