The cultural construction of birth: Changes in attitude and practice as illustrated by the history of birth chairs

Previous histories of birth concentrated on cataloguing and describing practices of delivery and failed to address the way society continually redefined and shaped these practices. The history of the design and changes in the popularity of a traditional artifact of birth, the birth chair, illustrates these subtle shifts in the values and attitudes of society toward women and birth. These changes in the philosophy of birth significantly influenced and altered the actual practice of delivery. The history of birth chairs indicates that the change from a natural philosophy to a medicalized definition of birth was not merely the result of a heightened knowledge of anatomy and physiology, but a consequence of the rise in medical professionalism, prevailing social attitudes of women as fragile and invalid, and the growing economic rewards of birth as a medical specialty. Furthermore, the revival of birth chairs in the late twentieth century illustrates the contest between official obstetrics and the alternative birth movement over the philosophy of birth. This debate was characterized by questions about the safety of medical delivery, the role of women in birth, and the efforts of official medicine toward further medicalization and consolidation of the lucrative business of birth. The history of birth chairs clearly illustrates changes in the prevailing philosophy of birth and the way in which society practiced delivery in response. Midwifery and obstetrical texts, artistic renditions of birth scenes, and interviews, in conjunction with a study of birth chairs, provides the basis for a history of birth which does not merely catalogue practices and beliefs, but creates a context in which the influence of the attitudes and beliefs of society on this culturally patterned event can be understood