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| Title: | To Control Their Own Reproduction: The Agenda of Black Teenage Mothers in Durban |
| Authors: | Preston-Whyte, Eleanor Zondi, Maria |
| Year: | 1989 |
| Periodical: | Agenda: Empowering Women for Gender Equity |
| Issue: | 4 |
| Pages: | 47-68 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic terms: | South Africa KwaZulu |
| Subjects: | single mothers Family Planning and Contraception Cultural Roles Health, Nutrition, and Medicine |
| External link: | https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10130950.1989.9675048 |
| Abstract: | The fast growing number of young women and girls in South Africa who bear children, often while at school or, at least, well before they might seriously contemplate marriage forms the focus of this paper. In order to understand their perspective, interviews were conducted in 1987 and 1988 with teenage girls in the greater Durban region of KwaZulu. The following aspects were examined: teenage perceptions of early pregnancy; role models for single parenthood; the importance of bearing children; attitudes towards contraception; fertility as a cultural value; the social context. The research suggests that early pregnancy, or at least the neglect of contraception, represents a fairly rational reaction to personal and societal pressures placed upon young women. When girls become pregnant their parents are upset and often outraged, but they take no decisive action to sanction those concerned and in time the child is welcomed into the family. The crisis is accommodated within the domestic family. Added to this is the high value placed on fertility and child bearing. Bibliogr., notes, ref. |
