ABSTRACT
This volume explores the conditions under which women are empowered, and feel entitled, to make the health decisions that are best for them. At its core, it illuminates how the most basic element of communication, voice, has been summarily suppressed for entire groups of women when it comes to control of their own sexuality, reproductive lives, and health. By giving voice to these women’s experiences, the book shines a light on ways to improve health communication for women.
Bringing together personal narratives, key theory and literature, and original qualitative and quantitative studies, the book provides an in-depth comparative picture of how and why women’s health varies for distinct groups of women. Organized into four parts—historical influences on patient and provider perceptions, breast cancer the silence and the shame, make it taboo: mothering, reproduction, and womanhood, and sex, sexuality, relational health, and womanhood—each section is introduced with a brief synthesis and discussion of the key questions addressed across the chapters.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
part |23 pages
Historical Influences on Patient and Provider Perceptions
chapter |11 pages
Voices from the Past
chapter |11 pages
The Culture of Medicine
part |27 pages
Breast Cancer, the Silence and the Shame
chapter |16 pages
Pink Is for (Survivor) Girls
chapter |10 pages
Breast Cancer and Shame
part |62 pages
Make it Taboo
chapter |13 pages
Comparing Chinese Immigrant Women with Caucasian Women on Maternal Health Communication with Healthcare Providers
part |67 pages
Sex, Sexuality, Relational Health, and Womanhood