Navajo childbirth in transition

Abstract

For the Navajo Indians, the transition from home-centered childbearing practices based on religious ritual to biomedically directed childbirth in hospitals was completed over a relatively short time in the middle decades of this century. For Anglo-American society, the acceptance of medically oriented childbirth occurred during an equally short period earlier in the century. The transition was driven for both by many common factors. For Navajo women it was additionally influenced by the social and economic changes that affected the Reservation following the beginning of the Second World War. This paper examines the changes in Navajo childbearing practices and, for comparison, those of the dominant American society. It reviews factors that permitted the acceptance of biomedical childbirth by Navajo women and explores the health implications of the transition.

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