Infant Feeding Practices

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xxxv

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2. Socio-cultural Perspective of Infant Feeding and Policy Framework

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 21-21

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3. Infant Feeding Practices

   1. Infant Feeding Beliefs and Practices Across Cultures: An Introduction

      • Pranee Liamputtong

      Pages 1-20

4. Socio-cultural Perspective of Infant Feeding and Policy Framework

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 21-21

      PDF

   2. Managing the Lactating Body: The Breastfeeding Project in the Age of Anxiety

      • Orit Avishai

      Pages 23-38

   3. Attitudes to Breastfeeding

      • Jane A. Scott

      Pages 39-54

   4. The Imperative to Breastfeed: An Australian Perspective

      • Athena Sheehan, Virginia Schmied

      Pages 55-76

   5. Infant Feeding and the Problems of Policy

      • Ellie Lee

      Pages 77-91

5. Motherhood, Work, and Infant Feeding Practices

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 93-93

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   2. Shifting Identities: Social and Cultural Factors That Shape Decision-Making Around Sustaining Breastfeeding

      • Joyce L. Marshall, Mary Godfrey

      Pages 95-108

   3. Breastfeeding Under the Blanket: Exploring the Tensions Between Health and Social Attitudes to Breastfeeding in the United States, Ireland and the United Kingdom

      • Caroline Jane Gatrell

      Pages 109-123

   4. Breastfeeding Beliefs and Practices Among Employed Women: A Thai Cultural Perspective

      • Susanha Yimyam

      Pages 125-140

   5. Good Mothers and Infant Feeding Practices Amongst Women in Northern Thailand

      • Pranee Liamputtong, Somsri Kitisriworapan

      Pages 141-159

6. Infant Feeding Practices and HIV/AIDS

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 161-161

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   2. Breastfeeding in Sub-Saharan Africa: Still the Best Despite the Risk of HIV

      • Lucy Thairu

      Pages 163-174

   3. Infant Feeding in the Era of HIV: Challenges and Opportunities

      • Tanya Doherty

      Pages 175-193

   4. Facing Competing Cultures of Breastfeeding: The Experience of HIV-Positive Women in Burkina Faso

      • Alice Desclaux, Chiara Alfieri

      Pages 195-209

   5. Fluid Boundaries: Multiple Meanings of the Illness ‘Moto’ in Northern Malawi

      • Laura Sikstrom, Rachel Bezner Kerr, Laifolo Dakishoni

      Pages 211-227

7. Infant Feeding Beliefs and Practices Within Socio-cultural Context

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 229-229

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   2. From Traditional to Optimal Breastfeeding Practices: Selected Cases from Central and Southern Africa

      • Penjani Kamudoni, Gerd Holmboe-Ottesen

      Pages 231-246

It’s natural... It’s unsightly... It’s normal... It’s dangerous. To breastfeed or not? For millions of women around the world, this personal decision is influenced by numerous social, cultural, and health factors. Infant Feeding Practices is the first book to delve into these factors from a global perspective, revealing striking similarities and differences from country to country. Dispatches from Asia, Australia, Africa, the U.K., and the U.S. explore as wide a gamut of salient issues affecting feeding practices as traditional beliefs about colostrums, “breast is best” campaigns, partner attitudes, workplace culture, direct government intervention, and the pressure to be a “good mother.” Throughout these informative pages, women are seen balancing innovation and tradition to nurture healthy, thriving babies. A sampling of topics covered: • Policy versus practice in infant feeding. • Infant feeding in the age of AIDS. • Managing the lactating body: the view from the U.S. • Motherhood, work, and feeding. • The effects of migration on infant feeding. • From breastfeeding tradition to optimal breastfeeding practice. Infant Feeding Practices is a first-of-its-kind resource for researchers and practioners in maternal and child health, public health, global health, and cultural anthropology seeking empirical findings and culturally diverse information on this sensitive issue.

• HIV/AIDS
• breastfeeding
• cross-cultural research
• developing countries
• maternal and child health
• social determinants of health
• women in the workplace

From the reviews:

“This cross-cultural perspective of infant feeding practices investigates how mothers in a variety of cultures and sub-cultures make infant feeding decisions. … The book’s strength is its acknowledgement and coverage of the multiple interlocking factors that determine women’s infant-feeding decisions, including the effects of class, geographical region and education, which affect the cultural background. … This book will encourage reflection for clinicians, health policy-makers, sociologists, cultural historians, and mothers themselves.” (Virginia Thorley, International Lactation consultant Association, November, 2011)

• School of Public Health, La Trobe University, Bundoora, Australia

  Pranee Liamputtong

Pranee Liamputtong is a Personal Chair in Public Health at the School of Public Health, La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia.  She has previously published a book with Springer: Doing Cross-Cultural Research: Ethical and Methodological Perspectives.

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