The ethics and politics of breastfeeding : power, pleasure, poetics /

Rather than engaging in standard debate either "for" or "against" breastfeeding, which relies mainly on medical research, Lee (Univ. of Alberta) problematizes the way the topic has been approached in Western culture. She avoids ethical or feminist paradigms and asks why there is so much controversy surrounding breastfeeding. The author briefly discusses the political decision to classify mammals by the defining feature of the production of milk by female mammary glands. She then approaches breastfeeding in terms of its strangeness, recognizing that the practice "unsettles independence and autonomy" and "throws subjectivity into question." Applying primarily the theoretical work of Michel Foucault, Emmanuel Levinas, and Luce Irigaray, the book examines how breastfeeding is shaped by discourses of power. Lee combines elements from their work to develop an understanding of breastfeeding as "an art of living" or "poiesis," which resists essentializing women as mothers. Furthermore, she uses insights from Donna Haraway on kinship and from the reproductive justice movement to propose a new art of breastfeeding composed of "bodily practices that are creatively imagined and continually transformed" (p. 12). Summing Up: Recommended. Advanced undergraduates through faculty and professionals. --Jennifer Jean Reed, University of Nevada-Las Vegas