The Dance of Nurture

Download or read book The Dance of Nurture written by Penny Van Esterik and published by Berghahn Books. This book was released on 2017-06-01 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Breastfeeding and child feeding at the center of nurturing practices, yet the work of nurture has escaped the scrutiny of medical and social scientists. Anthropology offers a powerful biocultural approach that examines how custom and culture interact to support nurturing practices. Our framework shows how the unique constitutions of mothers and infants regulate each other. The Dance of Nurture integrates ethnography, biology and the political economy of infant feeding into a holistic framework guided by the metaphor of dance. It includes a critique of efforts to improve infant feeding practices globally by UN agencies and advocacy groups concerned with solving global nutrition and health problems.