Earlier this month, Sheila Kitzinger, author, anthropologist and expert on natural childbirth died at her home in Oxfordshire, aged 86.
She is held to be a pioneer of her field and brought empowerment to women in childbirth at a time when doctors dictated the terms of how a birth should be. In the 1960s and 70s she developed the concept of a "birth plan", which aimed to give more choice to pregnant women, and she was a strong advocate of home birth and natural birth, having given birth to her own 5 children at home.
Throughout her life, Sheila promoted the importance of midwives, doulas and women's choice and campaigned on a wide range of issues including female genital mutilation, prisoners giving birth in handcuffs and human rights in midwifery in Eastern Europe. She also set up the Birth Crisis Network, a helpline for mothers who had experienced a traumatic birth.
She wrote over 25 books on childbirth including
Birth & Sex: The Power and the Passion and the Politics of Birth, and received an MBE in 1982 in recognition of her services to education for childbirth.
"Sheila was one of the main birth educators whose work I resonated with in the late 80's when I was pregnant with my first baby. I used her book " Pregnancy and childbirth" as my course text book, before I wrote my own book because I felt she gave a very broad and comprehensive view of the whole period. I loved her focus on the power and beauty of birth and the way that she drew in her experiences of birthing women in many cultures. She brought the issue of women's experience of birth to centre stage, powerfully arguing how it affects the whole of a woman's life on so many levels, including her emotions and sexuality. She was never afraid to question the over medicalization of birth and I admired the way she continued campaigning on issues such as the experience of birth for women prisoners right up till the end of her life. She is truly an inspiration to us all in the birthing field and I am sure will continue to influence our work for many years to come! "
Suzanne Yates, Bodyworker and Childbirth Educator, Author of
Beautiful Birth
Well Mother
http://wellmother.wordpress.com
Sheila Kitzinger was to me one of the people who shifted my perspective on what it is to be female. Her observations on femininity, sexuality and spirituality and bringing that perspective into birth and mothering were pioneering and in my opinion still are unspoken in the mainstream. As an Anthropologist she was one of the few people who truly looked at the whole picture and through her observations of other cultures and how they view sex, pregnancy, birth and mothering it highlighted to me just how blinkered the western mainstream view of birth and is. I hope that her work continues to create awareness for women's issues and that her legacy to lives on with her many inspiring books.
Eva Fernandes, Co-Founder of Born
Sheila approached her death as she approached birth. Kitzinger's husband Uwe Kitzinger was quoted as saying,
"She took to her bed three months ago, but she was drinking Kir Royale and champagne and eating chocolates three days ago, knowing she didn't have long".
"She was an icon of home birth who decided to have a home death."
Sheila's autobiography, A Passion for Birth: My Life – Anthropology, Family and Feminism, is due to be published next month.
