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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:Women's Childbearing Decisions in Guinea: Life Course Perspectives and Historical Change
Author:Levin, Elise C.ISNI
Year:2000
Periodical:Africa Today
Volume:47
Issue:3-4
Period:Fall
Pages:63-81
Language:English
Geographic term:Guinea
Subjects:women
pregnancy
Women's Issues
Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups)
Cultural Roles
Marital Relations and Nuptiality
Fertility and Infertility
Women and Their Children
External link:http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/africa_today/v047/47.3levin.pdf
Abstract:This paper examines Guinean women's perspectives on childbearing, family size and contraception at different stages of the life course, or 'kare', a Mandinka concept which has been translated elsewhere as age group or age grade. The author uses the life course approach to analyse two kinds of evidence about women's childbearing decisions: the ways that people use the past and future to rationalize actions in the present, and observations of intrahousehold interactions about childbearing. Despite some older women's claims that family size is shrinking, there is no statistical evidence of a change in fertility. The author shows that women's reproductive intentions vary according to their life course stage - 'sunkuru ni', or recently married; 'sunkuru' or married mothers; 'salibani' or established women with four or five children; and 'koro musow', older women - and both their actions and explanations of their own and other women's behaviour reflect this variation. Yet it is women in the younger 'kare' who say they want large numbers of children and those of the older 'kare' who speak more about limited household resources and the need for contraception. The author concludes that while the life course framework explains a good deal of the variation in reproductive talk and practice, historical changes over the last fifty years must also be taken into account. The paper is based on research carried out in Dabola, in the Haute Guinée region of Guinea, in 1994-1995. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum.
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