Contingent Lives : Fertility, Time, and Aging in West Africa - Caroline H. Bledsoe

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Contingent Lives

Fertility, Time, and Aging in West Africa

By: Caroline H. Bledsoe

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Paperback | 10 June 2002 | Edition Number 1

At a Glance

Paperback
416 Pages

Dimensions(cm)
22.78 x 16.41 x 2.11

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$100.75

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Most women in the West use contraceptives in order to avoid having children. But in rural Gambia and other parts of sub-Saharan Africa, many women use contraceptives for the opposite reason-to have as many children as possible.

Using ethnographic and demographic data from a three-year study in rural Gambia, Contingent Lives explains this seemingly counterintuitive fact by juxtaposing two very different understandings of the life course: one is a linear, Western model that equates aging and the ability to reproduce with the passage of time, the other a Gambian model that views aging as contingent on the cumulative physical, social, and spiritual hardships of personal history, especially obstetric trauma. Viewing each of these two models from the perspective of the other, Caroline Bledsoe produces fresh understandings of the classical anthropological subjects of reproduction, time, and aging as culturally shaped within women's conjugal lives. Her insights will be welcomed by scholars of anthropology and demography as well as by those working in public health, development studies, gerontology, and the history of medicine.

Industry Reviews

"Making brilliant use of the puzzle of women in The Gambia using modern contraception as a means to increase their fertility, Bledsoe shows - in a way no one previously has done so well - just why anthropological insights are needed in demographic research. Contingent Lives offers a rich contribution both to social theory and to social methodology." - David Kertzer, Brown University

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Foreword
Preface
Introduction
Reproductive Tolls and Temporalities in Studies of Reproduction
Setting, Data, and Methods
Managing the Birth Interval: Child Spacing
Disjunctures and Anomalies: Deconstructing Child Spacing
Realizing a Reproductive Endowment in a Contingent Body
Time-Neutral Reproduction, Time-Neutral Aging
Reaping the Rewards of Reproduction: Morality, Retirement, and Repletion
Discovering Our Habitus: Contingency and Linearity in Western Obstetric Observations
Rethinking Fertility, Time, and Aging
Appendixes
Glossary
References
Index
Table of Contents provided by Publisher. All Rights Reserved.

Contingent Lives

Fertility, Time, and Aging in West Africa

At a Glance

Paperback

Industry Reviews

Shipping

How to return your order

Defective items

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