![The new-born cried lustily as it came into this world… when the
mother laid eyes on her baby, tears welled up in her eyes. They
were not tears of joy… What crossed [the mother’s] mind was
not the anticipation of the joys of motherhood but the trials
that lay ahead.
(Venkatramani 1992: 127).](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/lecture7additionalinfanticide-140606060254-phpapp02/85/Lecture-7-additional-infanticide-2-320.jpg)
![Deliberate killing of children after [and
before] birth
“ (Watts and Zimmerman 2002: 1236)](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/lecture7additionalinfanticide-140606060254-phpapp02/85/Lecture-7-additional-infanticide-9-320.jpg)
![There are very few cultures in which males are more apt to
be killed than females… In 19th and early 20th century
Western Europe, [infanticide]… was publicly condemned
but practiced covertly, in ways that made it appear
accidental or inadvertent
(Warren 1985: 32-41).
“](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/lecture7additionalinfanticide-140606060254-phpapp02/85/Lecture-7-additional-infanticide-23-320.jpg)
Lecture 7 additional infanticide
- 1. Infanticide
- 2. The new-born cried lustily as it came into this world… when the mother laid eyes on her baby, tears welled up in her eyes. They were not tears of joy… What crossed [the mother’s] mind was not the anticipation of the joys of motherhood but the trials that lay ahead. (Venkatramani 1992: 127).
- 3. How could a family of day-wage agricultural workers… afford to bring up and marry off two daughters? How could they, when the dowry demanded by bridegrooms was always astronomical? The couple had decided to have a second child only in the desperate hope that it would be a boy. But on this sunny day, the dream lay shattered “
- 6. Film 3
- 8. the murder of an infant by its mother - and its subset of neonaticide - when the killing occurs within twenty-four hours of a child's birth “ (Ryznar 2013: 1)
- 9. Deliberate killing of children after [and before] birth “ (Watts and Zimmerman 2002: 1236)
- 10. Various forms
- 12. non-reportingof live birth and killing
- 14. out adoption
- 15. abandonment
- 16. 77 million missing girls in Asia (Amartya Sen) between 113 and 200 million women demographically missing (UN) 1989 2010
- 17. hospitals, medical practitioners, communities, relatives understand conditions and conspire in murder or longer-term neglect
- 18. not culture specific but specific vulnerability
- 19. Infanticide quite common in colonial America, during which time an estimated one-third of all killings were infanticides (Ryznar 2013:1)
- 20. common in Ancient Greece, targeting unwanted, vulnerable, or disabled children (Ryznar 2013: 1)
- 21. In the Kassena-Nankana District of Ghana… some children are subject to infanticide because they are regarded as spirit children sent “from the bush” to cause misfortune and destroy the family (Denham et al, 2010: 609). “
- 22. appears in Orwell’s ‘Down and Out in Paris and London’
- 23. There are very few cultures in which males are more apt to be killed than females… In 19th and early 20th century Western Europe, [infanticide]… was publicly condemned but practiced covertly, in ways that made it appear accidental or inadvertent (Warren 1985: 32-41). “
- 24. Defended and/or explained as ‘cultural’ issue ordenied
- 25. Birth: girls killed low pay negates rationale for schooling wage asymmetry devalue females low earnings justifies dowry females married off to reduce cost and incur costs in new family parents need sons for pensions favour boys over girls generates misogyny towards females girl children feared
- 26. Explanations 2
- 27. Biology
- 28. Predisposition to males: more valuable and important in harsher environments
- 29. Socio-economic
- 30. It’s a Girl
- 31. Ryznar, M (2013). ‘A Crime of Its Own? A Proposal for Achieving Greater Sentencing Consistency in Neonaticide and Infanticide Cases’. University of San Francisco Law Review, Winter Denham AR et al (2010). ‘Chasing spirits: Clarifying the spirit child phenomenon and infanticide in Northern Ghana’. Social Science & Medicine 71(3), pp. 608-615 Additional bibliography