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'Visions of Infant Joy'

Research and Practical Implications towards the greater enjoyment of Pregnancy, Birth and Babies

Birthlight Trust Launch Conference

10 – 12 July 2006
Homerton College, Cambridge UK

www.birthlightconference.com

The landmark conference really will be a truly epoch making event for all those concerned with sensitive maternity and postnatal care.

This Conference represents an unprecedented gathering of practitioners and scientists whose work has changed our understanding of birth and babies. Speakers include Frederick Leboyer, Ina May Gaskin, Joseph Chilton Pearce, Michel Odent, Sheila Kitzinger, Gowri Motha and Suzanne Arms.

Review Full Conference Schedule

The Conference, which will take place at Homerton College Cambridge, will include a reception for the Launch of the Birthlight Trust. The conference will also feature displays of art, photos and baby artifacts, poster sessions, video gallery and an exhibition.

The Conference has received Accreditation from the Royal College of Midwives and as such can be counted towards in service training. There are a number of sponsored places for midwives and childbirth educators.

About Birthlight

Birthlight is an international charity set up in 2000 in Cambridge. It’s mission statement is to ‘promote the physical and mental wellbeing during pregnancy, childbirth and parenthood of women, babies and fathers in the United Kingdom and the rest of the world through education and research’. Birthlight has developed a network of mothers, health professionals and researchers who share the view that much can be done in the community through simple means to promote greater wellbeing around childbirth.

Françoise Barbira Freedman, the founder of Birthlight, learnt her mothering skills from Amazonian rainforest people over long periods of anthropological fieldwork. She found empirically at first and increasingly through research that western babies and their parents could benefit greatly from this gentler yet rougher style of parenting both before and after birth. Breathing awareness, movement and rhythm, touch and sound have been integrated in simple practices accessible to all parents, whatever their backgrounds and culture. Yoga and swimming, which have been Françoise’s life long favoured exercises, have provided suitable cultural idioms in which to mould Birthlight applications. Parents in the world’s first nations are still a main inspiration and one of Birthlight’s aims is to enable them to adapt their cultures on their own terms in today’s world.

The trading arm of the Birthlight Trust, Birthlight Teaching Ltd, is active in training certified instructors who work with new families in the community and also in hospitals and health centres. There are currently over 1,000 Birthlight teachers in the UK alone; 35% work in the National Health Service and in Sure Start facilities. Birthlight actively promotes integrated care from the community, offering continuity of services from pre-conception to babies’ third year.

About the Conference

Over the past few years, findings in scientific research on foetal life and early brain development have been converging to offer a better understanding of the continuity from foetus to baby and child. The importance of interaction, primarily between babies and mothers but more generally with carers, has moved from myths and tales to scientific journals. With this Launch Conference, Birthlight aims to celebrate and validate the vision and work of pioneers who strived to promote better ways of welcoming babies into the world. These extraordinary agents of change will come together for this special occasion and this alone makes the conference a truly unique event. The recent scientific underpinning of the more sensitive forms of maternity and postnatal care which these pioneers have advocated for decades needs to be better known by health professionals across disciplinary boundaries and by the public at large. The conference aims to draw together knowledge and resources that can help women, babies and their families to expand their wellbeing and enjoyment of life in the transition to parenthood. Besides plenary talks, poster sessions and practical sessions aim to make the conference a lively forum for meeting and exchange. Anyone with an interest in birth and babies and the multiple implications of how pregnancy, birth and postpartum are experienced is welcome.

The Conference breaks provide an opportunity to visit the Exhibition, Art Expo and Birth Art Café. Optional evening outings include the Birthlight Launch event and an opportunity to try your hand at punting on the River Cam (or let a more experienced hand transport you down the river in style) on route to a Talking story and video presentation.

A conference creche, sponsored by Medela and free to conference delegates, will be available for ages birth to 5 years.

The dedicated site which includes an online booking facility is www.birthlightconference.com.

Call: +44 1223 362288 Fax: + 44 1223 362501.

Email:enquiries @ birthlight.com.

Bookings can be made for the whole conference or for separate days and events. Discounted rates and block bookings are listed on the conference website. Payments can be made through Paypal for online bookings, by cheque or BACS.

Venue and accommodation

Homerton College is situated less than a mile away from Cambridge City Centre and the oldest parts of the University, within walking distance from the railway station and on several bus routes to Addenbrookes Hospital.

Sponsors

Birthlight would like to give sincere thanks to our sponsors for this conference.