Picture of author.
7+ Works 519 Membros 9 Críticas

About the Author

Sandra Steingraber, Ph.D. received her doctorate in biological sciences from the University of Michigan and taught biology for several years at Columbia College, Chicago. The recipient of several awards for science writing, Steingraber was named a Ms. Magazine "Woman of the Year" in 1997. Recently, mostrar mais as part of international treaty negotiations, she briefed United Nations delegates in Geneva on breast milk contamination. She has been selected as the 2001 recipient of the Rachel Carson Leadership Award from Carson's alma mater, Chatham College. Currently on the faculty at Cornell University, she lives in Ithaca, New York, with her husband, the sculptor Jeff de Castro, and their daughter, Faith mostrar menos

Includes the name: Sandra Steinbgraber

Disambiguation Notice:

(yid) VIAF:62464231

(tgl) VIAF:79487132 (additional)

Image credit: Sandra Steingraber (credit: Dede Hatch)

Obras por Sandra Steingraber

Associated Works

American Earth: Environmental Writing Since Thoreau (2008) — Contribuidor — 414 exemplares
The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2011 (2011) — Contribuidor — 287 exemplares
Silent Spring and Other Writings on the Environment (2018) — Editor — 111 exemplares
The Sweet Breathing of Plants: Women Writing on the Green World (2001) — Contribuidor — 89 exemplares
Dear America: Letters of Hope, Habitat, Defiance, and Democracy (2020) — Contribuidor — 3 exemplares

Etiquetado

Conhecimento Comum

Data de nascimento
1959
Sexo
female
Nacionalidade
USA
Local de nascimento
Tazewell County, Illinois, USA
Locais de residência
Illinois, USA
Trumansburg, New York, USA
Educação
Illinois Wesleyan University (BA | Biology)
Illinois State University (MA | English)
University of Michigan (Ph.D | Biology)
Ocupações
biologist
Nota de desambiguação
VIAF:79487132 (additional)

Membros

Críticas

This book inhabits a niche that is neglected by both scientists and by the "mommy" writers' crowd: a story about being a pregnant human who is also a biologist, in a world permeated by toxins. I found it to be among the most humane - and human - of all the books I've read about being pregnant (among other things, it respects the dignity of the woman who is pregnant and later a mother, without sliding into EarthWombMother woo-woo or infantilizing her as a weird sort of sexualized child-being). The environmental message it speaks in alternate breaths is disturbing, as it should be.

(Even more disturbing is the way that such messages have been, and continue to be, ignored.)
… (mais)
 
Assinalado
ranaverde | 4 outras críticas | Dec 24, 2018 |
Ecologist Sandra Steingraber examines her own pregnancy and motherhood through an ecologist's lens. She identifies how the failure of governments to operate by the Precautionary Principle (a chemical must be shown to be safe before use, instead of being assumed harmless until proven dangerous) has damaged the environment at large and many individuals (fetuses, breastfed children, mothers). She asserts that governments ought to regulate the chemicals companies produce and sell; it should not be the responsibility of pregnant women and new mothers to try to protect themselves from dangerous pesticides and heavy metals present in food, etc.

In addition, Steingraber offers the most thorough, honest, and understandable account of the process of labor and delivery, as well as the most articulate explanation for why the weeks and months following an infant's birth are so difficult (lack of sleep causes a slowdown of daily tasks just as they need to be sped up).

Quotes

What is known about teratogenic chemicals in the environment? Where are they located, and who is exposed? The answers are "pathetically little" and "nobody knows." ...Most chemicals have not been tested for their ability to have teratogenic effects. (88)

...the popular books and magazines do not talk much about...environmental issues....There is some kind of disconnect between what we know scientifically and what is presented to pregnant women seeking knowledge about prenatal life. (105)

"In ignorance, abstain." Why does abstinence in the face of uncertainty apply only to individual behavior? Why doesn't it apply equally to industry or agriculture? ...It's pregnant women who have to live with the consequences of public decisions. (107-108)

Obviously, a public health policy that asks expectant mothers to give up certain foods while allowing industries to continue contaminating them is absurd. (128)

...a failure to acknowledge the unique position of the breast-fed infant within the ecological world [at the top of the food chain] prevents us from having an informed public conversation about a very real problem: the biomagnified presence of persistent toxic chemicals in breast milk. (251)

"Where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation." (1992 Earth Summit, Brazil)

More quotes in private notes section
… (mais)
½
 
Assinalado
JennyArch | 4 outras críticas | May 13, 2015 |
Das Buch ist nichts für schwache Nerven. Es ist sehr informativ und beleuchtet all zu oft nur die Seiten der Umweltverschmutzung, anstatt mehr auf die Schwangerschaft selbst einzugehen. Es schürrt teilweise regelrecht Ängste was die Nahrung betrifft, bietet aber keine Alternativen. Es beleuchtet dennoch sehr ausführlich welche Folgen und Studien existieren und ist wissenschaftlich sehr gut belegt. Man muss sich eben ausreichend selbst informieren um sich und die Seinen zu schützen.
½
 
Assinalado
SteWi | Oct 23, 2014 |
A good combination of scientific fact with personal experience.
 
Assinalado
Gail.C.Bull | 1 outra crítica | Sep 17, 2014 |

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Estatísticas

Obras
7
Also by
6
Membros
519
Popularidade
#47,860
Avaliação
4.2
Críticas
9
ISBN
18
Línguas
2

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