Motherhood in BondageMargaret Sanger (1883-1966) was a leading figure in the American birth control movement. Trained as a nurse, she moved to New York City to work among the poor. Having witnessed firsthand the travails of mothers in the city's poorest neighborhoods, she felt the need to provide them with information on reproduction and contraception. She abandoned her nursing career and devoted the rest of her life to disseminating information on women's reproduction and contraception, publishing books and articles and founding birth control clinics. In Motherhood in Bondage, first published in 1928, Sanger reproduced letters written to her from women and sometimes men from all over the country, in both urban and rural areas, who were seeking advice on reproductive matters and marital relations, but mostly imploring her to help them find ways to avoid more pregnancies. The letters are grouped by theme into sixteen chapters, and Sanger wrote an introduction to each chapter. |
Contents
Foreword by Margaret Marsh | xi |
Chronology | xliii |
Introduction | xlv |
Girl Mothers | 3 |
The Pinch of Poverty | 24 |
The Trap of Maternity | 40 |
The Struggle of the Unfit | 60 |
The Sins of the Fathers | 100 |
Solitary Confinement | 219 |
The Husbands Own Story | 246 |
Marital Relations | 264 |
Methods That Fail | 293 |
Selfimposed Continence and Separation | 322 |
The Doctor Warnsbut Does Not Tell | 359 |
Desperate Remedies | 394 |
Life Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness | 411 |
Wasted Efforts | 135 |
Double Slavery | 155 |
Voices of the Children | 179 |
The Two Generations | 202 |
Conclusion | 432 |
Appendix | 437 |
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