Birthing Work

Reviews / Votes

"In this fantastic contribution, Katharine McKinnon provides mothers, birthing professionals and academics stuck in the "birth wars" with tools to unpack the birthing experience. Readers will be enthralled with the wide array of options to negotiate the birthing space and process. Birthing Work is filled with gripping stories, of McKinnon's own birthing experiences and that of a range of women and birthing professionals. This is a must read for all those involved in the work of child birth." (Gerda Roelvink, author of Building Dignified Worlds: Geographies of Collective Action)

"This book doesn't just nudge old debates about birth in different directions; it spurs them into entirely new territory prompting readers to consider how humans and more-than-humans assemble around birth. Weaving together stories and conversations with mothers, midwives and doctors, Katherine McKinnon highlights the diversity of experiences of childbirth, resisting any singular universal truth. Babies, bodies, beds, institutions, machines and clocks act collectively to shape pregnancy and birth, enabling a range of different processes to unfold. Birthing Work is an important volume for human geographers but also for anyone interested in radically rethinking childbirth, labour and love." (Robyn Longhurst, Deputy Vice-Chancellor Academic and Professor of Geography, University of Waikato, New Zealand)

"This small book about birth is a gold mine of observations, reflections and conjectures about the terrain of human birth. The terrain of childbirth is a disputed territory in our society. Dr McKinnon describes all the players, both animate and inanimate, in that disputed terrain. The book goes beyond the disputes and offers rich insights into the many corners of childbirth. The book draws on the experience of individuals; it draws on several disciplines, including midwifery, obstetrics, philosophy, biology, sociology, human geography and quantitative epidemiology and thereby suggests ways of thinking and acting beyond our current constraints." (Andrew Bisits, Obstetrician, Maternity Medical Co-Director at Royal Hospital for Women, and Conjoint Associate Professor at UNSW School of Women and Children's Health)