Below is an article from Sheila Kitzinger's website. Kitzinger is a social anthropologist who has studied pregnancy, birth, and breastfeeding from women's perspectives from all around the world. She believes that women should "have the information they need to make choices about childbirth" and is a "strong believer in the benefits of home birth for women who are not at especially high risk." She is a firm believer in breastfeeding. Below is a study published in the British Medical Journal looking at how breastfeeding versus bottle feeding is portrayed in the media.
Media representation of breast and bottle feeding
Research on media representation of breast and bottle feeding was published in the British Medical Journal
Representing infant feeding: content analysis of British media portrayals of bottle feeding and breast feeding
Lesley Henderson, Jenny Kitzinger, and Josephine Green
BMJ, 2000, 321(7270): pp. 1196-1198
Media representations of breastfeeding often portray it as unusual, embarrassing, difficult or funny. By contrast, bottle feeding is presented as the normal and socially acceptable way to feed a baby. Analysis of one month of television output located just one TV program, Channel 4's soap opera Brookside , that showed a woman breastfeeding. The researchers found another 9 scenes in which breast pumps appeared (not in use). By contrast there were 170 scenes of bottle feeding (including formula preparation) across all kinds of programmes. Problems with bottle feeding were suggested only once in the TV sample while there were 27 references to problems with breastfeeding, including sleepless nights, 'droopy' breasts, sore nipples and being tied to the baby. Similar findings were echoed in the analysis of newspaper reporting. The conclusion: the media rarely present positive or just routine representations of breastfeeding and this may have profound implications for how women decide to feed their babies and thus for the health of the next generation.
Representing infant feeding: content analysis of British media portrayals of bottle feeding and breast feeding
Lesley Henderson, Jenny Kitzinger, and Josephine Green
BMJ, 2000, 321(7270): pp. 1196-1198
Media representations of breastfeeding often portray it as unusual, embarrassing, difficult or funny. By contrast, bottle feeding is presented as the normal and socially acceptable way to feed a baby. Analysis of one month of television output located just one TV program, Channel 4's soap opera Brookside , that showed a woman breastfeeding. The researchers found another 9 scenes in which breast pumps appeared (not in use). By contrast there were 170 scenes of bottle feeding (including formula preparation) across all kinds of programmes. Problems with bottle feeding were suggested only once in the TV sample while there were 27 references to problems with breastfeeding, including sleepless nights, 'droopy' breasts, sore nipples and being tied to the baby. Similar findings were echoed in the analysis of newspaper reporting. The conclusion: the media rarely present positive or just routine representations of breastfeeding and this may have profound implications for how women decide to feed their babies and thus for the health of the next generation.
No comments:
Post a Comment