# Grantly Dick-Read > Mediated Wiki article. Canonical URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Grantly_Dick-Read > Markdown URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Grantly_Dick-Read.md > Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grantly_Dick-Read > Source revision: 1298949813 > License: Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) {{Short description|British obstetrician}} {{Use dmy dates|date=May 2017}} {{Use British English|date=May 2017}} [[File:Grantly Dick-Read Harley Street blue plaque.jpg|thumb|Memorial plaque, 25 [Harley Street](/source/Harley_Street), London]] '''Grantly Dick-Read''' (26 January 1890 – 11 June 1959) was a British [obstetrician](/source/obstetrician) and a leading advocate of [natural childbirth](/source/natural_childbirth). ==Early life and education== Dr. Grantly Dick-Read was born in [Beccles](/source/Beccles), Suffolk[https://books.google.com/books?id=Wr0VYAjVcWsC&dq=%22Grantly+Dick-Read%22+suffolk&pg=PA9 Post-war Mothers: Childbirth Letters to Grantly Dick-Read, 1946-1956 - Mary Thomas - Google Books] Retrieved 2016-11-04. on 26 January 1890, the son of a Norfolk miller and the sixth of seven children. Educated at [Bishop's Stortford College](/source/Bishop's_Stortford_College) and [St John's College, Cambridge](/source/St_John's_College%2C_Cambridge), he was an excellent athlete and horseman. He received his medical training at [the London Hospital](/source/Royal_London_Hospital), [Whitechapel](/source/Whitechapel), where he qualified as a physician in 1914.{{cite journal |last= Dunn |first= Peter M |year=1994 |title=Dr Grantly Dick-Read (1890-1959) of Norfolk and natural childbirth |journal=[Archives of Disease in Childhood](/source/Archives_of_Disease_in_Childhood) |publisher=[BMJ Group](/source/BMJ_Group) |volume= 71|issue= 2|pages=F145–F146 |doi= 10.1136/fn.71.2.f145|pmc=1061103 |pmid=7979472}} ==Career and work== During World War I, Dick-Read served with the [Royal Army Medical Corps](/source/Royal_Army_Medical_Corps). He was badly wounded at Gallipoli but later served in France. When the war ended, he returned to the London Hospital for a year and then completed an [MD](/source/Higher_doctorate) at Cambridge. In the early 1920s, he worked at a clinic in Woking and it became very popular. Dick-Read specialised in childbirth and care, observing and writing up case histories and notes. He published his first book ''Natural Childbirth'' in 1933, coining the term "natural childbirth." He defined the term as the absence of any intervention that would otherwise disturb the sequence of labor. The book argued that because "civilized" British women feared birth, the birthrate was dropping, and if they were not to fear birth it would be easier since fear creates tension which, in turn, causes pain.{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/07/parenting/natural-birth.html|title=Welcome to NYT Parenting. Here's Why We Won't Say 'Natural Birth.'|last=Grose|first=Jessica|date=2019-05-07|work=The New York Times|access-date=2019-05-14|language=en-US|issn=0362-4331}} Dick-Read's ideas were at first ridiculed, and he was expelled from the London clinic he had set up with a group of fellow obstetricians. When the Woking partnership was dissolved in 1934, Dick-Read set up a private clinic at 25 Harley Street. His second book, ''Revelation of Childbirth'' (which was later retitled ''Childbirth without Fear''), was published in 1942, and aimed at a general readership. It became an international bestseller, and it is still in print. Dick-Read was invited to give lecture tours all over the world. He moved to South Africa in 1948. In 1953 he returned to England and continued to lecture and write. In 1956 the UK Natural Childbirth Association, now called the [National Childbirth Trust](/source/National_Childbirth_Trust), was founded by [Prunella Briance](/source/Prunella_Briance). It became the foremost charity concerned with birth and early parenthood. Grantly Dick-Read was its first president. In 1957, a [phonograph](/source/phonograph) album featuring Dick-Read and entitled ''Natural Childbirth: A Documentary Record of the Birth of a Baby'' was released by [Argo Records](/source/Argo_Records) in the UK and [Westminster Records](/source/Westminster_Records) in the US. It is still available as a CD from Pinter & Martin. He died on 11 June 1959 aged 69 in [Wroxham](/source/Wroxham), Norfolk, at a riverside home that previously had been owned by the UK ukulele entertainer [George Formby](/source/George_Formby). A memorial plaque on Dick-Read's former clinic at 25 [Harley Street](/source/Harley_Street) was unveiled on 11 June 1992.City of Westminster green plaques {{cite web|url=http://www.westminster.gov.uk/services/leisureandculture/greenplaques/ |title=Westminster City Council - Green Plaques Scheme |accessdate=2011-07-07 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20120716210428/http://www.westminster.gov.uk/services/leisureandculture/greenplaques/ |archivedate=2012-07-16 }} ==Criticism== Dick-Read has been criticized for being anti-feminist.{{cite book|author1=Suzanne McKenzie-Mohr|author2=Michelle N. Lafrance|title=Women Voicing Resistance: Discursive and Narrative Explorations|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DjwsAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA45|date=26 March 2014|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1-136-20656-6|pages=45–}} In his book ''Motherhood in the Post-War World'' he wrote, "Woman fails when she ceases to desire the children for which she was primarily made. Her true emancipation lies in freedom to fulfill her biological purposes," as well as stating that tribal women who died in childbirth did so "without any sadness...realizing if they were not competent to produce children for the spirits of their fathers and for the tribe, they had no place in the tribe."{{cite journal|author=O Moscucci |url= |title=Holistic obstetrics: the origins of "natural childbirth" in Britain - Moscucci 79 (929): 168 - Postgraduate Medical Journal |journal=Postgraduate Medical Journal |volume=79 |issue=929 |pages=168–173 |publisher=Pmj.bmj.com |date= March 2003|doi=10.1136/pmj.79.929.168 |pmid=12697920 |pmc=1742649 }}"Who Said Childbirth Is Natural?: The Medical Mission of Grantly Dick Read", by Donald Caton, MD, in Anesthesiology 4 1996, Vol.84, 955-964 He also stated in 1942, "The mother is the factory, and by education and care she can be made more efficient in the art of motherhood."{{cite book|author1=Edwin R. Van Teijlingen|author2=George W. Lowis|author3=Peter McCaffery|title=Midwifery and the Medicalization of Childbirth: Comparative Perspectives|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2DHrH08bl5YC&pg=PA321|date=1 January 2004|publisher=Nova Publishers|isbn=978-1-59454-031-8|pages=321–}} He also claimed that "primitive" women did not experience childbirth pain, although he did not define "primitive" and never watched women in childbirth in "primitive" societies.{{cite book|author=Rodolfo J. Walss|title=Hypnosis for Labor and Delivery|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zLgrltw9lIcC&pg=PA60|year=2006|publisher=Vantage Press|isbn=978-0-533-14843-1|pages=60–}} Anthropological research has demonstrated this claim to be untrue. There is as much variety in the method and experience of giving birth in so-called “primitive cultures” as there are in Western cultures.{{cite book|author=Tess Cosslett|title=Women Writing Childbirth: Modern Discourses of Motherhood|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HHu7AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA10|year=1994|publisher=Manchester University Press|isbn=978-0-7190-4324-6|pages=10–}} ==See also== * [Childbirth positions](/source/Childbirth_positions) ==References== {{Reflist}} * Dick-Read, Grantly (2004), ''Childbirth without Fear: The Principles and Practice of Natural Childbirth'', Pinter & Martin, {{ISBN|978-0-9530964-6-6}} * Noyes Thomas, A. (1957), ''Doctor Courageous: The story of Dr Grantly Dick Read'' * [https://web.archive.org/web/20061113155227/http://pregnancytoday.com/reference/articles/grantly.htm Pregnancy Today] article * [http://www.pinterandmartin.com Pinter & Martin], Grantly Dick-Read's publishers * [http://www.authorandbookinfo.com/ngcoba/di.htm ''New General Catalog of Old Books and Authors''] * [http://www.discogs.com/No-Artist-Natural-Childbirth-A-Documentary-Record-Of-The-Birth-Of-A-Baby/release/2222017 ''Natural Childbirth: A Documentary Record of the Birth of a Baby''] on Discogs ==External links== * {{Internet Archive author |sname=Grantly Dick-Read}} {{Authority control}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Dick-Read, Grantly}} Category:1890 births Category:1959 deaths Category:Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge Category:British Army personnel of World War I Category:British obstetricians Category:Natural childbirth advocates Category:People educated at Bishop's Stortford College Category:People from Beccles Category:Royal Army Medical Corps officers Category:People from Wroxham Category:Harley Street Category:Military personnel from Suffolk --- Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Grantly Dick-Read](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grantly_Dick-Read) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grantly_Dick-Read?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.