Breastfeeding: a cultural history
HistoryExtra podcast
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The History of Breastfeeding
Joanna Wolffeth's book Milk and Intimate History of Breastfeeding is available now published by Orion. In 1780, only 1000 babies were nursed by their own mothers in Paris; about 20,000 babies born in that same year were taken out to the countryside,. She says it wasn't economically viable for women living in Paris with high rent, working. It made more economic sense for them to pay somebody else to do it for them. The ideal that is presented for motherhood often butts up against the social and the economic realities for women.
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