... Chapter 2 interrogates the fraught terrain of black women’s reproductive bodies and the slave system that sought to exploit sexuality in the service of labor production. In this chapter the author argues that processes of black maternal longing limit the ability of black women to self-possess...

... Epigenetics, the study of how experiences, environments, and exposures alter gene expression, is a vibrant new area of postgenomic life sciences research. Epigenetics research situates the maternal body as a central site of epigenetic programming and transmission, and as a significant locus...

...The Maternal Body ...

... This chapter examines the explanatory functions and lapses of the maternal mortality ratio, the most commonly used maternal health indicator. Unlike people, metrics can be tracked, graphed, compared across time and space, converted to dollars, inserted into equations, and statistically...

... This chapter explores the relationships between political practices and evidence making in maternal health in Nigeria’s efforts to meet the Millennium Development Goals. Many actors become invested in the exercises of counting maternal outcomes and making decisions about care that will impact...