Can we envision a mother centric way to give birth?
Often the means of design in general carry the male-default bias and this goes to ancient Greece, where the female body was seen as a male “turned outside in” according to Aristotle. Even today, within our advanced technological and medical realms, design repeatedly fails to implement that the female body does not only differ in its size, but in its cellular levels too. Systematically design is destined to serve the average male consumer, and this is problematic when it comes to healthcare, which often increases female mortality due to the lack of data and testing obtained to serve half of the human population.
Ever since the birth of my daughter in January 2016, I have critically engaged with the environments where women experience one of their most empowering and transformative involvements – the moment when one body splits into two and gives life and nourishment to a new person.
Childbirth is frequently seen as a socially marked life crisis event that is consensually shaped and patterned. Childbirth with its complex melange of pre-, intra-, and postpartum events that result in a new human being, falls within the medical domain. It is part of the interchangeable terms of ‘cosmopolitan’, ‘western’, ‘medical’ and ‘scientific’ medicine.
I believe we need to re-design the system which avoids the unconscious balance of maternal welfare against the one of the children. We need to create a setting where the mothers feel harmless, secure, serene and sustained through a series of design elements of offerings and spatial interventions. Women should not compromise their health and wellbeing over the one of their children. That women should have choice and design is a great way of advocating so.
Student - Taught Postgraduate
