Birthing the Nation: Strategies of Palestinian Women in Israel (Public Anthropology)

303 Pages·2002·2.27 MB·English

by  Rhoda Ann Kanaaneh

Birthing the Nation
california series in public anthropology
The California Series in Public Anthropology emphasizes the
anthropologist’s role as an engaged intellectual. It continues anthro-
pology’s commitment to being an ethnographic witness, to describ-
ing, in human terms, how life is lived beyond the borders of many
readers’ experiences. But it also adds a commitment, through
ethnography, to reframing the terms of public debate—transform-
ing received, accepted understandings of social issues with new
insights, new framings.
Series Editor:Robert Borofsky (Hawaii Pacific University)
Contributing Editors: Philippe Bourgois (UCSan Francisco),
Paul Farmer (Partners in Health), Rayna Rapp (New York
University), and Nancy Scheper-Hughes (UC Berkeley)
University of California Press Editor:Naomi Schneider
1. Twice Dead: Organ Transplants and the Reinvention of Death,
by Margaret Lock
2. Birthing the Nation: Strategies of Palestinian Women in Israel,
by Rhoda Ann Kanaaneh
Birthing the Nation
Strategies of Palestinian Women in Israel
Rhoda Ann Kanaaneh
with a Foreword by Hanan Ashrawi
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS
. .
Berkeley Los Angeles London
University of California Press
Berkeley and Los Angeles, California
University of California Press, Ltd.
London, England
Grateful acknowledgment is made for reuse of
material from previously published articles by the
author: “New Reproductive Rights and Wrongs” in
Contraception across Cultures: Technologies,
Choices, Constraints, edited by Andrew Russell,
Elisa Sobo, and Mary Thompson (Oxford: Berg
Press, 2000), and “Conceiving Difference: Planning
Families for the Palestinian Nation,” Critical Public
Health7, nos. 3–4 (1997): 64–79.
© 2002 by the Regents of the University of
California
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kanaaneh, Rhoda Ann.
Birthing the nation : strategies of Palestinian
women in Israel / Rhoda Ann Kanaaneh ; with a
foreword by Hanan Ashrawi.
p. cm. — (California series in public
anthropology ; 2) Includes bibliographical
references and index.
isbn0-520-22379-9 (Cloth : alk. paper) —
isbn0-520-22944-4 (Paper : alk. paper)
1. Birth control—Israel. 2. Women, Palestinian
Arab—Israel—Social conditions. I. Title.
II. Series.
hq766.5.i75 k363 2002
363.9(cid:2)6(cid:2)095694—dc21
2002001244
Manufactured in the United States of America
11 10 09 08 07 06 05 04 03 02
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
The paper used in this publication meets the
minimum requirements of ansi/nisoz39 0.48–
1992 (R 1997) (Permanence of Paper)(cid:2)(cid:3)
To my mother, Dolores Agnes Kanaaneh,
and my father, Hatim Abdul-Kader
Kanaaneh, with love

Contents
List of Illustrations ix
Foreword by Hanan Ashrawi xi
Acknowledgments xv
Introduction: Placing 1
1. Babies and Boundaries 23
2. Luxurious Necessities 81
3. Fertile Differences 104
4. Modernizing the Body 167
5. Son Preference 229
Conclusion 251
Bibliography 257
Index 277

Illustrations
map
Galilee 3
figures
1. The logos for the Israeli sick funds 51
2. “David’s Shield” plan for Judaizing the Galilee 54
3. “Every Month, Four Thousand Newborns in Gaza” 63
4. Poster: “Marriage under Age 18/Marriage above
Age 18” 64
5. “Patience” by Naji il-(cid:2)Ali 66
6. Sliman Mansour’s painting The Intifada...
the Mother 67
7. “Woman” page of al-(cid:3)Ittihad 70
8. Cover of Israeli Ministry of Health’s family
planning pamphlet 79
9. Kamli and her son in his new room 87
10. Advertisement for Buddy Pudding 93
11. Child dancing in center of class 108
12. The Land—Motherland and Existence 127
13. Catalogue of beauty and weight-loss products 169
14. Advertisement for plastic surgery center 170
15. Advertisement for baby formula 174
ix