Birth is a lottery. Where, when and to whom you are born and the society into which you are born will influence your life chances.This free online course will look at both the big picture of the 'lottery of birth' and the smaller, human stories. You will examine the inequalities of birth, particularly being born rich or poor and being born female or male.You will also look at the lottery of birth as it relates to becoming a parent. You'll consider how individual countries and global organisations are responding to demographic changes and predictions and how this plays out in the lives of individual women and men in different parts of the world.You'll use a variety of disciplines in the course such as demography, health studies, sociology, comparative social policy, history, political science and economics. This interdisciplinary nature brings different perspectives together to create fresh insights and provide a bridge for different ideas to feed into social and political change.Towards the end of the course, you'll have the opportunity to critically analyse an initiative of your choosing from your own country.The course does not assume any prior knowledge of the issues surrounding birth or inequalities. It is postgraduate level and encourages personal research and data interpretation.Please note that this course includes some content of a sensitive nature, including discussions around abortion and female genital mutilation (FGM).
Overview
Syllabus
- Introduction
- Introduction
- Big picture, small picture
- An interdisciplinary issue
- Acknowledgements
- Week1Week 1: What do we mean by a lottery of birth?
- Introduction
- 1 The world’s 7 billionth baby
- 2 Thinking point: check your privilege
- 3 Poverty
- 4 Being born rich, being born poor
- 4.1 Global income inequality
- 4.2 Health inequalities and their causes
- 4.3 Lives on the line
- 4.4 Educational inequalities
- 5 Measuring inequality
- 6 Social mobility
- 6.1 Social mobility – growing or shrinking?
- 7 Is it fair?
- 7.1 The spirit level
- 7.2 Thinking point: the spirit level hypothesis
- 8 The global picture
- 9 Summary of Week 1
- References
- Further reading
- Acknowledgements
- Week2Week 2: Giving birth
- Introduction
- 1 A history of European childbirth through art
- 2 Maternal and infant mortality today
- 2.1 Maternal and infant mortality
- 2.2 State of the world’s mothers
- 2.3 Kangaroo mother care
- 3 What choices do individuals have?
- 4 Over population, under population
- 4.1 Don’t panic: the truth about population
- 4.2 Thinking point: optimism or pessimism
- 5 Reproductive choices
- 5.1 Parents with disabilities
- 5.2 Choices about parenthood
- 5.3 Contraception and abortion worldwide
- 5.4 Thinking point: Abortion rights and responsibilities
- 6 Pro-natalism and anti-natalism
- 6.1 Anti-natalist policies
- 6.2 The missing girls
- 6.3 Childbirth - a new kind of risk?
- 6.4 Pro-natalist support for parents and babies
- 6.5 Thinking point: State support where you live
- 7 Getting a ‘good parent’ in the lottery of birth
- 8 Summary of Week 2
- References
- Further reading
- Acknowledgements
- Week3Week 3: The lottery of birth – a good time to be born?
- Introduction
- 1 Is global inequality rising or falling?
- 1.1 Sustainable development goals
- 1.2 A ‘passport to protection’
- 1.3 230 million invisible children
- 1.4 Thinking point: Activism
- 2 Changing lives of girls and women
- 2.1 The changing lives of girls
- 2.2 The unchanging lives of girls
- 2.3 What is FGM?
- 2.4 Challenging FGM
- 2.5 Thinking point: Social media campaigning
- 3 One woman’s lifetime
- 3.1 ‘It’s a girl!’
- 4 Summary of Week 3
- References
- Further reading
- Acknowledgements
- Week4Week 4: Lottery of birth in the twenty-first century
- Introduction
- 1 An unequal world
- 2 Over population or under population
- 2.1 Population policies
- 3 A good time to be born?
- 4 Thinking point: the inequality debate
- 5 Looking into the future
- 6 Summary of Week 4
- References
- Further reading
- Acknowledgements
