The insensitivity of 'sensitive care': the bureaucracy of pregnancy tissue disposal in England, UK.

The practices surrounding pregnancy ends and pregnancy remains shift and change depending on the cultural and historical context. Based on ethnographic research in one group NHS Hospital organisation in England, the paper explores what practices around pregnancy remains reveal about the values afforded the material in different contexts by different actors and the moments when these intersect. It argues that framing miscarriage as bereavement helps to structure caregiving in clinical settings and that clinical practices produce foetal personhood in ways that may not be in keeping with women's notions of their pregnancy material.

Women's experiences of the consenting process for pregnancy remains disposal following early miscarriage.

Background And Methodology: UK clinical practices around managing pregnancy remains after pregnancy loss involve a process of documenting consent. Women are typically offered options for disposal, which may include cremation, burial, releasing for private arrangements, releasing to a funeral director and, in some cases, sensitive incineration. A single researcher conducted 20 months of ethnographic fieldwork in one National Health Service (NHS) Trust including observing the consenting process for pregnancy remains disposal (n=28) and interviewing 27 women, including 19 who had experience of the consent process for pregnancy remains disposal, about their understanding, attitudes and experiences of pregnancy remains disposal.

Further Hierarchies of Loss: Tracking Relationality in Pregnancy Loss Experiences.

The article extends Robson and Walter's concept of hierarchies of loss by describing further factors which afford differential social legitimacy to death-related losses. Drawing on our separate research with women in England who have experienced pre-viability pregnancy loss through different types of miscarriage and termination for foetal anomaly, we note that closeness of relationship to the object of loss does hierarchise pregnancy loss. However, other relational elements are also implicated, including ontological positions on what it was which was lost, in relation to other individually and socially experienced losses.

Culpability, blame, and stigma after pregnancy loss in Qatar.

Background: Following a miscarriage many women report feeling guilty and culpable for what has happened particularly when aspects of societal blame and stigma are involved. This research investigated the impact of cultural context on the experience of miscarriage. In particular, it focused on how elements of stigma and blame are linked to notions of miscarriage etiology and risk among Qatari women.

Causal explanations of miscarriage amongst Qataris.

Background: Despite its commonality, there is a paucity of literature on miscarriage in non-Western societies. In particular, there is little understanding of how people ascribe cause to miscarriage. This research sought to gain an in-depth understanding of notions of miscarriage causality and risk amongst Qataris.

Qatari intersections with global genetics research and discourse.

Genetic discourses have taken a predominant role in approaches to combating a number of conditions that affect Qataris. This paper is derived from an exploration of Qatari encounters with globalizing discourses of genetics, particularly as they relate to notions of risk. It explores Qataris negotiations of global interactions and influences, including the discourses around genetic risk and cousin marriage.

Birds, meat, and babies: the multiple realities of fetuses in Qatar.

This paper explores miscarriage in a variety of Qatari contexts to reveal the multiple realities of the unborn. During 18 months of ethnographic research, a range of settings in which fetuses emerged were explored. The unborn are represented and imagined differently, particularly in relation to the ways they are located, with multiple beings emerging according to the context and position of the stakeholder.

Arranging marriage; negotiating risk: genetics and society in Qatar.

This paper considers how the globalized discourse of genetic risk in cousin marriage is shaped, informed and taken up in local moral worlds within the context of Qatar. This paper investigates the way Qataris are negotiating the discourse on genetics and risk. It is based on data from ongoing ethnographic research in Qatar and contributes to anthropological knowledge about this understudied country.

Gulf war syndrome: a reaction to psychiatry's invasion of the military?

Following the 1991 Gulf War, a number of soldiers who fought there began to complain of various symptoms and disorders, the collection of which came to be known as Gulf War syndrome (GWS). A debate has raged about the nature and cause of this illness, with many suggesting that it is a psychiatric condition. GWS continues to be a contested illness, yet there is no disputing that many Gulf veterans are ill.

Toxic Emissions: The Role of Semen in GWS Narratives.

Narratives about Gulf War Syndrome (GWS) contain discussions of sex and reproduction and there is a high level of anxiety about these subjects. Although similar to other medically unexplained conditions, GWS has distinctive features. The most salient of these is its contagious nature, with the main vehicle for contamination being semen.

On being a Gulf veteran: an anthropological perspective.

There is no doubt that Gulf service has affected the well-being of some of the members of the UK armed forces who served in that conflict, yet the reason for this remain unclear. At present, the debate surrounding Gulf War Syndrome (GWS) has become stagnant and highly polarized. This paper argues that a new perspective is needed to further improve our understanding of the problem and suggests that the methods and theories of anthropology, with its focus on nuances and subtleties, can provide new insights.

Friendly fire.

From September 1990 to June 1991, the UK deployed 53,462 military personnel in the Gulf War. In 1993 reports began to surface in the UK about unexplained health problems occurring amongst Gulf War veterans. This paper considers the way sufferers of Gulf War Syndrome (GWS) came to label their condition in this way.