The visibility/invisibility of pain: a feminist debate over labor anesthesia in China and beyond

• In Event: Pan-Asian and Transnational Solidarities

Abstract

This paper approaches the history of medicalized childbirth in contemporary China from a gendered perspective. To historicize and contextualize the current feminist debate over the need for labor analgesia in China, I will trace back to early socialist endeavors in framing and relieving labor pain and examine how the socialist past impacts Chinese society's attitudes and practices towards labor pain management today. I aim to unpack how labor pain’s symbolic meaning is remembered across generations, why "labor pain" plays an important role in current feminist debates in China, and how female reproductive bodies embody socio-economic transformations.

Presenter

• Ziyi Zhao, Gender, Women and Sexuality Studies; University of Washington