Problematising older motherhood in Canada: ageism, ableism, and the risky maternal subject

IF 1.8 4区医学 Q3 PUBLIC, ENVIRONMENTAL & OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH

Health Risk & Society Pub Date : 2022-03-28 DOI:10.1080/13698575.2022.2057453

F. Scala, Michael Orsini

引用次数: 3

Abstract

This article examines how older motherhood and older mothers are problematised and represented in key Canadian policy texts on ‘delayed childbearing’ and ‘advanced maternal age’. Drawing on critical disability studies and feminist scholarship on motherhood, we identify three kinds of representations of older mothers in these texts: as risk-producing subjects, as unnatural mothers, and as irresponsible reproductive citizens. We argue that dominant discourses of older motherhood are structured by both ageism and ableism, which undergird policy documents. These discourses frame older women as disabled by the ‘burden’ of late parenthood and cast them as risky subjects who might give birth to ‘abnormal’ offspring. Within this discursive terrain, older women are not only othered: they are held responsible for their infertility and for their reduced propensity to reproduce ‘healthy,’ non-disabled offspring.

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加拿大高龄母亲的问题:年龄歧视、残疾歧视和危险的母亲主题

本文探讨了高龄母亲和高龄母亲如何在加拿大关于“晚育”和“高龄产妇”的关键政策文本中出现问题和代表性。根据对残疾的批判性研究和关于母性的女权主义奖学金，我们在这些文本中确定了老年母亲的三种表现形式:作为制造风险的主体，作为不自然的母亲，以及作为不负责任的生育公民。我们认为，高龄母亲的主导话语是由年龄歧视和残疾歧视构成的，这是政策文件的基础。这些话语将老年妇女框定为由于晚育的“负担”而残疾的人，并将她们视为可能会生下“不正常”后代的危险对象。在这种话语环境中，老年妇女不仅是他人:她们要为自己的不育负责，也要为她们生育“健康”、无残疾后代的倾向降低负责。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Health Risk & Society Multiple-

CiteScore

3.30

自引率

14.30%

发文量

期刊介绍： Health Risk & Society is an international scholarly journal devoted to a theoretical and empirical understanding of the social processes which influence the ways in which health risks are taken, communicated, assessed and managed. Public awareness of risk is associated with the development of high profile media debates about specific risks. Although risk issues arise in a variety of areas, such as technological usage and the environment, they are particularly evident in health. Not only is health a major issue of personal and collective concern, but failure to effectively assess and manage risk is likely to result in health problems.