Pregnant Bodies, Fertile Minds: Gender, Race, and the Schooling of Pregnant Teens (Paperback)

by Wendy Luttrell (Author) "Everyone has an opinion about teenage pregnancy and why it is a problem..." (more)
Key Phrases: telling pregnancy stories, stigma wars, clinic scenes, African American, Mexican American, Misty Gray (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"An important intervention into the debates about teenage pregnancy.." -- Valerie Walkerdine, author of Growing Up Girl: Psychosocial Explorations of Gender and Class

A beautiful, moving book about the way in which poor young pregnant women are positioned as objects of shaming and pathologising practices. Pregnant Bodies, Fertile Minds is a searing indictment of current social policies. -- Valerie Walkerdine, author of Growing Up Girl: Psychosocial Explorations of Gender and Class
A breakthrough book...[A] rich ethnographic study...Theoretically sophisticated and beautifully written, this study uses original and innovative methodology to raise and reflect upon issues of gender, race, culture and the institutional structure of schools. -- Kathleen Weiler, editor of Feminist Engagements: Reading, Resisting, and Revisioning Male Theorists in Education and Cultural Studies (Routledge)
An extraordinary and moving book and a theoretical and ethnographic stunner. It is hard to imagine that anyone other than her subjects themselves could portray their voices and selves with such compelling immediacy and liveliness better than Luttrell. A brilliant contribution to our greater knowledge of the worlds of gender, motherhood, race, and adolescence. -- Nancy Chodorow, author of The Power of Feelings: Personal Meaning in Psychoanalysis, Gender, and Culture
The triumph of Pregnant Bodies, Fertile Minds is that it manages to weave the social worlds of girls, the social stigma of pregnancy, and the social policies that swaddle these young women in and out of school into a compassionate and haunting ethnography. -- Carol Stack, author of All Our Kin
Luttrell's work...connects the reader to prominent literacy and academic pieces on teenage pregnancy, race and poverty...Luttrell's writing style is casual yet well researched. Her references span sociology, feminist/psychoanalytic theory, and developmental psychology. The range of her citations is impressive and this synthesis of fields broadens the appeal of the book to several academic disciplines. -- Contemporary Sociology, Wendy Luttrell

A beautiful, moving book about the way in which poor young pregnant women are positioned as objects of shaming and pathologising practices. Pregnant Bodies, Fertile Minds is a searing indictment of current social policies. -- Valerie Walkerdine, author of Growing Up Girl: Psychosocial Explorations of Gender and Class
A breakthrough book...[A] rich ethnographic study...Theoretically sophisticated and beautifully written, this study uses original and innovative methodology to raise and reflect upon issues of gender, race, culture and the institutional structure of schools. -- Kathleen Weiler, editor of Feminist Engagements: Reading, Resisting, and Revisioning Male Theorists in Education and Cultural Studies (Routledge)
An extraordinary and moving book and a theoretical and ethnographic stunner. It is hard to imagine that anyone other than her subjects themselves could portray their voices and selves with such compelling immediacy and liveliness better than Luttrell. A brilliant contribution to our greater knowledge of the worlds of gender, motherhood, race, and adolescence. -- Nancy Chodorow, author of The Power of Feelings: Personal Meaning in Psychoanalysis, Gender, and Culture
The triumph of Pregnant Bodies, Fertile Minds is that it manages to weave the social worlds of girls, the social stigma of pregnancy, and the social policies that swaddle these young women in and out of school into a compassionate and haunting ethnography. -- Carol Stack, author of All Our Kin
Luttrells work...connects the reader to prominent literacy and academic pieces on teenage pregnancy, race and poverty...Luttrells writing style is casual yet well researched. Her references span sociology, feminist/psychoanalytic theory, and developmental psychology. The range of her citations is impressive and this synthesis of fields broadens the appeal of the book to several academic disciplines. -- Contemporary Sociology, Wendy Luttrell

Product Description
They must make mature decisions before they are out of school, take on adult responsibilities before they have left home, and care for their children before they have completed their own childhood. One of today's greatest social issues, pregnant teens walk the boundary between childhood and adulthood, no longer able to reside in one world, and unprepared for the next. While society traditionally is quick to condemn, Wendy Luttrell counters the stigmatizing ways in which such girls have been traditionally held with this moving ethnography of their lives.
Focusing on fifty girls enrolled in a model public school program for pregnant teens, Luttrell explores how pregnant girls experience society's view of them and also considers how these girls view themselves and the choices they've made. She pays particular attention to how schools react to pregnant teens and what they are doing to help these vulnerable young women to achieve their education. Readers learn the real problems that pregnant teens are dealing with, and how society's racial and class stereotypes continue to stigmatize and scapegoat them. These individual stories are accompanied by personal self-portraits that present a carefully detailed and powerfully moving picture of the issues these girls face everyday.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Routledge; 1 edition (April 25, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0415931894
• ISBN-13: 978-0415931892
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #700,325 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Ideal for All Teachers, December 4, 2003

By	A. Harper "Breeze Harper" (California) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I am glad that Wendy Luttrell wrote this book. I enjoyed 'listening' to the teen girls stories and enjoyed viewing their collages that represented themselves. However, being a black female, I didn't learn anything new about black teenage girls. However, I think it is a GREAT book for people who work in the field of Education and honestly don't understand a) the complex identity process that working class african american girls go through in America (let alone being pregnant) and b) how to be conscious of their own 'whiteness' and Euro-Anglo centric view of 'deviance'. I got the feeling that this book was intended more for white middle class educators who teach or may teach working class african american pregnant teenagers. I am glad that Wendy depicted the pregnant girls in a "positive" light. Wendy clearly states that she doesn't want to stereotype. She explains to the reader that she herself is coming from a white middle class background. That acknowledgement of her 'whiteness' and white privilege are important in understanding who she is as a researcher. I like the fact she explains to the reader how she did her research and her honest directness of telling the audience how she felt while doing her field research and what challenges her own identity created while trying to connect to and understand the 50 individual pregnant girls she interacted with. Overall, it is great to see that she does not construct teenage pregnancy as 'deviant' behavior. The girls in this book are HUMANIZED.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Insightful study of teenage sexuality and pregnacy, November 26, 2003

By	S. Glazer (Cambridge, MA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Teenage sexuality and pregnancy is a complex issue with no easy answers. This book takes an in-depth look into the lives of 50 Southern, mostly African-American girls whose spirit and creativity manages to blossom despite many obstacles at school and in society.