Balance and biomedicine: how Chinese Canadian women negotiate pregnancy-related ‘risk’ and lifestyle directives

Abstract

In this article, we contribute to a growing body of literature that explores how risk discourse functions in the (globalised) neoliberal era of ‘intensive mothering’. A comparison of traditional Chinese medicine and Western biomedicine indicates that in these two approaches to medicine, pregnancy-related risks are derived from different sources and seen in different ways. In this article, we examine how women with a Chinese background living in North America negotiate these differences. More specifically, we use data from a qualitative research study to examine how 15 pregnant Chinese Canadian women living in Vancouver, British Columbia, understand and experience pregnancy-related risk and lifestyle directives. Examining data from a Foucauldian perspective that views ‘risk’ as a biopolitical technique of governance, we show that the ways in which the majority of the participants use traditional Chinese medicine and Western biomedicine – and identify risk – change as they move through the stages of pregnancy. While many of them integrated aspects of both traditional Chinese medicine and Western medicine prior to pregnancy (using Western medicine for acute issues and traditional Chinese medicine to restore bodily balance and strength), once pregnant the majority of the women in the study used biomedical ‘proof’ to guide them through a healthy pregnancy. They tended to avoid traditional Chinese remedies due to the ‘risk’ of teratogenic effects, and also avoided family advice intended to ensure bodily balance. Once the child was born, the participants viewed the (maternal) body in a different way: as a body out of balance in the yin-yang sense – and in need of traditionally ordained practices (typically called ‘doing the month’).

Keywords:

• globalisation
• risk
• risk perception
• maternal health
• traditional Chinese medicine
• ‘doing the month’

Notes

1. Feminist scholars argue that in Western societies, we are now living in an era of ‘intensive mothering’ that requires mothers to always put their children’s needs first (at the expense of their own selfhood), with culture holding out the promise of child-centred mothering as a uniquely rich source of personal fulfilment (Douglas & Michaels, 2004; Hayes, 1996; Lee, 2008). Such ‘intense mothering’ is especially prominent during pregnancy as women are constructed as a potential ‘risk’ to the health of the baby they are carrying, and pressed to make prudent and rational decisions about their own behaviours to mitigate the risk (Lupton, 2012; Ruhl, 1999).

2. Furth describes the way that beginning in the Han dynasty (late third century BCE to the start of the third century CE), the body was conceived in medical discourse as genuinely androgynous. Similarly, Galenic medicine subscribed to the one-sex model where both genders had a penis but men were associated with heat that allowed for expression of the organ while women’s inherent coldness caused the inversion of the organ inside the body, demonstrating her ‘incomplete’ nature (Laqueur, 1990).

3. According to Beck (1992), the growth of science and technology in late modern societies has led to an increase in manufactured (external) risk – such as pollution, nuclear warfare and chemical residue. In other words, the perceived risks produced under the conditions of late modernity have increased in magnitude and become globalised and are therefore more difficult than in past eras to calculate and manage or avoid. As such, we live in a ‘risk society’.

4. We are using Statistics Canada's definition of first- and second-generation Canadians whereby first generation refers to people born outside of Canada, and second generation includes individuals who were born in Canada and had at least one parent born outside Canada (NHS, 2011).

5. We recognise that Hong Kong and Taiwan differ from mainland China and are aware of the complex political and social issues leading to these divisions (that are beyond the scope of explanation here), but for the sake of this paper we designate all participants as ‘Chinese Canadian’ given the influence of mainland China over both Hong Kong and Taiwan. Moreover, our recruitment adverts specified a desire to speak with ‘pregnant Chinese-origin women’. The participant originally from Vietnam (Shirley) acknowledged the important role of Chinese culture in her life, largely influenced by her mother.