Culture of missing girls: Anthropological insight in culture, medical technologies and medicine
-
2014-03-28 https://doi.org/10.14419/ijh.v2i1.2017 -
Abstract
This paper illuminates cultural domains wherein we try to locate the causes of missing girls in Punjab. The prevailing cultural constructions of the social structures wherein girls are born in outnumber as compared to boys, but due to latter they continue to diminish since ancient times. It captures on one side the state historical efforts to check it by social legislations during the eighteenth, nineteenth centuries and during the pre & post independent periods. Further on other it links to the efforts of the State government to illuminate how advancement in medical technologies and medicines had been grossly mis/used to determine sex of unborn child and concludes that how these technologies have emerged as the integral parts of culture of Missing girls.
Keywords: Missing Girls, Culture, Medical Technology and Demographic Variable.
-
References
- Action Aids (2008). Alarming decline in female sex ratio, June 2008 Anand, M. (2004). Female Foeticide - A quest for survival. Social Welfare. Sept. 5-8.
- Annis, Linda Ferrill (1978). The Child before Birth. Ithaca: Cornell University Press Bardia A, Paul E, Kapoor S.K, Anand, K. (2004). Decline sex ratios: Role of society, Technology and government regulation in Faridabad district, Haryana. NatlMed J India; 17:207–11.
- Basu, A.M. (1989). Is discrimination in food really necessary for explaining sex differentials in childhood mortality? Population Studies; 43:193–200.
- Bastian M L. (2001). The demon superstition: abominable twins and mission culture in Onitsha history. Ethnology 40:13-27.
- Becker, G. (2000). On the Bones of the Serpent: Person, Memory, and Mortality in Sabarl Island gies. Berkeley: Univ. Calif. Press. 320 pp.
- Browner C, Sargent CF. (1996). Anthropological studies of human reproduction. In Medical Anthropology: Contemporary Theory and Method, ed. CF Sargent, TM Johnson, pp. 218-35. Westport, CT: Praeger
- Booth, BE, Verma M, Beri RS (1994). Fetal sex determination in infants in Punjab,India: Correlations and implications. BMJ; 309:1259–61.
- Cecil R. (1996). The Anthropology of Pregnancy Loss: Comparative Studies in Miscarriage, Stillbirth, and Neonatal Death. Oxford, UK/Washington, DC: Berg. 226 pp.
- Chaturvedi S, Aggarwal OP, Bhasin SK, Gupta P (2001). Prena-tal sex determination: a community-based investigation in East Delhi. Trop Doct; 31:204–6.
- Csordas TJ. (1996). a handmaid’s tale: the rhetoric of personhood in American and Japanese healing of abortions. In Gender and Health: An International Perspective, ed. CF Sargent, C Brettell, pp. 227-41. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
- Davis-Floyd R, Dumit J, eds. (1997). Introduction: the anthropology of birth. In childbirth and Authoriative knowledge: Cross-Cultural Perspectives, ed. R Davis-Floyd, CF Sargent, pp. 1-51. Berkeley: Univ. Calif. Press.
- Dube L (1983). Misadventures in amniocentesis. Economic and Political Weekly 40 (2): 279-80.
- Edelmann, RJ. And Connolly, KJ. (1986) Psychological aspects of infertility. Br. J. Med. Psychol., 59, 209-219.
- Gibb,G.D. (1984). A comparative Study of Recidivist and contraceptorsal and the dimensions of control Impulsivity. International Journal of Psychiatry19(6):581-91
- Ginsburg, Faye and Rayna Rapp (1991). The Politics of Reproduction. Annual review of Anthropology.20:311-343
- Greenhalghs.(2003). Unplanned persons and gendered children – planned births, unplanned persons: “population” in the making of Chinese modernity. Am. Ethol. 30:196-215
- Hartouni V. (1997). Cultural Conceptions: On Reproductive Technologies and the Remaking of Life. Minneapolis: Univ. Minn. Press. 175 pp.
- Handwerker, W. Penn (1990). Demography. In Medical Anthropology-A hand book of Theory and Practices. Edited by T M Jhonson and C F Sargent. Green Wood Press
- Hardacre H. (1997). Marketing the Menacing Fetus in Japan. Berkeley: Univ. Calif. Press.
- Harris Olivia and Kate Young (1981). Engendered structures: Some problems in the Analysis of Reproduction. In Anthropology Pre- capitalistic Societies. Joel Khan and Loblra Joseph eds. London.
- Inhorn MC, Van Balen F, eds. (2002). Infertility Around the Globe: New Thinking on Childlessness, gender, and Reproductive Technologies. Berkeley: Univ. Calif. Press. 347 pp.
- IIPS (2005). National Family Health Survey (NFHS-3) Vol.-I, International Institute of Population sciences (IIPS), India, 2005-06: Mumbai: .Konard, Monica (2005). Nameless Relations: Anonymity, Melanesia and Reproductive Gift Exchange between British ova Donors and Recipients. Berghan Books. New York and Oxford
- Kahn S M. (2000). Reproducing Jews: A Cultural Account of Assisted Conception in Israel. Durhan: Duke Univ. Press. 227 pp.
- Krishna Kumari DB, Vani C. (2004). Media for Gender Empowerment. Social Welfare. Oct.; 37-40.
- Landsman GH. (1998). Reconstructing motherland in the age of “perfect” babies: mothers of infants and toddlers with disabilities. Signs 24:l69-99.
- Layne LL. (2003). Motherhood Lost: A Feminist Account of pregnancy Loss in America. New York: Routledge. 354 pp.
- La Roche et al. (1984). Grief Reactions to Prenatal death. A follow-up study. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry.29(1):14-19
- Lazarus, Ellen S. (1994) what do women want? Issues of Choice, Control, and Class in Pregnancy and Child Birth. Medical Anthropology Quarterly 8(1)25-46
- Mahlotra, Sumit and Kant,S.(2006). Adverse Female to male Sex ratio at birth in India: A Cause for concerns. Comment. The National Medical Journal of Inida. vol 19,3,,2006 p 151-2.
- Mallick A. (2004).India's Missing Women. Social Welfare. July; 4-10.
- Miller BD.(1989) Son preference, the household and a public health program in north
- India. In: Maithreyi K, Karuna C (eds). Women and the household in Asia. New York:Sage Publications; 1989:191–208.
- Miller BD (1985). Prenatal and postnatal sex-selection in India: The patriarchal Context, ethical questions and public policy. Working paper 107, Women in International Development Publication Series. Michigan State University,MI 1985
- Miller BD. (2001). Female-selective abortion in Asia: patterns, policies, and debates. Am. Anthropol. 103:1083-95.
- Morgan LM. (2002). “Properly disposed of”: a history of embryo disposal and the changing claims on fetal remains. Med. Anthropol. 21:247-74.
- Oaks L. (1994). Fetal spirihood and fetal personhood – the cultural construction of abortion in Japan. Women’s Studding Int. Q. 17:511-23.
- Oomman N, Ganatra BR (2002). Sex selection: The systematic elimination of girls. Reprod Health Matters; 10:184–8.
- Punjab New Line (2008). Sorry, sex ratio dips again in Nawanshehar, 3 July.
- Parson H. (2004). Making Modern Mothers: Ethics and Family Planning in Urban Greece. Berkeley: Univ. Calif. Press. 335 pp.
- Patricia Leidl (2005). The State of World Population 2005. The Promise of Equality: Gender Equity, Reproductive Health and the Millennium Development Goals. Silent spring: The tragedy of India’s never-born girls.
- Picone M. (1998). Infanticide, the spirits of aborted fetuses, and the making of motherhood in Japan. See Scheper-Hughes & Sargent pp. 37-57.
- Rajalakshmi, T.K. (2002). Female foeticide in Punjab. Frontline. Vol.19.12, June 8-21, Rapp R. (1999). Testing Women, Testing the Fetus: The Social Impact of Amniocentesis in America. New York: Routledge. 361 pp.
- Rastogi SR and Kumari R. (1992). Son preference and effectiveness of the family welfare programme in Uttar Pradesh. In: Patil RN (ed). Health, environment and Population. New Delhi:Ashish Publishing; :165–79.
- Singh D, Kumar A, Vij K,(2004) Skewed Sex ratio in Punjab- A Demographic catastrophe. IIJFMT 2(4).
- Stephen,Lynn (1988). Zapotec gender Politics: the creation of Political arena by and for peasant women. A Paper presented in AAA, Phoneix.
- Trussell, T James (1979). Natural fertility: Measurement and Use in Fertility models. In Natural fertility by Henri L. and Jane Menken (Edited).
- Visaria L. (2002) Deficit of women in India: Magnitude, trends, regional variations and determinants. Natl Med J India; 15 (Suppl 1):19–25.
- Van Hollen CC. (1994). Perspectives on the Anthropology of birth: a review. Cult. Med. Psychiatry 18:501-12.
- Van Hollen CC. (2003). Birth on the Threshold: Childbirth and Modernity in South India. Berkeley: Univ. Calif. Press. 295 pp.
- Vishwanath, L S (1998). Efforts of Colonial State to Suppress Female Infanticide: Use of Sacred Texts, Generation of Knowledge. Economic and Political Weekly. 33(19) May 9, P.1104-1112.
- Walia, Ajinder (2005). Female Foeticide in Punjab: Exploring the socio-economic and cultural dimensions. IDEA, A journal of Social Issues, August 9, 2005 -- Vol.10, No.1.
- Williamson, Laila (1998). Hardness of Heart and Hardness of Life: A Brief History of Infanticide General Historical Evidence. The Society for the Prevention of Infanti-cide,Amzone, USA.
- Wood, James W. and Maxine, Weinstein (1988). A model of Age Specific Fecundability. Population Studies. 42:85-114.
-
Downloads
-
How to Cite
Singh, R., Sharma, V., Khurana, S., & Talwar, U. (2014). Culture of missing girls: Anthropological insight in culture, medical technologies and medicine. International Journal of Health, 2(1), 7-16. https://doi.org/10.14419/ijh.v2i1.2017Received date: 2014-02-19
Accepted date: 2014-03-13
Published date: 2014-03-28