Mother's Love by Nancy Scheper-Hughes

¶ … Mother's Love" by Nancy Scheper-Hughes The anthropological study discussed by Nancy Scheper-Hughes entitled, "Mother's Love: Death without weeping," brings into lucidity the theoretical debate of "nature vs.

nurture." The article discusses the issue of how, because of external influences and factors, there have been an alteration on women, especially, mothers' propensity to care and love for their children -- a phenomenon more popularly known as "motherly instinct." Hughes analysis shows that an ethnographic study on mothers in the town of Bam Jesus in Brazil, where, evidently, nurture prevails over nature -- that is, the social environment has a more vital role than "motherly instinct" (or nature) in influencing the mothers' attitude towards raising her children, especially those in poor health.

The researcher points out two primary factors that influence the perpetuation of "passive infanticide" or mortal selective neglect among mothers in Bam Jesus: the prevalence of poverty and dominance and strong influence of Catholicism among Bam Jesus residents. Poverty, the first factor, makes nursing for newborn infants impossible for mothers who have to work during the day in order to survive everyday and provide food to eat for her children. In effect, because of parental neglect, infants die from hunger and/or neglect from his/her mother's care and attention.

Moreover, apart from poverty, what further alleviates the situation and leads to the prevalence of passive infanticide is the mothers' fatalistic belief that some children who are "wanting to die," while there are also survivors, those who managed to live.