Vania Smith-Oka
Biographic Data
| ID | 1732942 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Vania Smith-Oka |
| GIVEN NAMES | Vania |
| FAMILY NAME | Smith-Oka |
| SIGNATURE | SMITH-OKA V |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Notre Dame |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-4121-3056 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 14 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 133 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 14 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2008 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2022 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
Competing Narratives
Cutting Women
Apprenticeship, Or Learning to Be An Expert
Commentary to the special issue 'Therapeutic Apprenticeship: Uncovering Truth and Performing Responsibility' by Vania Smith-Oka
Obstetric Violence in Their Own Words
This article, based on ethnographic research in Mexico and South Africa, presents two central arguments about obstetric violence: (a) structural inequalities across diverse global sites are primarily linked to gender and lead to similar patterns of obstetric violence, and (b) ethnography is a powerful method to give voice to women's stories. Connecting these two arguments is a temporal model to understand how women across the world come to expect…
Crossing Bodily, Social, and Intimate Boundaries
Bodies are useful instruments for understanding the reproduction of inequalities. In this article, we investigate why and how bodily, social, intimate, and physical boundaries are crossed and what this can tell us about individual and social bodies. We unpack how seeing and being seen, touching and being touched, or feeling and being felt are conditioned in very particular ways by the broader political economy. Participants in this ethnographic r…
Microaggressions and the reproduction of social inequalities in medical encounters in Mexico
Fallen Uterus
This article focuses on rural indigenous Mexican women's experiences with uterine prolapse, particularly the illness's expression of social suffering. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted during 2004-2005 and 2007 in a Nahua village in the state of Veracruz, the article analyzes the multifactorial nature of women's social suffering. Results show that the roots of uterine displacement for the women lie in lack of social relations and in perc…
Managing Labor and Delivery among Impoverished Populations in Mexico
Birthing experiences for low-income and marginalized women have frequently been framed within explanatory models of authoritative knowledge and power dynamics. Many of these explanatory models have pointed out the structural violence inherent in the biomedical model of birth. The research on which this article is based suggests that clinicians' stressful work environment and class-based stereotypes of low-income women resulted in the routinizing …
“They Don’t Know Anything”
An analysis of two indigenous reproductive health illnesses in a Nahua community in Veracruz, Mexico
Background This article describes the local concepts indigenous Nahua women hold regarding their reproduction. Specifically it provides a description of two indigenous illnesses-isihuayo and necaxantle, it discusses their etiology, symptoms, and treatments, and it analyzes them within the local ethnomedical framework and sociopolitical context. A perception of female vulnerability is shown to be an underlying shaper of women's experiences of thes…
Bodies of risk
Carole H. Browner and Carolyn F. Sargent, editors
Unintended consequences
Plants Used for Reproductive Health by Nahua Women in Northern Veracruz, Mexico
Microaggressions and the reproduction of social inequalities in medical encounters in Mexico
Unintended consequences
Bodies of risk
Managing Labor and Delivery among Impoverished Populations in Mexico
Birthing experiences for low-income and marginalized women have frequently been framed within explanatory models of authoritative knowledge and power dynamics. Many of these explanatory models have pointed out the structural violence inherent in the biomedical model of birth. The research on which this article is based suggests that clinicians' stressful work environment and class-based stereotypes of low-income women resulted in the routinizing …
Cutting Women
Plants Used for Reproductive Health by Nahua Women in Northern Veracruz, Mexico
Fallen Uterus
This article focuses on rural indigenous Mexican women's experiences with uterine prolapse, particularly the illness's expression of social suffering. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted during 2004-2005 and 2007 in a Nahua village in the state of Veracruz, the article analyzes the multifactorial nature of women's social suffering. Results show that the roots of uterine displacement for the women lie in lack of social relations and in perc…
Obstetric Violence in Their Own Words
This article, based on ethnographic research in Mexico and South Africa, presents two central arguments about obstetric violence: (a) structural inequalities across diverse global sites are primarily linked to gender and lead to similar patterns of obstetric violence, and (b) ethnography is a powerful method to give voice to women's stories. Connecting these two arguments is a temporal model to understand how women across the world come to expect…
Crossing Bodily, Social, and Intimate Boundaries
Bodies are useful instruments for understanding the reproduction of inequalities. In this article, we investigate why and how bodily, social, intimate, and physical boundaries are crossed and what this can tell us about individual and social bodies. We unpack how seeing and being seen, touching and being touched, or feeling and being felt are conditioned in very particular ways by the broader political economy. Participants in this ethnographic r…
An analysis of two indigenous reproductive health illnesses in a Nahua community in Veracruz, Mexico
Background This article describes the local concepts indigenous Nahua women hold regarding their reproduction. Specifically it provides a description of two indigenous illnesses-isihuayo and necaxantle, it discusses their etiology, symptoms, and treatments, and it analyzes them within the local ethnomedical framework and sociopolitical context. A perception of female vulnerability is shown to be an underlying shaper of women's experiences of thes…
Plants Used for Reproductive Health by Nahua Women in Northern Veracruz, Mexico
Unintended consequences
Carole H. Browner and Carolyn F. Sargent, editors
“They Don’t Know Anything”
An analysis of two indigenous reproductive health illnesses in a Nahua community in Veracruz, Mexico
Background This article describes the local concepts indigenous Nahua women hold regarding their reproduction. Specifically it provides a description of two indigenous illnesses-isihuayo and necaxantle, it discusses their etiology, symptoms, and treatments, and it analyzes them within the local ethnomedical framework and sociopolitical context. A perception of female vulnerability is shown to be an underlying shaper of women's experiences of thes…
Bodies of risk
Managing Labor and Delivery among Impoverished Populations in Mexico
Birthing experiences for low-income and marginalized women have frequently been framed within explanatory models of authoritative knowledge and power dynamics. Many of these explanatory models have pointed out the structural violence inherent in the biomedical model of birth. The research on which this article is based suggests that clinicians' stressful work environment and class-based stereotypes of low-income women resulted in the routinizing …
Fallen Uterus
This article focuses on rural indigenous Mexican women's experiences with uterine prolapse, particularly the illness's expression of social suffering. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted during 2004-2005 and 2007 in a Nahua village in the state of Veracruz, the article analyzes the multifactorial nature of women's social suffering. Results show that the roots of uterine displacement for the women lie in lack of social relations and in perc…
Microaggressions and the reproduction of social inequalities in medical encounters in Mexico
Crossing Bodily, Social, and Intimate Boundaries
Bodies are useful instruments for understanding the reproduction of inequalities. In this article, we investigate why and how bodily, social, intimate, and physical boundaries are crossed and what this can tell us about individual and social bodies. We unpack how seeing and being seen, touching and being touched, or feeling and being felt are conditioned in very particular ways by the broader political economy. Participants in this ethnographic r…
Obstetric Violence in Their Own Words
This article, based on ethnographic research in Mexico and South Africa, presents two central arguments about obstetric violence: (a) structural inequalities across diverse global sites are primarily linked to gender and lead to similar patterns of obstetric violence, and (b) ethnography is a powerful method to give voice to women's stories. Connecting these two arguments is a temporal model to understand how women across the world come to expect…
Competing Narratives
Cutting Women
Apprenticeship, Or Learning to Be An Expert
Commentary to the special issue 'Therapeutic Apprenticeship: Uncovering Truth and Performing Responsibility' by Vania Smith-Oka
Sociology (10 works) · Medicine (9 works) · Ethnography (7 works) · Political science (7 works) · Anthropology (6 works) · Psychology (6 works) · Gender Studies (5 works) · Gender Studies (5 works) · Maternal and Perinatal Health Interventions (5 works) · Geography (4 works)