La Leche League are consulting to remove the words: Womanly, Art and Breastfeeding from their book, 'The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding'

[WomanlyArtOfBreastfeeding]

A global poll has been sent to La Leche League Leaders and applicants which proposes to remove the words Woman and Breastfeeding (as well as Art) from The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding, first published in 1956.

The survey states:
The WAB 9th edition Task Force has been asked by the LLLI Board to make a recommendation regarding whether the title of the book The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding should change or not in the next edition.

Then goes on to ask:
If the title is changed, how would you feel about the word 'womanly' being removed?
Pleased
Neutral
Displeased
Please explain your response to the question above (removing 'womanly').
Your answer

If the title is changed, how would you feel about the word 'art' being removed?
Pleased
Neutral
Displeased
Please explain your response to the question above (removing 'art').
Your answer

If the title is changed, how would you feel about the word 'breastfeeding' being removed?
Pleased
Neutral
Displeased
Please explain your response to the question above (removing 'breastfeeding').
Your answer

Pleased
Neutral
Displeased

"Displeased" does not adequately describe how I feel about this.

Only women breastfeed and they use their breasts to do it!

Oh come on!
It's a shit title.
As upthread, Breastfeeding Explained, much better title.

@Kendodd

Oh come on! It's a shit title. As upthread, Breastfeeding Explained, much better title.

Breastfeeding is also being removed...

I think it’s a wonderful title for a great book and a great shame if they change it.

It may be a little twee.

But any alternative that ceases to centre women and breastfeeding is ridiculous.

It is such a comprehensive guide to breastfeeding. I hope they don't decide women aren't important. Because I don't find ignoring women or female experiences inclusive.

I loved this book, the advice in there is gold, but the title made me cringe when recommending it to others. It needs the word Breastfeeding in the title though!

I reckon they could go with ‘The La Leche League Guide to Breastfeeding’ and it would be perfectly fine.

Losing ‘Womanly Art Of’ in and of itself is not a bad idea because it’s a dated title - in marketing/book publishing term ‘womanly art of’ doesn’t add to our knee-jerk understanding of what the book is. We still know it’s for women about breastfeeding.

That they’re polling their members is smart. I think there will be a huge bias swing to keeping ‘breastfeeding’. Good.

I’m not in favour at all of eliminating ‘woman’ or ‘womanly’ from the lexicon around breastfeeding. But sometimes it’s necessary to pick your battles and I’d go title updated as long as the central tenet of the book - that mothers breastfeed -is unchanged.

Ridiculous.
It’s a book about mother-infant dynamic and about breastfeeding which is feeding a baby with your breasts!

I don’t really object to a new title if it’s off putting due to being perhaps a little dated (the term chestfeeding makes me rage) but it’s actually a pretty radically feminist to write a book that is about about something unique and powerful than only women can do.

It is a well known book.

It was written donkeys years ago.

I assume it had a specific author/s?

They want to change it?

As long as totally new publication then well they're being very silly and will lose all that recognition of the title. A totally different volume.

Well that's bollocks but up to them.

To change it somehow retrospectively is a massive insult to the authors. Totally unacceptable.

It also discards once and for all the women who started LLL and those who supported up until now.

Idiots.

Chest feeding is the most ludicrous of inclusive language.

Males and females have breasts. It’s ALREADY inclusive however only one sex can produce milk. It gives me rage when I see it.

I used to not be too keen on the title but in all honesty feeding, and longer term, is an art. It's really bloody hard!

It's not just feeding your child, it's managing a lot of feelings and challenged and also teaching breastfeeding manners etc when a bit older.

It's a massive book. And only women can do it.

I bet they ditch the womanly in the end, the art of breastfeeding. I don't think the latter will go but there will be a huge disclaimer added :(

@EllieSattler

They'll need to re write the whole book, because it is incredibly heavy, indeed dogmatic*, on the unique mother-baby dyad,.how the mother has a special biological bond with the baby and how breastfeeding is a part of that. I have no idea how they can remove mothers and breastfeeding from it. It will be an entirely different book.

(*Once you get beyond the dogma its a very useful guide to breastfeeding)

Agree with this. LLL have a clear and definitely sexed on the mothering (including feeding) of small and not-so-small children and this inevitably comes through in the book. And that's fine - it's about something which is much more than simple mechanics of baby + breast.

In many ways I mothered my children in line with the LLL philosophy, particularly in relation to breastfeeding, but I also through necessity put them both into full-time childcare as young toddlers. This is not the state of affairs endorsed by the Womanly Art, but i rolled my eyes and took what was useful from the book anyway. I assume I wasn't the only one. I'm sceptical about the 'be kind' approach that infers trans men can't also roll their eyes and take what is useful and leave what doesn't fit.

I imagine the consultation will recommend losing 'womanly' and possibly also 'art' whilst retaining 'breastfeeding', and tbh it was a title which didn't resonate for me as I don't feel 'womanly' although obviously I am a woman. But trying to make the other stuff gender-neutral would be an extraordinary undertaking. Im sure there are plenty of relatively (or easily adapted) gender-neutral guides to breastfeeding, but it's a long way from the LLL starting position on motherhood.

To clarify @GreyhoundG1rl I absolutely abhor the idea of removing woman and breastfeeding from the title. The point of my post was that women are stuck with breastfeeding however the words are obfuscated; the fact breastfeeding was the most traumatic experience of my life makes this doubly painful to me.

Any bets on this originating in the US?

To be fair I really hate the title, although I do own the book.

MsGoodenough
I feel your pain. Experiences such as yours are being completely ignored in favour of the feelings of people who want to erase women from reality.

If they're looking to make changes, how about instead of going full throttle on deleting words like "woman" and "breastfeeding" they should update the book to be more inclusive of women who struggle to breastfeed, who feel like failures.
They should focus on psychological support for women like this.
Not just go ballistic on trans ideology for no useful reason whatsoever.

The title is old-fashioned but what exactly is wrong with it?

Breastfeeding is an art. No two babies are the same and they don't pick up breastfeeding in exactly the same way. Mothers have to adapt their style to the baby that they have.

Men and children don't breastfeed. Only women are able to breastfeed, therefore it is not incorrect to use the word 'womanly' in this context. What, precisely, is the problem with the word 'womanly'?

The book is famous and the title is instantly recognisable. Yes, it could be changed to something else but another 'Breastfeeding Explained' book does not differentiate it from the hundreds of similarly titled books already on the market.

My suspicion is that LLL might use the term 'nursing', which is commonly used in the USA to describe breastfeeding. It is used to distinguish nursing at the breast from feeding with expressed breast milk, which is more common over there.

It is actually very curious how 'chestfeeding' has taken off as a term in the US when 'nursing' is a more common expression than 'breastfeeding' anyway.

Nursing also means being a nurse in a hospital or care home, being a male or female person.

A title that does not include woman or breast or art but does use nursing, could end up rather confusing.

"The nursing help book" for example.

As someone who has recently started her breastfeeding 'journey' (as such endeavours are wont to be described these days), I am hugely disappointed by LLL.

I've actually found their website incredibly helpful and so far the language still appears to be women-centred and based in biological reality - perhaps they haven't got round to updating their older articles.

For such an organisation to go down this route is deeply dismaying. Only one class of people can breastfeed: women.

Women alone bear the burden and the privilege, the expense, the inconvenience and the joy of breastfeeding (delete as applicable). Women are the ones who must navigate work and breastfeeding. Women must deal with the physical aspects of breastfeeding. This is a feminist issue. Pretending that it isn't helps nobody.

I agree the title is a bit naff
but breastfeeding HAS to be in there somewhere
I looked at their definition, far too much about 'people'....a quick scan could leave the impression that this is potentially something men could do. I mean they have nipples so why not? I did know a man once who let his baby suck at his nipples for comfort. He wasn't an idiot so he knew he wasn't going to produce milk.

nursing does not make sense in the UK context

@Gncq

Nursing also means being a nurse in a hospital or care home, being a male or female person.

A title that does not include woman or breast or art but does use nursing, could end up rather confusing.

"The nursing help book" for example.

True, and certainly in the UK 'nursing' is not used as a synonym for breastfeeding. However, it is a common term in the US.

My suspicion is that LLL might use the term 'nursing', which is commonly used in the USA to describe breastfeeding. It is used to distinguish nursing at the breast from feeding with expressed breast milk, which is more common over there.

But that's a much less widely-used term in the UK - I think there would be quite a few people who didn't realise a book called 'the womanly art of nursing' was about breastfeeding, and zero people who didn't realise that 'the womanly art of breastfeeding' is.

I do think it's a dreadful title, but then I dislike the way that LLL - who provide brilliant breastfeeding support - are so dogmatic about the style of parenting that should accompany breastfeeding, which I think is very off-putting to a lot of women. I think the current title does actually reflect that. I actually think there's something particularly pernicious about getting rid of the word 'woman' if you have a philosophy like LLL which requires so much more of mothers than fathers and which is so incredibly demanding of mothers - acting like this is something 'parents' or 'people' do erases that. It also undermines the case for specific rights for women, such as maternity leave, as opposed to general parental leave - and in practice parenting as LLL advises requires specific accommodations for mothers, not just for 'parents'.

What, precisely, is the problem with the word 'womanly'?

The problem is gender ideology.

People who adhere to it are aiming to divorce the usage of the words "woman" and "man" from their original meaning, which relates to our biology.

Any usage of the words "woman" including "womanly" in relation to giving birth or breastfeeding or menstruation must be erased.

The ideology demands that "woman" and "womanly" now means something else that people with a penis can be.

So, no thank you LLL.

I think the issue is that they're not suggesting updating the title because it's dated or twee. The motivation is pandering to the lobby that wants to remove women from everything.