The Maternal Imprint

This Women’s History Month, you’re invited to a thought-provoking presentation where leading gender and science scholar Sarah S. Richardson charts the untold history of the idea that women’s health and behavior during pregnancy can have long-term effects on their children’s health and welfare.

The Maternal Imprint, Richardson’s groundbreaking book, offers a critical analysis of conceptual and ethical issues—in particular, the staggering implications for maternal well-being and reproductive autonomy—provoked by the striking rise of epigenetics and fetal origins science in postgenomic biology today.

Richardson examines what we might take for granted about human pregnancy, and invites us to challenge our values and assumptions that have guided science’s perspectives on the maternal body and infant health. Shifting scientific views throughout history have influenced medicine, ethics, and public perceptions of motherhood highlighting the complex interface of science and society.