Watering the Plant in Another’s Courtyard: An Ethnographic Exploration of Daughters’ Devaluation Through Sex-Selected Abortions Among the Rural Married Females in South Punjab,Pakistan

Abstract

The current study sets forth the cultural underpinnings for daughters’ devaluation over son preferences in South Punjab, Pakistan. The major purpose of the present study was to provide an accurate description of women’s attitude on different aspects of sex-selected abortions (SSAs). Women, with a rural background, either forced to devalue their female fetus clinically or based on violence, were the targeted participants. Using ethnographic exploration with 161 obtrusive observations, 37 in-depth interviews, and 10 focus group discussions (FGD), comprising of 85 narrated case studies, the attitudes of rural married females toward daughters’ devaluation through SSAs were recorded. The findings of study allied the autonomy paradigm with a feminist perspective through argumentation of the lack of women’s individual identity in the domestic sphere. In addition, sociocultural legitimization toward patriarchal regimes snatches women’s autonomy over their reproductive behavior. Resultantly, daughters’ devaluation is analogous to sons’ preference, which arose through women’s subservience and exposure to violence in the intricate cultural web. Using ethnographic exploration through various anthropological research techniques, it explicates the nuanced feminist regimes for understanding women’s reproductive choice and empowerment. In conclusion, women’s subordination is the cause of differential power relations and inadequate gender inequality which results in SSAs. The current study exposed gender-biased power discrimination that consequently affects the women’s autonomous decision making about their reproductive behavior. Similarly, it highlighted how husband and in-laws (especially mother-in-law) used illegal medicines, dietary practices, traditional methods, or new biotechnological methods to execute the illegal act of SSA. This study may serve as the basic legal framework to check the deep-rooted culture of violence against vulnerable segments of the population.