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Fighting for Life: Pro-Woman Framing in the Pro-life Movement

Trumpy, Alexa Jane
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1306280819

Abstract Details

2011, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, Sociology.
How do marginal actors change hearts and minds? Social movement scholars have long recognized that institutional outsiders target a range of potential allies to press their agenda. While much of the movement research historically privileged formal political activities in explaining social change, understanding the way actors draw upon culture and identity to garner wider support for a variety of social, political, and economic causes has become increasingly important. Ultimately, research that incorporates political process theories with the seemingly dichotomous notions of cultural and collective identity is especially valuable. To better understand how movement actors achieve broad change, I draw on recent attempts to examine how change occurs in fields. I argue it is necessary to examine how a field’s structural and cultural components, as well as the more individual actions, resources, rhetoric, and ideologies of relevant actors, interact to affect field change or maintain stasis. This research does so through an analysis of the current debate over abortion in America, arguably the most viciously divisive religious, moral, political, and legal issue since slavery. Over the past four decades, the American abortion debate has been glibly characterized as fight between the rights of two groups: women and fetuses, with pro-choice groups championing the rights of the former and pro-life groups the latter. Yet recently, a growing contingent of the pro-life movement is attempting to alter this dichotomy by using pro-woman rhetoric to argue that instead of advancing women’s equality, abortion is actually harmful to women. I use a combination of focus groups, individual interviews, participant observation, and content analysis to explain why a faction of the pro-life movement is attempting to alter the debate’s field frame by replacing the fetal rights focus with an emphasis on how abortion is harmful to women. Ultimately, this faction believes changing the field frame will persuade more actors to become pro-life. They believe that this, in turn, will lead to decreased abortion rates, higher percentages of Americans arguing that abortion should be illegal, and more restrictive abortion laws. As a result of these changes, actors in this faction of the pro-life movement believe abortion will eventually become illegal and unthinkable in America. Overall, this research contributes to our understanding of how change in fields is situated in both political and cultural struggles over meanings and resources.
Andrew Martin (Committee Chair)
Vincent Roscigno (Committee Member)
Liana Sayer (Committee Member)
162 p.
Sociology
social movement; framing; abortion

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Trumpy, A. J. (2011). Fighting for Life: Pro-Woman Framing in the Pro-life Movement [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1306280819

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Trumpy, Alexa. Fighting for Life: Pro-Woman Framing in the Pro-life Movement. 2011. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1306280819.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Trumpy, Alexa. "Fighting for Life: Pro-Woman Framing in the Pro-life Movement." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2011. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1306280819

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1306280819
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© 2011, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.