Controversy Over Tongue-Tie: Divisions in the Community of Healthcare Professionals

Larrain, Maria; Stevenson, Edward G.J.

doi:10.1080/01459740.2022.2056843

Controversy Over Tongue-Tie: Divisions in the Community of Healthcare Professionals

Larrain, Maria; Stevenson, Edward G.J.

Authors

Maria Larrain

Dr Edward Stevenson jed.stevenson@durham.ac.uk
Associate Professor

Abstract

While recent decades have seen a rapid rise in cases of infant tongue-tie and in surgery to correct it, a controversy is now raging over the condition. Opinion is especially divided over so-called posterior tongue-tie, a variant which is detected based on the “feel” of the sub-lingual space. Drawing on ethnographic research with clinicians in England, we clarify the professional and personal commitments involved in the controversy. Our analysis is informed by Douglas’ theory of cultural representations (grid-group theory), in which ideas of what is natural and unnatural constitute central metaphors.

Citation

Larrain, M., & Stevenson, E. G. (2022). Controversy Over Tongue-Tie: Divisions in the Community of Healthcare Professionals. Medical Anthropology, 41(4), 446-459. https://doi.org/10.1080/01459740.2022.2056843

Journal Article Type	Article
Online Publication Date	Apr 8, 2022
Publication Date	2022
Deposit Date	Apr 13, 2022
Publicly Available Date	Apr 20, 2022
Journal	Medical Anthropology
Print ISSN	0145-9740
Electronic ISSN	1545-5882
Publisher	Taylor and Francis Group
Peer Reviewed	Peer Reviewed
Volume	41
Issue	4
Pages	446-459
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1080/01459740.2022.2056843

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© 2022 The Author(s). Published with license by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.