1. 'What've a boiling kettle got to do with a baby?' : the maintenance of ignorance -- 2. 'It never does to plan anything' : deliberate accidents and casual attempts to avoid pregnancy -- 3. 'The majority went back to withdrawal' : the survival of traditional methods of birth control -- 4. 'We did try one of them rubber things once, but we didn't like 'em' : the advantages of traditional methods of birth control -- 5. 'She was pleased to leave it to me' : gender relations and birth control practices
Summary
"The first half of the twentieth century witnessed a revolution in contraceptive behaviour as the large Victorian family disappeared. This book offers a new perspective on the gender relations, sexual attitudes, and contraceptive practices that accompanied the emergence of the smaller family in modern Britain. Kate Fisher draws on a range of first-hand evidence, including over 190 oral history interviews, in which individuals born between 1900 and 1930 described their marriages and sexual relationships. By using individual testimony she challenges many of the key conditions that have long been envisaged by demographic and historical scholars as necessary for any significant reduction in average family size to take place."--BOOK JACKET
