BEYOND INFANT-MORTALITY - GENDER AND STILLBIRTH IN REPRODUCTIVE MORTALITY BEFORE THE 20TH-CENTURY

Though it has been the largest component of reproductive mortality sin ce its statutory registration in 1928, stillbirth has received little attention from historical demographers, who have relied on the more or thodox indicator of early human survival changes-'infant mortality'. T he exclusion of stillbirth hampers demographic analysis, underestimate s progress in newborn vitality, and over-privileges post-natal causes in theoretical explanation. A case is made for estimating stillbirth b efore 1928 as a ratio of early neonatal death, and for employing perin atal mortality as an historical indicator of female health status. The long-run trend of reproductive mortality (encompassing mature foetal and live born infant death during the first eleven months) reveals a s ubstantial decline in perinatal causes in the first industrial century (1750-1850), implying a major concurrent improvement in the nutrition al status of child bearers. Reproductive mortality is a more complete indicator of death in infancy. It offers demographers a means of fract uring the fertility versus mortality dualism and a potential purchase on gender as a demographic variable, while re-opening the case on mort ality in the demographic dynamic of the world we have lost.