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Oxford Studies in International History
Lamaze: An International History
The Lamaze method is virtually synonymous with natural childbirth in America. In the 1970s, taking Lamaze classes was a common rite of passage to parenthood. The conscious relaxation and patterned breathing techniques touted as a natural and empowering path to the alleviation of pain in childbirth resonated with the feminist and countercultural values of the era.
In Lamaze , historian Paula Michaels tells the surprising story of the Lamaze method from its origins in the Soviet Union in the 1940s, to its popularization in France in the 1950s, and then to its heyday in the 1960s and 1970s in the US. Michaels shows how, for different reasons, in disparate national contexts, this technique for managing the pain of childbirth without resort to drugs found a following. The Soviet government embraced this method as a panacea to childbirth pain in the face of the material and fiscal shortages that followed World War II. Heated and sometimes ideologically inflected debates surrounded the Lamaze method as it moved from East to West amid the Cold War. Physicians in France sympathetic to the communist cause helped to export it across the Iron Curtain, but politics alone fails to explain why French women embraced this approach. Arriving on American shores around 1960, the Lamaze method took on new meanings. Initially it offered a path to a safer and more satisfying birth experience, but overtly political considerations came to the fore once again as feminists appropriated it as a way to resist the patriarchal authority of male obstetricians. Drawing on a wealth of archival evidence, Michaels pieces together this complex and fascinating story at the crossroads of the history of politics, medicine, and gender.
The story of Lamaze illuminates the many contentious issues that swirl around birthing practices in America and Europe. Brimming with insight, Michaels' engaging history offers an instructive intervention in the debate about how to achieve humane, empowering, and safe maternity care for all women.
In Lamaze , historian Paula Michaels tells the surprising story of the Lamaze method from its origins in the Soviet Union in the 1940s, to its popularization in France in the 1950s, and then to its heyday in the 1960s and 1970s in the US. Michaels shows how, for different reasons, in disparate national contexts, this technique for managing the pain of childbirth without resort to drugs found a following. The Soviet government embraced this method as a panacea to childbirth pain in the face of the material and fiscal shortages that followed World War II. Heated and sometimes ideologically inflected debates surrounded the Lamaze method as it moved from East to West amid the Cold War. Physicians in France sympathetic to the communist cause helped to export it across the Iron Curtain, but politics alone fails to explain why French women embraced this approach. Arriving on American shores around 1960, the Lamaze method took on new meanings. Initially it offered a path to a safer and more satisfying birth experience, but overtly political considerations came to the fore once again as feminists appropriated it as a way to resist the patriarchal authority of male obstetricians. Drawing on a wealth of archival evidence, Michaels pieces together this complex and fascinating story at the crossroads of the history of politics, medicine, and gender.
The story of Lamaze illuminates the many contentious issues that swirl around birthing practices in America and Europe. Brimming with insight, Michaels' engaging history offers an instructive intervention in the debate about how to achieve humane, empowering, and safe maternity care for all women.
264 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2014
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About the author
Paula A. Michaels
2 books6 followersA specialist in twentieth-century Russian and Central Asian history, Paula Michaels is the recipient of numerous awards and grants, including from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, the American Council of Learned Societies, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the National Institutes of Health. Her book Curative Powers: Medicine and Empire in Stalin's Central Asia (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2003) won the Association for Women in Slavic Studies' Heldt Prize and was a finalist for the PEN Center USA Literary Award. Michaels teaches history and international studies at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
December 29, 2014
If childbirth is known for something, it’s being painful. And many mothers give silent thanks to French obstetrician Fernand Lamaze for inventing a method to ease some of that pain. It’s pretty much a given that, if you’re having a baby, you’re doing “Lamaze.” The method is so engrained in American culture that few are aware that it has been around for less than a century…and that it has Soviet roots! (Cue scary music.)
Curious about the real origins of this popular birthing technique, historian and mother Paula A. Michaels, Senior Lecturer at Australia’s Monash University, combed archival material from four countries and even conducted personal interviews to learn more. In Lamaze: An International History (Oxford, 2014), she presents the stories behind the search for a painless delivery, from the Grantly Dick-Read method to I.Z. Vel’vovskii’s psychoprophylaxis to “Lamaze” as practiced today. There’s also much about the cyclical popularity of anesthesia, on the upswing more recently with the introduction of the epidural. What the reader will quickly discover is that these techniques didn’t materialize out of thin air, but were the products of social forces at work. Michaels’ story is not merely about obstetrics, but about Cold War tensions, political propaganda, psychology’s role in medicine, feminist movements, American consumerism, and the fads of “natural childbirth” with all its shades of meaning.
I don’t have much interest in medicine – my stomach churns when people talk about their operations – but I can honestly say I enjoyed reading Lamaze. It gave me a new understanding of and appreciation for the techniques, drugs, and machines available to new mothers today. I hope the book finds its way to the reading lists of many graduate-level history classes, particularly those in Gender History that want to discuss patriarchy, psychotherapy, and the control of women, and those covering 20th Century United States History that could benefit from an unusual perspective on Soviet-American relations. As for new mothers, I recommend only giving it to those who you know would appreciate a scholarly book. For the rest, they’ll have to wait until a PBS documentary is made.
Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book as a First Reads giveaway winner on GoodReads.com. There was no obligation to write a review.
Curious about the real origins of this popular birthing technique, historian and mother Paula A. Michaels, Senior Lecturer at Australia’s Monash University, combed archival material from four countries and even conducted personal interviews to learn more. In Lamaze: An International History (Oxford, 2014), she presents the stories behind the search for a painless delivery, from the Grantly Dick-Read method to I.Z. Vel’vovskii’s psychoprophylaxis to “Lamaze” as practiced today. There’s also much about the cyclical popularity of anesthesia, on the upswing more recently with the introduction of the epidural. What the reader will quickly discover is that these techniques didn’t materialize out of thin air, but were the products of social forces at work. Michaels’ story is not merely about obstetrics, but about Cold War tensions, political propaganda, psychology’s role in medicine, feminist movements, American consumerism, and the fads of “natural childbirth” with all its shades of meaning.
I don’t have much interest in medicine – my stomach churns when people talk about their operations – but I can honestly say I enjoyed reading Lamaze. It gave me a new understanding of and appreciation for the techniques, drugs, and machines available to new mothers today. I hope the book finds its way to the reading lists of many graduate-level history classes, particularly those in Gender History that want to discuss patriarchy, psychotherapy, and the control of women, and those covering 20th Century United States History that could benefit from an unusual perspective on Soviet-American relations. As for new mothers, I recommend only giving it to those who you know would appreciate a scholarly book. For the rest, they’ll have to wait until a PBS documentary is made.
Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book as a First Reads giveaway winner on GoodReads.com. There was no obligation to write a review.
March 6, 2014
I quite enjoyed this book. Although written by an historian and published by an academic press, it's very accessible. The author came to write it because she was surprised to find out during her first pregnancy that the Lamaze method of prepared childbirth, which she had always assumed was developed in France, was in fact imported by Dr. Lamaze from the Soviet Union. She was particularly surprised because her field of specialty is Russian medical history and she didn't know this!
I have no such credentials but was also surprised that Lamaze, also known as psychoprophylaxis, is not French in origin. That was the hook that got me into the book, but I stayed for the really intriguing take she has on childbirth and culture and how they interact. By following this method from its Soviet origins to France to England and other places in Europe and across the ocean to the US, she chronicles how the meaning of its use was affected by and affected each culture. It was fascinating how the same technique can be viewed as liberating to some women and oppressive to others. She's full of interesting ideas about the intersection of childbirth, culture, and women's power and agency.
Recommended to those interested in women and in pregnancy/childbirth.
I have no such credentials but was also surprised that Lamaze, also known as psychoprophylaxis, is not French in origin. That was the hook that got me into the book, but I stayed for the really intriguing take she has on childbirth and culture and how they interact. By following this method from its Soviet origins to France to England and other places in Europe and across the ocean to the US, she chronicles how the meaning of its use was affected by and affected each culture. It was fascinating how the same technique can be viewed as liberating to some women and oppressive to others. She's full of interesting ideas about the intersection of childbirth, culture, and women's power and agency.
Recommended to those interested in women and in pregnancy/childbirth.
May 10, 2016
Paula is an incredible educator. Her speech is immaculate and her insights resonate with me for days after her University lectures. An extraordinary person. I cannot wait to read more of her work.
March 15, 2023
Es bueno saber como nació la filosofía.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews