Abstract

The breast/chestfeeding body is a site of intense politics and power relations in the United States. Hardly a week passes without an incident in the news of a person being publically shamed, or unlawfully asked to change their behavior while using their body to feed their infant in public. Lactating bodies are deemed out-of-place. Simultaneously, birth-parents are judged on their infant feeding practices, with those who do not nurse cast outside of the biologically deterministic ‘good mother’ role. This framing causes the nursing or not-nursing body to become a site of debate. These takes, which point to governance, surveillance, and sexualization of bodies are limiting and have brought these debates to an impasse. What I suggest here is that a re-reading is needed, which situates the body as a site of care, here I focus on the lactating body in particular considering food production, co-production, and consumption. Re-reading the body in this way illuminates how food production and care work are undervalued as related to infant feeding and re-casts the act of nursing as not about ‘women’s bodies’ but about food + care. Ultimately, such work allows for bodies to be considered multiple and as transformational sites of knowledge production.

摘要

母乳喂养机构是美国政治和权力关系紧张的场所。几乎没有一周没有一个人在公共场合被公开羞辱，或被非法要求改变他们的行为，同时在公共场合用他们的身体喂养婴儿的新闻。泌乳体被认为是不合适的。同时，对亲生父母的评判取决于他们的婴儿喂养方式，而那些不吃奶的人则被排除在生物学决定论的“好母亲”角色之外。这种框架导致护理或非护理机构成为争论的焦点。这些观点表明，对身体的治理、监视和性别化是有限的，并使这些辩论陷入僵局。我在这里的建议是需要重新阅读，将身体定位为护理场所，在这里，我将重点关注泌乳体，特别是考虑食物生产、联合生产和消费。以这种方式重新解读身体，阐明了食品生产和护理工作是如何被低估的，因为它们与婴儿喂养有关，并将护理行为重新定义为不是关于“女性身体”，而是关于食物+护理。最终，这样的工作允许将身体视为多个并作为知识生产的转化场所。