Woman’s Body and Discursive Order of Biopower/Biopolitics

After the Second World War, body sociology has become one of the main areas of sociology with the influence of poststructuralist thinkers. Conclusive studies have been put forward especially with the development of health sociology since the second half of the 20th century. This study is based on Foucault’s concepts of bio-power and bio politics and Turner’s theory of body sociology. The focus of this study is to show how the discourses of regulatory power affect women’s body and the population at the macro level. The technological developments and neoliberal political discourse of this century
are very effective in medicine, especially in the female body. The research design of this study is narrative in nature. In this study, 10 women diagnosed with risky pregnancy were interviewed and the participants were asked to narrate their life history during their pregnancy. In the light of the data obtained from the interviews with women, four themes were identified by inductive content analysis. These themes consist of four different themes: The order and normalizing effect of medical discourse (1), the uniqueness of women and the psychological process (2), control of the body and social
practices (3) and the social / work life of the woman (4).In this study, it was found that the dominance established on their bodies through bio-power and bio-political was accepted by women in desperate terms. In addition, the risk and uncertainty concepts that cause anxiety in pregnant women constitute the normalizing practices of medical discourse. In this sense, expert opinion, international companies performing genetic testing, laboratory investigations, psychological process, hospitals have come to the forefront as the most important forces in the diagnosis of risky pregnancy.