Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Abortion ; Literature'

Choose Me is a literary novel about abortion. In the dark basement of an Islington flat, a woman lies chained to a double bed. She is Grace Walker – forty-three, single and childless. Her captor is Anna Carmichael, a nineteen-year old girl with a gun. Anna, the disturbed only child of a wealthy couple, has always been haunted by memories of a past life and believes she is reincarnated. She is certain that Grace is the mother who aborted her twenty years ago and has tracked her down in order to execute her revenge. The novel switches between the viewpoints of mother and daughter as they struggle with their feelings towards each other and confront the day of the abortion and its aftermath. The critical component of the thesis, ‘Letting the Foetus In’, explores the process of writing this novel. It highlights the issues encountered whilst drafting an earlier science fiction version by comparing this version with novels such as Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, and Doris Lessing’s Memoirs of a Survivor. It then goes on to discuss the transition from using a science fiction premise to one closer to magical realism, looking at issues of voice and character creation. Examples of ‘abortion-literature’, such as Margaret Atwood’s Surfacing and Louise L. Lambrich’s Hannah’s Diary are also analysed. In the final chapter, Toni Morrison’s Beloved is examined to see what narrative and stylistic devices the author employs to realise her premise.

This thesis argues for the innovative potential of an abortion trope, exploring its capacity for conceptual reformulation in both contemporary criticism and the nineteenth-century poetry of Thomas Hardy and Emily Dickinson. In contemporary deliberations over the ethical and legal legitimacy of abortion, critics will often converge upon aesthetic questions of ‘appropriate analogy’, ‘conceptual errors’ and discursive boundaries. This investigation takes up this point, highlighting its parallel with contemporary anxieties concerning the ‘use’ and ‘autonomy’ of literature. Combining the work of four key critics (Barbara Johnson, Kevin Newmark, Christina Hauck and Maria C. Scott) it will be argued that abortion has already undergone a degree of formulation as a less negative aesthetic, and its manifestation as an aesthetic is presented as governing textual strategies, as well as dynamics between author, reader, and text. The poetry of Hardy and Dickinson offers an invaluable starting-point in which to explore this possibility in practice, clarifying the trope’s characteristics and potential. The abortion trope informing nineteenth-century poetics impacts various aesthetic paradigms during the period, while also shedding light upon conventional perceptions of abortion today. The impetus here is to encourage conceptual expansion and support conceptual change, challenging some of the more debilitating formulations of abortion.

A couple travels through Spain in order to obtain an abortion for an unwanted pregnancy. The couple, an unnamed American man and a woman known only by the nickname Jig, has a much more complicated relationship than first seems and must navigate through complex emotions and gender roles. This story, and elaboration on Hemingway’s well known “Hills Like White Elephants”, attempts to give the characters introduced by Hemingway more depth and back story than the original short story.

Bakgrund: Globalt genomfördes ungefär 56 miljoner aborter år 2014 och i Sverige genomförs årligen omkring 35–38000 aborter. Det finns olika anledningar till att kvinnorna väljer att avbryta sina graviditeter. Några av sakerna är att det är fel tidpunkt i livet, socioekonomiska faktorer, brist på utbildning och att förhållandet till partnern inte är stabilt. Det finns studier som visat att en av fyra kvinnor och endast hälften av deras partners, varit nöjda med vården vid en abort. Det är därför viktigt att belysa kvinnors upplevelser av omvårdnaden och öka kunskapen hos sjuksköterskor om hur de bäst kan stödja kvinnor som genomgår en abort. Syfte: Syftet med denna studie var att beskriva kvinnors upplevelser av omvårdnaden i samband med en abort. Metod: Litteraturöversikten baserades på 15 stycken vetenskapliga artiklar från databaserna CINAHL, PubMed och PsycINFO. Resultat: Kvinnors upplevelser av omvårdnaden i samband med en abort var främst att de fick en bristande information och en otillräcklig smärtlindring. Resultatet visade även att det är viktigt att få ett bra stöd och ett neutralt och icke-dömande bemötande från sjuksköterskor och närstående. Det var även viktigt för kvinnor att få bestämma över sin egen abort. Slutsats: En abort är komplex då det innebär både fysisk och emotionell smärta. Det är viktigt att kvinnorna får information om aborten och hur den kan påverka dem fysiskt och emotionellt. Sjuksköterskor måste även vara anpassningsbara och lyhörda för olika behov, samt ge ett professionellt och neutralt stöd. Detta eftersom en abort ofta är fylld av skuld och skam.
Background: Globally, approximately 56 million abortions were performed in 2014 and in Sweden about 35–38000 abortions are performed annually. There are various reasons why women choose to end their pregnancies. Some of the things are that there is the wrong time in life, socio-economic factors, lack of education and that the relationship with the partner is not stable. There are studies that show that one in four women and only half of their partners have been satisfied with the nursing care during an abortion. It is therefore important to describe women's experiences of nursing and to increase knowledge about their experiences in how to best support women who undergo an abortion. Aim: The aim of this literature review was to describe women´s experiences of nursing during an abortion. Method: A literature review based on 15 scientific articles from the databases CINAHL, PubMed and PsycINFO. Results: The women's experiences of the nursing care during an abortion were mainly that they received a lack of information and insufficient pain relief. The results also showed the importance of a good support and a neutral and non-judgmental treatment from the nurses and the relatives. It was also important for women being able to decide on their own abortion. Conclusion: An abortion is complex as it involves both physical and emotional pain. It is important that women get information about the abortion and how it can affect them physically and emotionally. Nurses must also be adaptable and responsive for different needs, as well as provide professional and neutral support. This because an abortion is often filled with guilt and shame.

Prior to the advent of modern birth control beginning in the nineteenth century, the biological reproductive cycle of pregnancy, post-partum recovery, and nursing dominated women’s adult years. The average birth rate per woman in 1800 was just over seven, but by 1900, that rate had fallen to just under than three and a half. The question that this dissertation explores is what cultural narratives about reproduction and reproductive control emerge in the wake of this demographic shift. What’s at stake in a woman’s decision to reproduce, for herself, her family, her nation? How do women, and society, control birth? In order to explore these questions, this dissertation broadens the very term “birth control” from the technological and medical mechanisms by which women limit or prevent conception and birth to a conception of “controlling birth,” the societal and cultural processes that affect reproductive practices. This dissertation, then, constructs a cultural narrative of the process of controlling birth. Moving away from a focus on “negative birth control”—contraception, abortion, sterilization—the term “controlling birth” also applies to engineering or encouraging wanted or desired reproduction. While the chapters of this work often focus on traditional sites of birth control—contraceptives, abortion, and eugenics—they are not limited to those forms, uncovering previously hidden narratives of reproduction control. This new lens also reveals men’s investment in these reproductive practices. By focusing on a variety of cultural texts—advertisements, fictional novels, historical writings, medical texts, popular print, and film—this project aims to create a sense of how these cultural productions work together to construct narratives about sexuality, reproduction, and reproductive control. Relying heavily on a historicizing of these issues, my project shows how these texts—both fictional and nonfictional—create a rich and valid site from which to explore the development of narratives of sexuality and reproductive practices, as well as how these narratives connect to larger cultural narratives of race, class, and nation. The interdisciplinary nature of this inquiry highlights the interrelationship between the literary productions of the nineteenth and twentieth century and American cultural history.

Bakgrund: Abort är en process där en graviditet avslutas och styrs av abortlagen, som ändrades till sin nuvarande form år 1974. Kvinnan ska själv bestämma över sin graviditet. En abort kan ske via medicinska åtgärder eller genom kirurgiska åtgärder beroende på graviditetsvecka. Abort är en svår process för kvinnorna och det är kvinnan eget beslut. Det kan vara utmanande både för kvinnan och för sjuksköterskan som arbetar med aborter.   Syfte: Att beskriva sjuksköterskans erfarenheter i mötet med kvinnor som genomför abort.  Metod: Litteraturöversikten är baserad på 15 vetenskapliga artiklar från databaserna CINAHL och PubMed. Alla artiklarna är granskade och godkända enligt etisk kommitté. Artiklarna kvalitetsgranskades och är av medel eller hög kvalitet. Under analysen kategoriserades artiklarna genom likheter och skillnader och 5 kategorier framkom.   Resultat: De olika valda kategorierna som framkom i resultatet var: att känna engagemang och stolthet, att behöva stöd och hantera känslor, att möta kvinnan, att uppleva etiska och moraliska dilemman och att uppleva hinder och ett behov av mer utbildning inom abortvård.   Slutsats: Litteraturöversikten påvisade att sjuksköterskor upplevde mötet med kvinnorna som emotionellt och de sökte därför stöd från sin närmaste omgivning. Genom kvinnornas tacksamhet upplevde sjuksköterskorna engagemang till arbetet och ansåg sin roll vara stöttande och inte dömande. Dock kunde sjuksköterskorna uppleva en konflikt mellan personliga och professionella värderingar samt hinder i arbetet som grundas i ett stort antal patienter.
Background: Abortion is a process in which a pregnancy ends and is governed by the Abortion Act, which was changed to its present form in 1974. The woman determines about her pregnancy. An abortion can be done through medical measures or surgical procedures depending on weeks of pregnancy. Abortion is a difficult process for the women and it is the woman's own decision. It can be challenging for both the woman and the nurse working with abortions.  Aim: To describe nurse´s experiences in meeting women who going through an abortion.   Method: The literature review is based on 15 scientific articles from the CINAHL and PubMed databases. All articles are reviewed and approved by the Ethics Committee. The articles were quality checked and are of medium or high quality. During analyzes, the articles were categorized by similarities and differences and 5 categories.  Results: The various selected categories that emerged in the results were: feeling commitment and pride, needing support and dealing with emotions, meeting the woman, experiencing ethical and moral dilemmas and experiencing obstacles and needs for more education in abortion care.  Conclusion: The literature review showed that nurses perceived meeting the women as emotional and sought support from their surroundings. Through the women’s gratitude, the nurses experienced commitment to work and considered their role to be supportive and not judgmental. However, the nurses could experience conflicts between personal and professional values and obstacles in work based in many patients.

Plantea que el tema del poemario Trilce de César Vallejo es el aborto del feto y aborda está temática en el resto de la obra del poeta. Analiza un cronotopo o situaciones comunes por épocas que van desde los poemas juveniles de Vallejo pasando por Los heraldos negros hasta finales de los cuarenta y un semema común es el fracaso en el no nacimiento del hijo. Asimismo se analizará la dialogización de conceptos, el pathos o terror a la paternidad en César Vallejo como autorreferencialidad en su obra y en esquemas claramente metafóricos que lo hacen aún más complejos.
Tesis

Die philosophischen Grundlagen der Meta-Dimension des Rechts auf Menschenwürde lösen eine Fragestellung aus, die die Grenzen der Disziplin des Rechts übertrifft: wie könnte das Transzendentale als ein Aspekt der Bedeutung von Menschenwürde dargestellt werden? Das Beharren auf der nicht-Bestimmung des Menschenbildes oder auf dem Begriff ‚Gott’ in der Präambel des Deutschen Grundgesetzes, wie es sich in der Deutschen Dogmatik widerspiegelt, gepaart mit dem Bestreben nach einer Fall-zu-Fall ad hoc Konkretisierung dessen, was Menschenwürde bedeutet, inspiriert diese Untersuchung von ‚etwas fehlt’ [‘something missing’]. In postmoderner Art und Weise beschreibt diese Geschichte das Gesetz der Menschenwürde als Trojanisches Pferd und bietet hermeneutische und literarische Grundlagen für eine affirmative Haltung gegenüber einer ''leeren'' Rede im juristischen Diskurs. Die Forschungsfrage erweckt und umkreist die polemisch verbrämten Begriffe von ‚Leere’ und ‚Black Box’: Warum erscheint der Rechtsbegriff der Menschenwürde ‚leer’? Oder wie ist er ‚leer’? Warum und wie ist er eine ‚Black Box’? Wie erscheinen Manifestationen des Konzepts abstrakt wie Universalien, aber im Einzelnen konkret? Die ontologischen, sprachlich-analytischen und phänomenologischen philosophischen Erkenntnisse, vorgestellt im ersten Kapitel, bilden die Linse, durch die fünf maßgebliche Fälle des Bundesverfassungsgerichtes – über Abtreibung, lebenslange Freiheitsstrafe, Transsexualität, staatliche Reaktion auf Terroranschläge und die Gewährleistung eines menschenwürdigen Existenzminimums – im zweiten Kapitel analysiert werden. Die philosophischen Quellen werden nicht als Momente im langen Verlauf der Menschenwürde in der Geschichte der Ideen eingeklammert.
The philosophical underpinnings of what may be called the meta-dimension of the law of human dignity trigger a question that surpasses the boundaries of the discipline of law: how could the transcendental as an aspect of human dignity meaning be portrayed? The insistence on non-determination of the Menschenbild [human image] or ‘God’ in the Preamble to the German Basic Law [Grundgesetz] reflected in German legal doctrine, paired with the commitment to case-by-case ad hoc concretization of what human dignity means inspire this story of ‘something missing’. In postmodern fashion, this story portrays the law of human dignity as a Trojan Horse and provides hermeneutic and literary foundations for an affirmative stance towards ‘emptiness’ talk in legal discourse. The research question rekindles and twists polemically framed ‘emptiness’ and ‘black box’ contentions: Why does the legal concept of human dignity appear ‘empty’? Or, how is it ‘empty’? Why and how is it a ‘black box’? How do manifestations of the concept appear abstract as universals and concrete as particulars? The ontological, linguistic-analytical, and phenomenological philosophical insights presented in Chapter One compose the lens through which five benchmark Bundesverfassungsgericht cases – on abortion, life imprisonment, transsexuals, state response to terrorist attacks, and the guarantee of a dignified subsistence minimum – are analyzed in Chapter Two. The philosophical sources are not bracketed as moments in the long course of human dignity in the history of ideas.

This dissertation examines the evolution and interaction of the public policy debate on reproductive issues in Germany and literary portrayals of crisis pregnancies in German literature and concentrates mainly on literature produced in the 20th century. Clusters of works thematicizing infanticide and abortion appear when public attention is focused on issues of morality and population concerns. The discussion about the rising number of infanticide cases during the late 18th century was accompanied by a cluster of works aligned with the Storm and Stress movement. These works explored injustices committed by the upper classes against the lower classes and evoked sympathy for the woman by depicting the woman's circumstances and motivations. During the Weimar Republic left-wing and left-leaning political parties called for a liberalization of the complete ban on abortions in place since 1871. The plays and novels that appeared in the 1920s and early 1930s explored the class-discriminatory effects of the law. Many depicted young, single, working women, an image that called up both positive and negative cultural connotations including a rational, efficient outlook on life as well as decadence and consumerism. The postwar works fall into three phases. The early works of the 1950s and 1960s explore the issue within the context of war atrocities and question society's view of death and killing. In the mid-1970s, abortion was legalized in the East and liberalized somewhat in the West. A cluster of works appeared in the early 1980s that explores the longer-term effects of abortion on both men and women. Two novels by women written after reunification return to a more direct political message and explore how choice affects women's lives. These last two works represent the opposite viewpoint of the works from the 1920s and 1930s, but like their historical precursors, they are opposed to the prevailing legal status of abortion.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2007.
Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 68-11, Section: A, page: 4704. Adviser: Robert Dale Parker. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 149-175) Available on microfilm from Pro Quest Information and Learning.

Dissertação de Mestrado em Estudos de Cultura, Literatura e Línguas Modernas apresentada à Faculdade de Letras
The series “The Handmaid´s Tale”, created by Hulu in 2016, is an adaptation of the novel with the same name written by Margaret Atwood, published in 1985. The story follows how a religious autocratic regime, Gilead, would come to power in the United States. The book is one of the most famous pieces of feminist literature, reflecting on the second wave feminist movement and the opposition to women´s equality that arose in its aftermath. The series extends the representation of female characters and feminist themes. The adaptation however updates the reflection of feminist movements as heterogenous, focuses on the importance of solidarity and cooperation between women and expands on the message of urgency in fighting for women´s rights. With the election of President Trump in 2016, there was a new push for restrictive abortion laws and the nomination of new conservative judges to the Supreme Court. As a result, 2017 was marked for a new awakening to women´s equality. The series reflects on this moment and creates an analogy between Gilead and the current society, emphasizing the consequences of passiveness and the lack of movements for social equality when face with new legislation that puts previous earn rights at risk.Elevating the series characters as heroines prone to inspire, catapulting the red cloak as a powerful symbol of protest and creating communities on social media, the first season of the “Handmaid´s Tale” has created tools that inspire protests, cultural production and the continuation of the discussion around the series themes.With topical themes, the series adds to the book historical influences and together they create a frame of reference to the different periods in history where women have seen their rights being in peril. With the adapted story and the new media, the series symbols are now used worldwide to criticize political and social changes through the lenses of women´s equality.
A série “The Handmaid´s Tale”, criada pela Hulu em 2016, é uma adaptação do romance com o mesmo nome, escrito por Margaret Atwood, publicado em 1985. A história apresenta como um regime religioso autocrata, Gilead, subiu ao poder nos Estados Unidos. O livro é considerado um dos trabalhos mais importantes da literatura feminista, refletindo a segunda onda do movimento feminista e da oposição que surgiu no rescaldo desta. A série expande a representação de personagens femininas e os temas feministas. A adaptação diferencia-se da sua fonte por refletir movimentos feministas como heterogéneos, por se focar na importância da solidariedade e cooperação entre as mulheres e por expandir a mensagem de urgência na luta pelos seus direitos. A eleição do Presidente Trump em 2016 trouxe a aprovação de legislação que restringe o aborto e a nomeação de novos juízes conservadores para o Supremo Tribunal. Como consequência, 2017 foi marcado por um novo despertar da luta pelos direitos das mulheres. A série reflete este momento e cria correspondências entre Gilead e a sociedade atual, especialmente em relação às consequências da passividade e falta de mobilização pela igualdade no surgimento de políticas que põem em causa os direitos adquiridos.Transformando personagens em heroínas capazes de inspirar outras mulheres a nível global, elevando o manto vermelho a um símbolo poderoso de protesto e motivando grupos em redes sociais onde os fãs da série formam comunidades, a primeira temporada de “The Handmaid´s Tale” criou ferramentas que têm inspirado protestos, produções culturais e continuado a discussão pública em torno dos seus temas.Com uma mensagem moldada ao momento atual, a série expande as referências históricas do livro e, juntas, criam um quadro de referência para os diferentes períodos da história em que as mulheres viram os seus direitos em perigo. Com uma história adaptada e um novo media, a série é agora referenciada em todo um mundo para criticar mudanças políticas e sociais através da perspetiva dos direitos das mulheres.

This dissertation argues that the crucial quality of American literary naturalism is the polemicism of its major authors and texts. Scholars have long been attuned to the “rebellious” nature of naturalism. Indeed, following the charge of H. L. Mencken (for whom naturalism constituted an aesthetic assault on the pious vacuities of Howellsian social realism), critics have been apt to frame naturalism as the national literature of disobedience. What is less than clear, however, is what, exactly, naturalism is supposed to be rebelling against. In a century of criticism, naturalism has constituted an assault on “machine industrialism” (Parrington), romantic imagination (Trilling), literary realism (Pizer), sentimentality (Lehan), regionalism and local color fiction (Campbell), feminization (Seltzer), capitalism (Benn Michaels), European aestheticism (Dudley), and patriarchal hegemony (Fleissner). My thesis builds on the assumption that the “real object” of naturalism’s rebellion is less definitive than the antinomian spirit itself. The naturalists, in short, were polemicists: naturalism is defined less by a coherent and stable philosophical orientation than by an attitude, a posture of aggressive controversy, which happens to cluster loosely around particular philosophical themes. Moreover, the conspicuous polemicism of the original naturalist project has been registered and extended in the critical construction of the genre over the past century. Naturalism has always depended upon polemical reconstruction by its critics, who were themselves feeding upon the palpable polemicism of Norris, Dreiser, et. al. In chapter one, I argue that the naturalists (and their critics) have adopted a self-effacing polemical rhetoric to establish the genre as the “central marginal” figure in the American canon. By emphasizing their own otherness to the American mainstream, the naturalists were, in effect, claiming it. Then, in close examinations of works by Frank Norris, Theodore Dreiser, and Richard Wright, I argue that the naturalists used their fiction to explore some of the most controversial political and cultural issues in modern American life. Scholars have long noticed how naturalism draws on the scientific theories of Darwin, Spencer, Sumner, Huxley, and others to challenge the prevailing Judeo-Christian cosmology. But the naturalists also charted the basic co-ordinates of a wide range of issues. So, my second chapter considers Frank Norris’s The Octopus in relation to emerging discourses of environmentalism and nascent anxieties over ecological despoliation. Chapter three considers the relationship between abortion and censorship in Theodore Dreiser’s An American Tragedy, and argues that the “tragedy” of Dreiser’s text hinges upon our understanding how its protagonist, Clyde Griffiths, is himself a work of art. In chapter four, I argue that Native Son’s chilling protagonist, Bigger Thomas, represents a distinctly modern figure for terror, and that the novel elaborates a disturbing complimentarity between terrorism and lynching as the crime and punishment that exist outside the confines of the law. While my project considers each of these polemical debates within the cultural and intellectual climates in which they emerged, it is also an attempt to engage with these ideas in their own spirit—that is, to situate naturalistic novels, polemically, within the highly fraught contexts they helped to invent.

Encore est le récit d’une jeune femme hantée par un avortement qui lui semble n’avoir jamais eu lieu et pourtant se rappelle sans cesse à elle, comme un mauvais rêve. C’est l’histoire de son désir, écrite contre la domestication de son corps, et par laquelle elle tente de se réapproprier le néant de son ventre et d’y faire apparaître les traces de sa mémoire. Mon essai porte sur Le Bleu du ciel de Georges Bataille, dont j’ai voulu interroger les « monstrueuses anomalies » — expression qu’emploie Bataille lui-même dans la préface de son livre. Comment faire un monstre de récit, comment transgresser la loi d’un genre réputé sans contrainte ? Mon projet aura été de mettre en évidence, plutôt que la monstruosité de l’histoire racontée, le travail, ou la besogne, dans l’écriture de ce récit, de l’informe et de la chance, termes que j’emprunte à Bataille et soumets au jeu de sa fiction.
Encore (Again) tells the story of a young woman haunted by an abortion, which she thinks has never happened to her, and yet keeps hounding her, especially in her dreams. This is the story of her desire, held against the domestication of her body, and through it, she tries to repossess her womb and make the traces of her past appear, beyond the visible. My essay addresses the « freakish anomalies » of Georges Bataille’s Blue of Noon (Le Bleu du ciel), as Bataille himself qualified his novel in his preface. How to transgress a genre that has no law, no constraint ? Rather than analyzing the freakishness of the narrative or the characters, I have tried to understand how writing was here performed, or tasked, by formless and chance, two concepts that I have borrowed from Bataille and confronted to his fiction.