lecture 7 additional infanticide
TRANSCRIPT
Infanticide
The new-born cried lustily as it came into this world… when
the mother laid eyes on her baby, tears welled up in her eyes.
They were not tears of joy… What crossed [the mother’s]
mind was not the anticipation of the joys of motherhood but
the trials that lay ahead.
(Venkatramani 1992: 127). “
How could a family of day-wage agricultural workers… afford to
bring up and marry off two daughters? How could they, when the
dowry demanded by bridegrooms was always astronomical? The
couple had decided to have a second child only in the desperate
hope that it would be a boy. But on this sunny day, the dream lay
shattered
“
Definitions1
Explanations2
Film3
Definitions1
the murder of an infant by its mother - and its subset of neonaticide - when the killing occurs within twenty-four hours of a child's birth“
(Ryznar 2013: 1)
Deliberate killing of children after [and
before] birth “(Watts and Zimmerman 2002: 1236)
Various
forms
sex-selective abortion
non-reporting of live birth and killing
‘accidental’ death
out adoption
abandonment
77 million missing girls in Asia (Amartya Sen)
between
113 and 200 million women demographically missing (UN)
1989
2010
hospitals, medical practitioners, communities,
relatives understand conditions and conspire
in murder
or longer-term neglect
“
not culture specific but
specificvulnerability
Infanticide quite common in colonial America,
during which time an estimated one-third of all
killings were infanticides (Ryznar 2013:1)
“
common in Ancient Greece, targeting unwanted, vulnerable, or disabled children (Ryznar 2013: 1)
In the Kassena-Nankana District of Ghana… some
children are subject to infanticide because they
are regarded as spirit children sent “from the
bush” to cause misfortune and destroy the family
(Denham et al, 2010: 609).
“
appears in Orwell’s ‘Down and Out in Paris and London’
There are very few cultures in which males are more apt to
be killed than females… In 19th and early 20th century
Western Europe, [infanticide]… was publicly condemned
but practiced covertly, in ways that made it appear
accidental or inadvertent
(Warren 1985: 32-41).
“
Defended and/or explained as
‘cultural’ issue
or denied
Birth: girls killed
low pay negates rationale for
schooling
wage asymmetry devalue females
low earnings justifies dowry
females married off to reduce
cost andincur costs in new family
parents need sons for pensions
favour boys over girls
generates misogyny
towards females
girl children feared
Explanations2
Biology
Predisposition to males: more valuable and important in harsher environments
Socio-economic
It’s a Girl
Ryznar, M (2013). ‘A Crime of Its Own? A Proposal for Achieving Greater Sentencing Consistency in Neonaticide and Infanticide Cases’. University of San Francisco Law Review, Winter
Denham AR et al (2010). ‘Chasing spirits: Clarifying the spirit child phenomenon and infanticide in Northern Ghana’.Social Science & Medicine 71(3), pp. 608-615
Additional bibliography