Suzanne Arms
Suzanne Arms | |
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| Born | Suzanne Arms |
| Occupation | Writer |
| Citizenship | United States |
| Alma mater | University of Rochester |
| Subject | Childbirth, adoption |
| Notable works | Immaculate deception (1977) |
| Notable awards | Lamaze International Lifetime Achievement Award |
Suzanne Arms is an American writer. She has published seven books on childbirth and child care.
Life
Arms was born in Summit, New Jersey,[1] and grew up on the East Coast of the United States.[2] Her parents were both teachers.[1] She received a BA in literature from the University of Rochester in Rochester, New York. She moved to Marin County, California to work as a teacher in nursery schools and in the Head Start Program.[1]
Work
Her first book, A Season to be Born, was published in 1973. It was a diary of the birth of her daughter, with photographs by the baby's father, John Arms.[1]
A second book, Immaculate Deception: A New Look at Women and Childbirth in America, appeared in 1975, which became a best-seller, was a New York Times Best Book of the Year;[3] By 1979, it had sold more than 150,000 copies.[2]
Arms has described the precautions against risk in obstetric wards in the West as "just-in-case obstetrics".[4]
In 1978, with six other women, Arms started a birth center, The Birth Place, in Palo Alto, California; it was organized much as she had proposed in her 1975 book. It became a state-licensed facility in the year 1979.[5]
Arms has made documentary films on pregnancy and birth: she shot, directed, and produced Five Women, Five Births in the 1970s;[2] Giving Birth (35') was made in 1998.[6] She also directed and co-produced the film "Birth" with Christopher Carson, which is critical of the medical-pharmaceutical-hospital approach to birth, proposing a different approach.[clarification needed][citation needed]
Recognition
Arms has been awarded the Lamaze International Lifetime Achievement Award for her contribution to the field of childbirth.[citation needed]
Books
- Suzanne Arms, John Arms. A Season to Be Born. New York: Harper & Row [1973]
- Suzanne Arms. Immaculate Deception: A New Look at Women and Childbirth in America. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1975 (reprinted 1977, 1985)
- To Love and Let Go (1983)
- Adoption: A Handful of Hope (1985)
- Seasons of Change: Growing Through Pregnancy & Birth (1993)
- Immaculate Deception II: Myth, Magic and Birth (1994 & 1997)
- Breastfeeding: How to Breastfeed Your Baby (2004)
References
- ^ a b c d "Daily Independent Journal from San Rafael, California · Page 17". www.newspapers.com. Daily Independent Journal. 30 November 1973. Retrieved 5 March 2015.
- ^ a b c Miller, Fran. "Arms advocates home birth". The Stanford Daily. Retrieved 5 March 2015.
- ^ Jennifer Block (2007). Pushed: The Painful Truth about Childbirth and Modern Maternity Care. Da Capo Press, Incorporated. ISBN 9780738211824.
- ^ Robbie E. Davis-Floyd (14 February 2004). Birth as an American Rite of Passage: Second Edition, With a New Preface. University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-92721-6.
- ^ Autumn Stanley (1995). Mothers and Daughters of Invention: Notes for a Revised History of Technology. Rutgers University Press. pp. 194–. ISBN 978-0-8135-2197-8.
- ^ Arms, Suzanna. "Suzanne Arms' giving birth". trove.nla.gov.au/. Trove. Retrieved 18 December 2014.
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