Shapes of motherhood: exploring postnatal body image through photographs

Abstract

This article contributes to, and extends, feminist and visual sociological scholarship by examining how a sample of pregnant women in Australia documented their postpartum experiences through digital photographs. It is argued that photography is powerful in helping women to articulate the ways in which subjectivities and bodily boundaries are reframed in the postpartum period. Dressing is used as a key example to demonstrate this. A further aim of this paper is to identify whether women's photographs can be used to contest dominant cultural ideologies and how we may read these using feminist perspectives. Throughout this article, women's individual embodied experiences of post-pregnancy are reflected in the production and viewing of their own photographic images.

Keywords::

• body image
• celebrity
• clothing
• photograph
• postnatal
• visual culture

Notes

^1. The headless photographs may be attributed to the public nature of the website and the need for anonymity.

^2. I will discuss the phenomenon of the headless photo in greater detail in forthcoming sections.

^3. SOAM has spawned a number of similar websites that encourage women to use photographs and narratives to contradict key aspects of contemporary Western societies which perpetuate normative femininities. For example, ‘Caesarean Scar’ (www.caesareanscar.com) gives caesarean scars a place to ‘speak’. Women send in photographs of their caesarean scars along with answers to the following questions: What does your scar say when you look at it? What does your scar say when you touch it? Similarly, ‘007 Breasts’ (www.007b.com) has a gallery of ‘non-sexualised’ photographs of breasts that are submitted by women of different ages and ethnic backgrounds along with stories to contextualise them. Bonnie Crowder also created a ‘sister’ site to SOAM for all women to submit photographs and stories called ‘This is a Woman’ (www.thisisawoman.com). In line with SOAM, the new site highlights a range of bodily experiences for women of all body types throughout the life course with categories including eating disorders, infertility and cancer.

^4. The questions that spell the acronym SHOWeD include: ‘What do you See here? What is really Happening here? How does this relate to Our lives? Why does this situation, concern, or strength exist? What can we Do about it?’ (Wang 1999, p. 189)

^5. I use the term ‘first-time mother’ or ‘new mother’ to refer to participants who gave birth for the first time during the course of the study.

^6. I use the term ‘experienced mother’ to refer to those participants who already had children.

^7. Australian colloquial term for tracksuit pants.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Meredith Nash

Meredith Nash is a Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Tasmania. Her book, Making ‘postmodern’ mothers: pregnant embodiment, baby bumps and body image, was published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2012.