Four Women
The chapter presents four case studies, selected from a possible total of 509, according to the following criteria: (1) there should be one from each of the four geographical areas included in the Social Support and Pregnancy Outcome study; (2) they should be selected from the intervention group, in order to give a fuller picture of just what ‘giving social support’ means; and (3) they should exemplify and expand on a number of critical themes both within the study and outside it. These themes concern the social and medical construction of women's reproductive bodies and social selves. Particular issues relate to the appropriation of women's domestic labour by the privatized family; the material (under)resourcing of women as mothers; the commodification of the female body and of reproduction by the medical system; and the ownership of expert knowledge about reproduction and motherhood.