Culture as a discursive resource opposing legal abortion

Macleod, Catriona I; Sigcau, Nomakhosi; Luwaca, Pumeza

Title: Culture as a discursive resource opposing legal abortion
Creator: Macleod, Catriona I
Creator: Sigcau, Nomakhosi
Creator: Luwaca, Pumeza
Date Issued: 2011
Date: 2011
Type: Article
Identifier: vital:6293
Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1014721
Identifier: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09581596.2010.492211
Description: The notion of ‘culture’ features in the abortion literature to explicate, first, contestation of the meaning of abortion (as in the ‘culture wars’ about abortion), second, the normalisation of abortion in certain countries (as in ‘abortion culture’), third, the response of women to abortion within a particular social milieu and fourth, cross-cultural variability in attitudes towards and experiences of abortion. What is missing is an exploration of how ‘culture’ may be deployed as a discursive resource to oppose legal abortion. In this article, we report on a study conducted in a rural area of South Africa. We conducted focus group discussions utilising hypothetical vignettes to stimulate talk. Although, inconsistencies were evident in participants’ talk, in the context of cultural discussions, abortion was constructed as killing and inevitably destructive of cultural values and traditions. Abortion was equated with colonialist interventions and as something that should be opposed in the preservation of culture. Furthermore, cultural opposition to abortion was rooted in fears around the breakdown of gendered and generational power relations. Examples of how culture may be used in everyday interactions to induce shame and negative experiences are also discussed.
Format: 10 leaves
Format: pdf
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Group
Language: English
Relation: Macleod, C., Sigcau, N., & Luwaca, P. (2011). Culture as a discursive resource opposing legal abortion. Critical Public Health, 21(2), 237-245.
Rights: This is an electronic version of an article that was published in Critical Public Health © 2011 Copyright; Taylor & Francis

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Gender Action Forum (GENACT)

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