Social Experiences of Breastfeeding: Building Bridges between Research, Policy and Practice

✍ Scribed by Sally Dowling (editor); David Pontin (editor); Kate Boyer (editor)

• Publisher: Policy Press
• Year: 2018
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 282
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

This book brings together international academics, policy makers and practitioners to build bridges between the real-world and scholarship on breastfeeding. It asks the question: How can the latest social science research into breastfeeding be used to improve support at both policy and practice level, in order to help women breastfeed and to breastfeed for longer? The edited collection includes discussion about the social and cultural contexts of breastfeeding and looks at how policy and practice can apply this to women’s experiences. This will be essential reading for academics, policy makers and practitioners in public health, midwifery, child health, sociology, women's studies, psychology, human geography and anthropology, who want to make a real change for mothers.

✦ Table of Contents

SOCIAL EXPERIENCES OF BREASTFEEDING
Contents
List of tables and figures
Tables
Figures
Notes on contributors
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Background
Breastfeeding in the UK
Aims of the seminar series
Developments during the series
Structure of the book
Terminology
The UK policy context: reconfiguration of the Unicef UK Baby Friendly Initiative to reflect the importance of relationships and ensuring sustainability
Introduction
Historical overview
Responding to the evidence: Unicef UK Baby Friendly standards 2012
Achieving sustainability
What happens after services have achieved sustainability?
Conclusion
Part 1. Breastfeeding and emotions
1. Managing the dynamics of shame in breastfeeding support
Introduction
The hidden nature of shame
The relevance of shame to breastfeeding
Shame versus guilt
How shame may lead to tricky interpersonal processes
Helping new mothers resist and avoid feeling shamed by breastfeeding difficulties
Conclusion
2. Breastfeeding’s emotional intensity: pride, shame and status
Introduction
Status anxiety
Status and emotions: pride and shame
Status anxiety, shame and breastfeeding
The pride and shame of infant feeding
Conclusion
3. ‘Betwixt and between’: women’s experiences of breastfeeding long term
Introduction
Background
Methods used in the study
Discussion: women’s experiences of breastfeeding long term
Conclusion: how does this help us to support women to breastfeed for longer?
4. Weaving breastfeeding practices into policy
Introduction
Understanding breastfeeding as a practice 
Elements of breastfeeding practice
Infant formula feeding as competing practice
How can policy influence these practices?
Conclusion
Breastfeeding and emotions: reflections for policy and practice
Introduction
Realistic breastfeeding promotion and education
Supporting mothers in becoming resilient
Supporting health professionals
Going forward
Part II. Cultures of Breastfeeding
5. ‘Missing milk’: an exploration of migrant mothers’ experiences of infant feeding in the UK
Introduction
Who are migrants?
The health of migrants and their children
What is known about infant feeding behaviours in migrant families?
Why do infant feeding practices change post migration?
What are migrant parents’ views on infant feeding post migration?
Discussion
Conclusion
6. Changing cultures of night-time breastfeeding and sleep in the US
Introduction
The origins of fragmentation
Consequences of fragmentation
Conclusion
7. Breastfeeding and modern parenting culture: when worlds collide
Introduction
The transition to motherhood
The baby care book market
What is normal baby behaviour?
The impact of strict routines upon breastfeeding
Conclusion
8. Parenting ideologies, infant feeding and popular culture
Introduction
Infant feeding and the jigsaw of early parenting
Considering the scene in current infant feeding debates
Feminism, choice and infant feeding
Health promotion and neoliberalism
Conclusion: putting infant feeding in context
Cultures of breastfeeding: reflections for policy and practice
Part III. Breastfeeding and popular culture
9. Law of lactation breaks in the UK: employers’ perspectives
Introduction
Context
The law on lactation breaks
Managers’ understanding of and access to the law
Breastfeeding directly at the breast
Risk assessment on return to work
Debates about lactation breaks
Conclusion
10. Making breastfeeding social: the role of brelfies in breastfeeding’s burgeoning publics
Introduction
Social media activism and the role of the image
The advent of the brelfie
The politics of brelfies
Brelfies as consciousness-raising
From breastfeeding in public to breastfeedings’ publics
Conclusion: making breastfeeding social
11. Encountering public art: monumental breasts and the Skywhale
Introduction
Skywhale
Media reactions
Analysing affect
Monumentalism
Connections
Conclusion
12. Embodiment as a gauge of individual, public and planetary health
Introduction
Barriers, embodiment and disembodiment
Full embodiment as key to best practices
Environmental issues complicate narratives 
Full embodiment 
Embodiment as compassion
Conclusion
Breastfeeding and popular culture: reflections for policy and practice
Introduction
Something about us
The public/private division of breastfeeding
Images of breasts
Breastfeeding and the ecological precipice
Embodiment and empowerment
Breastfeeding, work and the law
Conclusion
Series context: reflection on experiences of attending the seminar series
Conclusion
Introduction
Connections between disciplines and across continents
Policy and practice contributions
The academic contribution of this book
Our influence on policy and practice
Conclusion
Appendix: Schedule for ESRC Seminar Series: Social Experiences of Breastfeeding: Building bridges between research and policy, 2015–16
Index