Date of Award
Summer 1994
Document Type
Thesis - Restricted
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department
Communication
First Advisor
Sterk, Helen
Second Advisor
Turner, Lynn
Third Advisor
Vusse, Leona Vande
Abstract
This thesis analyzes birthing experience narratives, featuring examination of the male partner's involvement. The analysis is informed by Walter Fisher's narrative paradigm, which sees all stories as powerful rhetoric, vital to our human lives. How male partners are featured in women's private birthing stories as well as in public, popular birthing stories reveals two important, persuasive forms of rhetoric worthy of comparison and analysis. The private stories represent a report of personal experience; thus, the public stories are compared to standards of experience as told in the private stories. In that respect, the private stories are privileged, since they represent a woman's personal birthing experience. The private and public stories are studied in terms of probability and fidelity. Probability is tested by checking the internal coherence of the women's stories, while fidelity is verified through thematic comparisons of the public with the private stories. Overall, many of the public themes did not meet measures of fidelity. Specifically, the public stories were found to idealize and over-valorize a male partner's role in the birthing experience. The conclusion suggests such a distortion reinforces patriarchal assumptions of male importance in all key events of family life.
Recommended Citation
Finstad, Jessica Kristine, "Unrealistic Expectations: A Thematic Comparison of Public and Private Birthing Narratives" (1994). Master's Theses (1922-2009) Access restricted to Marquette Campus. 1777.
https://epublications.marquette.edu/theses/1777