Beynon-Jones Siân M
Department of Sociology, Wentworth College, University of York, York, UK.
Sociol Health Illn. 2017 Jul;39(6):832-846. doi: 10.1111/1467-9566.12522. Epub 2016 Dec 2.
Tensions between the 'clock time' of medicine and the embodied times of its subjects are central to feminist writing concerning Western obstetric practice. In this article, I expand the focus of this literature by addressing the temporal dynamics of another site of reproductive healthcare: abortion provision. Echoing obstetric accounts of birth, time in legal, healthcare and social scientific discourse on abortion is routinely conceptualised as a finite resource contained within the pregnant/foetal body, which can be measured using clocks and calendars. I argue that women's interview accounts of their experiences of ending their pregnancies offer opportunities for critical reflection on this characterisation of pregnancy as linear 'gestational time'. First, participants in this study re-position the significance of gestational time by articulating its embodied meaning. Second, they provide alternative accounts of the temporality of pregnancy as a process which emerges through, and is disrupted by, the dynamics of socio-material relations. The article considers the broader implications of women's accounts of pregnancy times for legal, healthcare and social scientific accounts of 'later' abortion.
医学的“时钟时间”与其主体的具体时间之间的紧张关系，是有关西方产科实践的女性主义写作的核心。在本文中，我通过探讨生殖健康护理的另一个领域——堕胎服务——的时间动态，扩展了这一文献的关注点。与产科对分娩的描述相呼应，法律、医疗保健和社会科学领域关于堕胎的论述中，时间通常被概念化为包含在孕妇/胎儿体内的一种有限资源，可以用时钟和日历来衡量。我认为，女性关于终止妊娠经历的访谈记录，为批判性反思将怀孕描述为线性“孕期时间”提供了契机。首先，本研究的参与者通过阐明孕期时间的具体意义，重新定位了它的重要性。其次，他们提供了关于怀孕时间性的另一种描述，即怀孕是一个通过社会物质关系的动态过程产生并被其扰乱的过程。本文探讨了女性对怀孕时间的描述对法律、医疗保健和社会科学领域关于“晚期”堕胎的描述所具有的更广泛影响。
