What doctors hardly talk about: trance and ecstasy at the scene of childbirth. Dissident experiences and perceptions of health and welfare in contemporary times

摘要

> size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">For the groups of women devotees of ways of giving birth other than cesarean section and the technocratic hospital model, the pain of labor seems to operate at another register, quite different from disorder and something to be avoided. Fully prepared to "experience the birth," they seem to eagerly embrace the contractions, the emotions and lack of control, giving expression to perceptions of health that appear to be permeated by sexuality and spirituality and by elements of ecstasy and trance. Therefore, the scope of this paper is to explore whether and in what ways these experiences and perceptions have dislodged the medical practice of "biopolitics," thereby examining their impressions and attitudes in light of the logic of the intense emotions and affection, namely of new modes of subjectivity and possibility of other moralities, other than hysteria and the fragility of women's bodies.