The Right to Birth-Control Information in Family Planning

1965 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 96-101
Author(s):  
Susan G. Davis

Gershon Legman was born to poor Hungarian-Romanian immigrants in Scranton, Pennsylvania, in 1917. This chapter lays out the origins of his interest in collecting erotica and folklore and connects his scholarly beginnings to his childhood and early education. Gershon grew up in the intensely pious world of Orthodox Judaism and was, his parents felt, destined to be a rabbi. His childhood was spent in the study of words and texts. As a boy, he chafed at the prudery of his domineering father, and as an adolescent he was appalled by the American censorship regime that kept accurate sex and birth control information out of the hands of ordinary people. Rejecting his parents’ goals for him, Legman became absorbed with the literature and oral traditions of sex and began his extensive collection of dirty jokes. The author uses Legman’s letters and memoirs to explore the familial and personal origins of his lifelong erotic folklore collecting projects, including his purported kinship to Viennese folklorist Friedrich S. Krauss.


2008 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 225 ◽  
Author(s):  
William MacKinnon

Grocery lists, birth control information, bank records, and intimate letters to friends past: all are personal items that find their way into the garbage bins of Canadians on a daily basis.1 Canadians have come to expect that once a garbage bag is thrown in a bin behind a home, it makes a direct uninterrupted trip to a landfill, a place where its contents will remain private through the decomposition process. Few realize that, quite frequently, the police, as state agents charged with the responsibility of solving criminal cases, sift through the discarded items of Canadians in the hunt for valuable information. This police behaviour raises two important constitutional questions...


Author(s):  
Monica Khanna

Feminist studies accord great importance to the issue of reproductive rights, because the control over her body is the first step that a woman takes towards liberation and freedom from the oppression by patriarchy. Adele Clarke in her essay ‘Subtle Forms of Sterilization Abuse’ comments: Reproduction is a fundamental human right: neither the state nor the actions of others should deny any person autonomy over their reproductive processes […] Reproductive freedom is the prerequisite for any kind of liberation for women. The right to decide whether and when to bear children is fundamental to a woman’s control of her own body, her sexuality, her life choices. (Clarke 1984: 189-190) This paper examines two stories which deal with the right of a woman to birth control and family planning, ‘Daktaramma’s Room’ (2004) by R. Chudamani and ‘Giribala’ (2004) by Mahashwta Devi.


2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 281-290 ◽  
Author(s):  
Flore Janssen

Abstract This article explores the debate around widening access to birth control information in the late nineteenth century through a case study of Annie Besant’s participation in the 1877 Knowlton Trial. Examining Besant’s rhetoric at the trial and in related publications, it highlights the public and performative nature of her campaign to facilitate access to birth control information for working-class married couples. With reference to the representation of issues of gender and social class and the shifting focus from the private to the public in Besant’s rhetoric, the article argues that the late nineteenth-century debate around birth control access was a middle-class debate about working-class life and experience.


2015 ◽  
Vol 125 (3) ◽  
pp. 144-148 ◽  
Author(s):  
Agnieszka Skrzeczkowska ◽  
Jerzy Heimrath ◽  
Justyna Surdyka ◽  
Jerzy Zalewski

Abstract Introduction. Family planning methods let one make an informed decision about having children at the right time. People have been trying to adopt the right family planning methods for centuries, mainly through using various contraceptives. These used to be very diverse over the time, yet the goal remained the same – preventing pregnancy. Aim. Assessment of the factors affecting the knowledge and prevalence of contraceptive methods, as well as the factors affecting sexual behavior of adolescents/young adults. Material and methods. 219 individuals (111 women and 108 men) between 17-21 years of age, attending secondary schools, participated in this voluntary and anonymous study. A survey questionnaire prepared by the authors was used as a study tool. Statistical analysis of the data obtained was performed using the SPSS 17.0 software. Results. 81% of the adolescents/young adults stated that their knowledge of contraception is sufficient for them to be in charge of their own sexual lives, whilst some 9% mentioned that they lacked such knowledge, 85% of the young people studied stated that they were interested in contraception. The main sources of knowledge about contraception are the Internet (35%) and peers (22%). The survey showed that 59% of the individuals correctly answered the question regarding the length of a woman’s menstrual cycle, 77% correctly defined the first day of the cycle, and 49% correctly determined the time of ovulation. The studied group of people had difficulties determining menstrual cycle phases; 23% considered them as fixed, 27% – that they are variable, and 29% gave the correct answer. The surveyed people thought that contraceptive method effectiveness (43%), availability (33%) and ease of administration (17%) are most important when choosing the method. Condoms are the most common (72%) contraceptive method among the surveyed people while hormonal contraceptives and interrupted intercourse are poorly known (12% and 11%, respectively). The respondents deemed the hormonal method (50%), and intrauterine contraceptive methods (21%) and condoms (21%) the most effective modes of contraception. They thought that interrupted intercourse (53%) and natural birth control methods (34%) are the least effective. The age at which most of the respondents started their sexual life ranged between 16 and 18; with the age of 16 being the most common (24.2%). Some 40% of the surveyed called their sexual intercourse occasional. Conclusions. Adolescents consider both the Internet and their peers the primary source of information about sexuality, family planning or birth control methods. The average age of the first sexual experiences has been gradually decreasing and the condom remains to be the most common method of contraception for adolescents/young adults. The knowledge concerning family is insufficient and frequently inaccurate. Education in the fields of sexuality, contraceptive and family planning methods should be included in primary school curriculum.


1979 ◽  
Vol 10 (4) ◽  
pp. 186-189
Author(s):  
Chrisann S. Geist ◽  
Chilton Knudsen ◽  
Kurt Sorenson

Should sex education be an important topic covered in our planning for independent living for the retarded? Given the fact that many retarded persons have or will be involved in sexual activity, let us take a practical look at some of the issues involved. Birth control information should be delivered and a positive attitude toward one's own body and sexuality in general should be promoted. This article takes a practical approach to these questions, attempts to answer some and creates a few more.


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