Here's to strong women! May we know them. May we be them. May we raise them. ~Unknown
International Women's Day (IWD) is celebrated in many countries around the world. It is a day when women are recognized for their achievements without regard to divisions, whether national, ethnic, linguistic, cultural, economic or political. International Women's Day first emerged from the activities of labor movements at the turn of the twentieth century in North America and across Europe.
Since those early years, International Women's Day has assumed a new global dimension for women in developed and developing countries alike. The growing international women's movement, which has been strengthened by four global United Nations women's conferences, has helped make the commemoration a rallying point to build support for women's rights and participation in the political and economic arenas.
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Celebrate With Wonder Woman and Lois Lane
Of course, at Blossom Health and Maternal Wellness, we are choosing to celebrate International Women's Day by focusing on birth, breastfeeding, and baby-wearing traditions and images from around the world.
BIRTH HISTORY
World Birthing Traditions
The experience of giving birth is both universal and unique all at once. Although women have been doing it since the dawn of humanity, the process, politics and social norms around pregnancy and birth have evolved as medical practitioners and mothers become more experienced in birthing methods.
Historical and Traditional Birthing Positions
In hospitals of the "developed" world, the vast majority of women give birth in a flat-on-the-back, semi-reclining, or semi-sitting position. Why do women use these passive positions and not more active positions like upright, kneeling, squatting, all-fours, side-lying, or asymmetric positions, which have historically been favored by many cultures?
MIDWIFE HISTORY
Midwives have been part of the human experience for as long as we know.”The ancient Jews called her the wise woman, just as she is known in France as the sage-femme, and in Germany, the weise frau and also Hebamme or mother’s adviser, helper, or friend. The English ‘midwife’ is derived from Middle English “mit wif, or with-woman”(J.H. Aveling). The Latin term cum-mater and the Spanish and Portuguese term comadre, have the same meaning: with woman.
Up until the mid-20th century, when obstetricians and hospitals became the primary location for delivery, these midwives provided most of the care for poor and rural pregnant women--black and white--throughout the South. Granny midwives were healers trained in their communities, a legacy of slavery but also central to health care during segregation.
BREASTFEEDING IN AMERICA
Proof that the “as-long-as-you-cover-up” mentality hasn’t been around for very long.
Black Wet Nurses And The Negative Connotations That Surrounds Them
When someone thinks of a black wet nurse, they don’t think of the ideal of a nurturing maternal figure. Rather, the modern black woman thinks of the idea of being a nurse or even of the notion of breastfeeding in general as evoking a visceral reaction akin to swallowing spoiled milk. Yet, the white ideal of breastfeeding evokes nostalgia, especially when it concerns black nursemaids—so much so that a “mammy” figure is used to sell syrup bottles in the twenty-first century. For the black woman, being subjected to the cruel, inhumane job of being a nursemaid still causes posttraumatic stress disorder so much so that it affects their quality of life.
When someone thinks of a black wet nurse, they don’t think of the ideal of a nurturing maternal figure. Rather, the modern black woman thinks of the idea of being a nurse or even of the notion of breastfeeding in general as evoking a visceral reaction akin to swallowing spoiled milk. Yet, the white ideal of breastfeeding evokes nostalgia, especially when it concerns black nursemaids—so much so that a “mammy” figure is used to sell syrup bottles in the twenty-first century. For the black woman, being subjected to the cruel, inhumane job of being a nursemaid still causes posttraumatic stress disorder so much so that it affects their quality of life.
“There were some older black women who wanted to disassociate themselves from the past, from slavery and the wet-nursing,” she said, explaining that often young slave women were impressed into giving their milk to white infants.
How and who do you celebrate on International Women's Day?
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