Publisher's Synopsis
When a child is born, there is hardly a question that is discussed as heatedly as that of his diet. In Western Europe, breastfeeding established itself as the norm in the course of the 20th century, but nutritional practices were not always based on it - in the early 20th century, but also in the 1950s to 1960s, bottle feeding was popular. The present study provides for the first time an overview of the history of bottle feeding for babies from its invention in 1865 to the advertising ban in 1981. It shows how nutritional knowledge arose, how this knowledge was communicated to the general public and finally how people implemented this knowledge in baby care. Bottle feeding entered into alliances with actors in science, industry and psychology, among others, which led to it being able to establish itself as a legitimate alternative to breast feeding. This consensus only began to crumble in the 1970s. Using the sample countries Germany and Sweden, the study shows social specifics of this process and examines the changing relationship between parents, children and experts from things and things using the example of infant nutrition historical perspective.
