Hollywood's Reproduction Code: Regulating Contraception and Abortion in American Cinema, 1915-1952

Abstract

“Hollywood's Reproduction Code: Regulating Contraception and Abortion in American Cinema, 1915-1952” examines the visual and verbal rhetorics of choice with regard to filmic representations of contraception, abortion, and female reproductive agency. My dissertation draws upon films such as Where Are My Children? (1916), Christopher Strong (1933), Gambling With Souls (1936), and Leave Her to Heaven (1945), which I consider alongside censorship practices and the Production Code, reproductive rights history, legal and eugenics discourses, and narrative concerns. I argue that over time, film’s progressive treatment of reproductive agency sharply declines, and any vestiges of objectively, scientifically didactic aims or goals disappear. Relatedly, this trend demonstrates an increasing disconnect between pro-choice popular morality and anti-choice prescribed morality.