A Systemic Lack of Space: The Emotional and Embodied Experience of Pregnancy Loss Among Teachers

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Thursday 9:50 am Four Seasons Ballroom 2-3
  In Roundtable Session: The Personal Is Professional: How Teachers Navigate the Demands of Family and Work (Table 2)

Abstract

This study explores the emotional and embodied experience of teachers who have endured pregnancy loss, likely an under-researched but frequent phenomenon. I collected then analyzed stories from forty-three teachers who experienced a loss in the last ten years through the concepts of disenfranchised and stifled grief (Doka, 1989; Eyetsemitan, 1998), related terms for when grief is not acknowledged or allowed to run its course, and of misfit, a “feminist materialist disability concept” that highlights moments when bodies and material realities are in disjunction (Garland-Thomson, 2011, p. 591). I use these concepts to highlight the systemic lack of physical and emotional space for teachers following pregnancy loss and the ways that individuals can create space and offer support.

Author

• Amanda Pinkham-Brown, East Carolina University