Ways Of Being Born

A tribute to Indigenous midwives who continue to uphold traditional birthing wisdom in the face of institutional neglect.

Dr Mmatshilo Motsei draws upon ancestral guidance, academic inquiry and her lived experience as a trained midwife and spiritual healer to contribute to the growing body of work that seeks to decolonise maternal health in South Africa. Ways of Being Born is both a searing indictment of obstetric violence in the nation’s hospitals and a platform for the voices actively countering cultural erasure and humanising a sacred life-giving ritual.

Ways of Being Born is an exploration of childbirth as a sacred African rite of passage. Drawing on Indigenous midwifery knowledge and practices, Dr Motsei challenges obstetric violence and medicalisation, framing birth as relational and ancestral. Through the book, we understand birth as a physical, cultural and spiritual phenomenon.

Grounded primarily in South Africa, the book also engages birth rituals and ceremonial practices from across the continent, tracing shared Indigenous philosophies and ancestral lineage. The book examines the medicalisation of childbirth and the resulting dehumanisation of both birthing people and midwives. This critique is situated within the entangled histories of colonialism, the pressures of capitalist healthcare systems, and the fragmentation of care in postcolonial societies.

Ways of Being Born presents African birth knowledge as living, offering pathways to rehumanise contemporary childbirth practices.