Woman's Hour - Artificial wombs, exam stress, and celebrating the role of grandmothers

Episode Date: May 9, 2022

Childbirth is something that more than 80% of women go through in their lifetime. But could that be about to change? Sci-Fi author Helen Sedgwick thinks we’re just a generation away from external, artificial wombs being used for childbirth. But what does this mean for the concept of motherhood and a woman’s place in society? Anita is joined by Helen and designer of an artificial womb Lisa Mandemaker.Exam season is upon us - Highers have begun in Scotland and A-levels and GCSEs start on the 16th May and finish on the 28th June, but maybe your kids have end of year exams coming up too. As a parent what is the best way to support your child? Especially if they have important exams looming but are doing everything they can to pretend that they don’t? Or perhaps you have the opposite problem and your child is paralysed with anxiety. How do you engage the teenage brain and support your child with their revision? Anita is joined by Dr Jane Gilmour, a Consultant Clinical Psychologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital.What does your grandmother mean to you? The South African musician Toshi has released a new song – Khokhoba – which means ‘getting old’ in her native language of Xhosa. The song is dedicated to her grandmother and we hear about the spiritual and societal role that elderly women and grandmothers play in the Xhosa culture.Sex Parties have gone from being fringe underground raves to large, well-established sell-out club nights, in the last few years! Why are we seeing a resurgence the sex party? We hear from Dr Kate Lister, Sex Historian and Author of A Curious History of Sex & Miss Gold, who runs One Night Parties, a sex party in London. They discuss how Covid-19 has changed the way we approach sex, the female gaze and hedonism through history

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2, and of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme, peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning, welcome to Friday's Woman's Hour. The sun's out, the days are getting longer, the weather is warming up. It could only mean one thing, exam season is here. Do you live with a teenager? how is revision going in your household how are the stress and anxiety levels are you seeing the teenage brain in full-on fight and flight mode right now i want to know this morning what's happening in your home but i'd also love

your questions if you need some advice and guidance about how to get your teenager to revise maybe you'd like to know how to get you through the exam period or you'd like to share the memories of your time. Did your parents help you or not? Were you coaxed gently or just shouted at? Whether you were worried your teenager is working too much or not enough, if their anxiety is going through the roof and you just don't know what to do about it,

I'm going to be joined by consultant clinical psychologist Dr Jane Gilmore who will be answering all your questions. You can get in touch in the usual way. You can text us, 84844. You can email us by going to our website, or you can contact us via social media. It's at BBC Woman's Hour. We also have music today from South African singer-songwriter Toshi,

who will be talking about honouring her grandmother and the wisdom she got from her. Then, when sci-fi becomes reality, as it often does, we're going to be talking about artificial wombs on the show this morning. Can you imagine having a baby in a womb created for the gestation of a child? What would the implications be for us as a society, morally, ethically, legally? We're going to get into that fascinating subject a little bit later. And sex parties. Well, it is practically the weekend. But first, exam season is upon us. Stress, sleepless nights, butterflies in your tummy,

and that's just the parents. Hires have begun in Scotland and A-levels in GCSE start on the 16th of May and finish on the 28th of June, just in time for the sunshine. But maybe your kids have end of year exams coming up too. As a parent, what is the best way to support your child, especially if they have important exams looming, but are doing everything they can to pretend they don't? Or perhaps you have the opposite problem and your child is paralysed by anxiety. How do you engage the teenage brain and support your child with their revision? To give us some advice about how to get through this tough time, I am joined by Dr Jane Gilmore, who is a consultant clinical psychologist at Great Ormond Street. Jane, welcome to the Woman's Hour studio. It is lovely to be in your

physical presence. Thank you for having me. You've written a book called The Incredible Teenage Brain. So before we actually get into exam revision and what we should and shouldn't be doing, what is the teenage brain? Well, it's a great question because the teenage brain is unique. As soon as you hit puberty, the brain is marinated in these pubertal hormones. And it means that the brain changes state, right? It's different from the brain of a younger child, and it's different from the brain of an adult. And so those teenage years, and actually in terms of brain science, up until the age of 25, the brain is developing in an extraordinary way. It's a learning machine. There are some

unique drives that we need to know about as the adult supporting the teenager so that we can capitalise on them and make sure that they reach their potential. So some of these drives might include a search for novelty. A really key drive is about getting integrated into the peer group, a search for identity, thinking about independence and autonomy. So what we want to do here is think about how neuroscience and education can join hands and learn from one another so that this young person can ride on the crest of a wave and get through this learning period, whether that be life skills, content in terms of exams and make the most of that period of time. Yeah, there's a lot of conflicting stuff going on, isn't there? If you want to be out there experimenting and doing all the novelty stuff and fitting in with your friends. And if your friends are out there, lots to get into. Surely every brain is different, though, Jane. Every brain works differently.

That is true. And I think there's a bit of an art here about holding a balance between these general patterns that are pretty strong in the science. The neuroscience is pretty strong and there's persistent and strong evidence that these things happen in order for the brain to be ready for adulthood. So that the drives I talked about and we'll talk about a little bit more in the context of learning do exist and also there are individual differences and so for example risk-taking is a key activity that young people in adolescence will do more of they'll become riskier but the kid who's not a risk taker is not going to be suddenly very different that they will be riskier so those individual differences will manifest in each young person and I think as parents we need to hold in time in in mind two frameworks one is the teenage brain neuroscience and the other is I know my kid and where those two worlds collide is the fine art and that's the magic that's the intersection where the success will happen excellent um 84844 I can just imagine all the teenagers listening to this right now

going, it's not me. It's my brain. It's just the way it is my brain. Okay, message has just come in. And I think this is going to be relevant to possibly quite a few people. Someone has just said my daughter won't revise. She says she can't makes me crazy. Okay, so here we've got a teenager that says she can't revise or won't revise. I'm not sure which that might be. So the first thing is to find out what's going on here. Now, there's an old saying, never ask a question unless you're prepared to hear the answer. And that's a really important message to have in your family framework.

You need to know what's going on. So is this young person frightened about the idea of getting engaged because it feels like a big hill to climb? Or do they not know where to start? You know, there's a huge, let's imagine GCSEs, there's a lot of content there and it's an organisational issue. So you want to ask the question with genuine curiosity, what is it that's stopping you getting going? Now, one of the key things we know about the teenage brain is that they respond really well to a consultative model. This is part of their drive towards being independent. So I would ask that young person, so what is it that's stopping you getting going today? What is it? What do you think the hardest thing would be? Ask them to write their timetable. Ask them to say, what would be the hardest thing to do in terms of your timetable getting back on track, let's say. Ask me what I

should do as the parent supporting you in order to keep to your plan. So all of those things are taking a consultative role in order to make them the architect of their own platform, let's say. And that can often get things going. But it might also be a question of organisation. It could be an issue of not getting hold of the notes. You know, you need to know what's going on there. So if you ask the question, make sure you stay calm and allow them to keep talking, because that way you will hear more about the issue in hand. If you start to yell, actually the teenage brain, in fact, any of our brains would see that as a threat. Well, the end of that tweet was, makes me crazy so i'm kind of you

know you're saying get into the consultative model to have a discussion but if you're crazy how do you need to kind of train your own brain to get to that so try not to let that emotion bleed into the conversation with your teenager it's okay to feel those emotions but take them to your partner and your friend let them all hang out sort through them with that adult context and then once you're clear-headed and calm go back into negotiations with your young person lots of messages coming in jane i've got a ton of questions but i'm going to keep going to um our listeners here 84844 is the number to text um helen in essex says is it really possible to discuss exams without mentioning covid how it's taken out so many pupils and staff recently, so revision is disrupted. And then she goes on to talk about

infection and ensuring that it isn't spread in exam halls. But this, for a lot of young people sitting their A-levels, this will be the first time they've ever sat an exam. And that's true. So for the year 13 kids who are doing A-levels in England and be the first time they've ever sat an exam. And that's true. So for the year 13 kids who are doing A-levels in England and Wales, they haven't had any gateway exams before. And so I think there is some anxiety, certainly in the families I'm talking to in work and so on, that they haven't had the experience of GCSEs. Will they be OK? I think it's worth bearing in mind that many young people around the world have only one set of gateway exams. And in fact, there's a little bit of a push in the education and neuroscience community

to rethink GCSEs in their entirety. So that's one thing to bear in mind. I think the second thing is, and it sort of comes back to the question we were discussing before, is, is the young person anxious or is the parent anxious? Because the strategies would be very different depending on where the anxiety lies. And look, you know, as parents, we all hold some anxiety about these, you know, exam periods, because we are looking forward into the future and young people are more likely to be in the moment. So there is an element of that. So I think I would want to think about that a little bit and recognise that COVID did have an impact on attainment, particularly in the primary school years rather than secondary school years,

and young people in socioeconomic disadvantage did fall behind further than they had already. And that is the message of COVID, somewhat. Those disadvantages that existed were somewhat polarised and magnified, and that's true in education and true in mental health and other areas. So what do you do with an incredibly anxious child? So I think the first thing to notice about anxiety is perpetual reassurance rarely helps. I would get practical about this. Now three things we know help in terms of learning material is having a bit of wakeful rest,

so a short period of active learning and then a rest. Good quality sleep, it's the glue of the memory and also to think about learning in a calm environment. So if you get that information across to a young conscientious person so that they have a realistic timetable that's not overwhelming, they will take that on board. I think the other thing to recognise is what's the message at home? You know, is the first question you ask when they come in the door, how was the test? What was your mark? What did everyone else get? You are somehow giving them the message that academic work is your priority. Now, of course, exams are important.

But if you ask any parent, the only thing they care about is that their kid is all right. So think about the messages that you're giving. You know, you can be fabulous and not perfect. You know, it's something you might say out loud and act out and talk about in words and actions. Praise a very conscientious kid for taking a break, for seeing their friends, for looking after themselves. And holding that balance and that perspective is really one of our key tasks as a parent, really. I think the other thing to say about... I'm smiling because I'm gender stereotyping Asians in my own mind and laughing at the

idea of Asian parents not asking what grade you got. Sorry, massive stereotype. Sorry, I interrupted you. I was going to say the other thing about stress which is quite interesting exam stress is a stress but we want to differentiate between chronic and perpetual stress which is overwhelming and toxic for particularly for the for the developing brain and short bursts of stress which are actually can be embraced and can push you to find something about yourself that is wonderful find something else out about yourself. So we actually know there's a group at Sanford who looked at the different mindset about stress. So if you consider a short burst of stress, extra energy, your brain and your body react in a different way,

and you're more likely to build resilience, as compared to a young person who sees stress as absolutely bad news. So think about that mindset at home as well. Exam nerves are extra energy. This is rocket fuel to get you through your exam. That can really change the way you consider an experience of stress but it's important to differentiate between that and you know ongoing feelings of being overwhelmed and that would very much be something to be addressed in a different way. Yeah because people are asking about this someone just messaged to say my 16 year old daughter is so stressed and anxious we're not putting pressure on her at home but she feels huge self-pressure she struggles to see the way out it's sucking her down she's then said what is the point of life this is awful and all I have afterwards is a levels uni and further stress it's hard to know how best to support her if we are doing our best I think

that's again about walking the walk now if it was a if it at home about why you're you are valuable to us as a person so in some cases and this is quite an extreme suggestion but it works in some instances you can say right I don't want to know what your exam mark is I want to know you're looking after yourself don't even tell me what it is the things that matter to me is that you're engaged with this you're enjoying it you're doing your best so for a child that really has lost that perspective it might be about showing that your value to me is not your exam results I might also want to worry if that young person has got some perfectionist tendencies and girls sometimes are more likely to have these perfectionist

tendencies. I would perhaps want to have a little bit of a, you know, keep an eye on that one because sometimes it can build a bit of momentum and get out of control. So that might be something to keep an eye on. And certainly if she's voicing concerns about, you know, feeling overwhelmed, listen to those very seriously. Girls having perfectionist tendencies, is that cultural? Actually, I don't know the data on cultural differences. I do know that there is a significantly higher likelihood of perfectionist tendencies in the female population. And there is an overlap between those perfectionist tendencies and elements of obsessive compulsive disorder. So it is something to keep an eye on because if it does move into the obsessive compulsive disorder forum, then it certainly needs treatment.

And the quicker, the better in that instance. Now, if you're concerned your child isn't buckling down, does nagging work? Well, here's what I'd say about that is it's unlikely to have a positive effect on the family environment. I think this is again coming back to the idea of using these drives in the teenage brain. So if you think about, for example, the drive to be part of a peer group, now that's there for a very good reason. You have to learn to be part of your community in order to be, you know, not excluded in the future. So can you use that and think about hosting a study group at home, get peer to peer learning going. And that's also very useful because we know if you learn in order to teach someone, you learn in a more,

it's embedded more richly than if you learn simply to pass a test. So that's a win-win for a teenager. So get some kids around, do a study group. Think about seeking out novelty. Teenagers love novelty. Mix up where, when and how they study and think about using their passions. If they're into hip-hop dance, get them to learn the physics equation to a hip-hop dance and they can visualise that, right? Yeah, you'd need to know a bit about hip-hop as well, right,

if you were going to do the revision around and that's a whole nother thing about teenagers um yeah um okay big question what do you do about the mobile phone right if i had a penny for every time i'm asked this i would be extremely rich the mobile phone we have to recognize that two key brain drives in the teenage brain are friends and novelty trends. So a mobile phone stands for friends and trends. It is extremely attractive to a teenager, more so than perhaps any other demographic group. So we have to recognise the pull at a basic brain level towards a phone. Now, that does not mean that you should have 24-7 access to your mobile phone. We also know the mobile phone, if it's in the room,

even if it's switched off, has an effect on our cognitive capacity. It's as if you're doing something in a sleep-deprived state. Wow. Right? And so I would come to using a consultative model again, right? The deal is the mobile phone stays out of the room. How are we going to make sure you have enough access so you find out

what's going on who's on the whatsapp group so you're not penalizing your young child or your young person rather for having the mobile phone out the room and you're also allowing them to take control about how that happens because the non-negotiable part is the mobile phone stays out the room the laptop and other technology yes absolutely but the mobile phone stays out of the room. The laptop and other technology, yes, absolutely. But the mobile phone is specific, it's bespoke, and it's designed to get your attention. What about taking breaks? How important is that? Oh, it's absolutely fundamental. Now, ideally, something like what they call in the literature,

wakeful rest, so staring into space, literally, having a daydream. So not, I've got my downtime, mum, mom dad can i get on insta for a little while well that has there's got to be a balance there so a break has got to be feel good for you so so a little bit of staring into space yes that does we show that there is evidence that consolidates information and also there's got to be a reward that means something to you so it's a reward if you're if your young person comes up with a reward and you can go with it, it's much more likely to motivate them because nothing breeds success like success. They've got a signal from the brain and their environment. They've done that chunk of work. They're doing something that feels good for a little bit of time. So I think it's about holding a balance between a little bit of wakeful rest, a little bit of what they would like to do.

And it is very important to have breaks and they're actually good for well-being and actually good for learning the content too i'm just going to flip it around a bit what if you want to do the best by your kid you're listening to this taking all the advice um finding it really useful but you're just busy you're working non-stop and you can't give your teenager the attention that they need well look that's life isn't it so i think this is something about, I mean, I would say here, I work with lots of families that have got working parents. So I think one of the things you could do is think about using technology

actually in a sort of innovative way. So you might drop in and have some face time. Let's say after 20 minutes, how are you doing? You could even use your lunch break, let's say, and do some social learning together. Tell me about, you know, the chemistry equation you've just learned. So you don't have to be in the room to be emotionally available. And I also think you could also think about using that social brain again, trying getting some study groups together.

So you might not be the person that's supporting the learning process, but there is a social group that is. Particularly, we know that because teens really do want to fit in with their peer group, if they have a peer group that's very orientated towards studying, they probably will go with it and actually do something really interesting if they're left to learn some content in a study group context. So you might, in other words, you might recruit the social world if you can't be there. Here's an email that's come through that actually is quite interesting and specific,

saying my son is studying towards his GCSEs but tends to eat too much. He seems to need it for psychological support. What shall I do? Well, sometimes eating can be a way of blocking out emotions and one might hypothesise that it's pretty anxiety-provoking time. So that could be around. In terms of practical strategies,

I think having food, you know, we all do this, you know, I know for I'm writing a book, I make tea, you know, I stop and I make tea instead of, you know, writing what I should be writing. So it might be that he's got into a little habit of eating in order, you know, instead, you know, in the context of his study time so I would put the food out of the room and it's great to be out the room mix it up get away from his desk and so then you can really make him be conscious about what he's eating not in a punitive way but in a way to say look just stop and you have a walk by the time you get down to the kitchen you know you might have thought of something else to do and I think do keep an eye on it because you know it's part of a healthy eating

plan is a good idea too. And there'll be teenagers listening very quickly Jane, cramming can they do it is it a thing does the brain absorb information as you're walking into the down the corridor towards the exam room? Right one one part of me you know the evidence is a well-rested calm well you know well-fed brain in a positive mindset is the best circumstance in which to engage with an exam and also in extremis it's never too late never too late uh talk to jane gilmore um stay with us actually if any more questions come through we'll put them to you um and richard sent an email i just want to read this out single dad bring up two daughters i found exam season not only gcses and a levels and their university at home quite stressful call them for me as well i

found the best way to support them was to make sure they had food when they needed it chocolate in case of emergencies and any support they needed and an understanding that they were very stressed coupled with big hugs. It could have been bad. Both have now graduated university, having done a degree and their masters. Very proud father. Well done, you, Richard, and your daughters. 84844.

Any more questions for Jane? I'm going to keep her in that chair for a little while because she's a font of very good information. Also, if you want to talk about anything we're discussing on the show, how about when sci-fi becomes reality, as it often does? Have you or someone you love been through childbirth? How would you feel if the whole process could happen artificially? Artificial wombs have been a part of medicine and scientific research for a while.

Back in 2017, scientists in Philadelphia revealed a biobag, an artificial womb outside the body that could change the odds dramatically for babies born prematurely who are too young for an incubator. Five years on, and some doctors in the Netherlands think we could be less than 10 years away from using artificial wombs for the whole term of a pregnancy. Basically, a woman would not get physically pregnant. Instead, a baby would develop in an artificial replica of a womb outside the body and be born without the woman having to go through childbirth. But what does this mean for

the concept of motherhood and a woman's place in society, not to mention the ethics and morals around this? Fascinating stuff. My next guests have been looking into just those questions lisa mandamaka is a designer in the netherlands who created an artificial womb as part of an exhibition about the reproduction and helen sedgwick is a former bioengineer and author who's written about artificial wombs being a part of everyday life in her book the growing season welcome to both of you. You've both explored this area of artificial rooms for your creative projects. Lisa, yours an art installation.

Helen, yours a novel. I'm going to ask you both where these ideas came from. Lisa, I'll come to you first. When did you first become interested in this subject? Yeah, it yeah different things coming together uh at some point i was i'm always very interested in uh the meaning of technology and how it affects us as humans and society and uh yeah reproductive technologies of course are going to impact uh so many people so that's a really interesting technology to think about and to work in as a

designer and I kind of came across a design studio that was researching the future of reproductive technology and they needed a designer to help kind of translate it into tangible things and I was really interested in it so I just wrote wrote them. I'm here. I'm a designer. I'd love to help out. And yeah, before I know it, I was in the team and thinking about how artificial wombs could look like in the future. And what was the purpose of the installation? What did you want people to get from it? The purpose was kind of a, it was a prototype, a speculative prototype, and it was a research model. So it was there to inspire people or to kind of get people to think about how they feel about a technology like an artificial womb because usually when you read about it in a in an academic paper

or something um you don't really uh get this imagination how it would look like or how it would be part of your daily life and to have this tangible things thing that you can walk around of and ask yourself like why is it not see-through or why is it so big or I don't feel comfortable with this shape or why can I not hug it? Why is it not in my body? Yeah, exactly. These questions arise. And we wanted to kind of get the debate going and the ethical parts of this with a general public. That was the main thing. So take it out of the lab,

take it out of the hospital where scientists are working on it and talk about it with like a broad group of people. Well, we have a broad group of people listening to us this morning. What do you think about this? 84844, let us know.

Helen, you wrote a book about it. I mean, I love it when sci-fi writes about something and it's like, it's not even sci-fi, it's happening. What was the conversation that inspired you to write Growing Season? I was chatting to a group of friends, mostly writers, all women, all feminists, about the fact that we still didn't have equality, really. We didn't have equal pay. We don't have equal

representation. Why don't we have these things yet? And what is it going to take to really change society, so that we're living in an equal world. And my idea, tying into my background as a scientist was that we were developing, we were going to develop an external womb. And this would have all kinds of impacts, many of them in my head during this conversation, very, very positive. I could see all sorts of benefits. I could see liberation for women. I could see potential changes in, you know, bringing in equal parental leave, much more flexible working conditions, all that kind of thing. And I was describing this technology. I imagined a very portable womb that you could actually wear on your body. So you could kind of strap it on, walk around with it. Men could carry it.

Everyone could carry it. It would have this equalizing effect across society. And in the book, the wombs are called pouches. Yes, they're called pouches. Part of everyday life. But how do they change the gender dynamics in society in the book? Well, that's the big question. And as I was kind of developing this idea, I was talking to a lot of people and many of them were not sharing my enthusiasm, but were getting fairly horrified or fairly concerned about some of these ideas and what it would mean for women, for women's bodies. And that's really what I wanted to explore in the book, is all these different points of view, all these very

different reactions that people can have to a technology like this. So originally, we see what appears to be a utopian society. And as the book goes on, we see more and more examples in which this technology can be misused, or used for the wrong reasons. And particularly, we see the commodification of this technology, where it's owned by a private company who then have an awful lot of control, a lot of power over what's happening in the society. Well, that is the sort of first question when I was thinking about this overnight that came to my mind, Lisa. You know, who would control the technology if something like this existed?

Yeah, that's a good question. Yeah, so I've been working with the scientists in the hospital of Eindhoven. So for me, it was mostly from a medical point of view that we worked on it. So then I would imagine that the doctors would control it but yeah I can imagine that that there's these different private companies that would start to control it but yeah I'm trying with different design projects to kind of move away from these maybe more dystopian things like that it's so controlled with like i don't know capitalist futures um to imagine new kind of stories um to move away from from from that controlled

environments i mean you you say dystopian but presumably if we did have this somebody would have to create the technology so somebody would have ownership over it wouldn't they yeah yeah it's it's such a complex thing so i don't really have the answer no no we don't none of us do we're just discussing it this is why it's so fascinating and the people listening want to talk about it as well molly's been in touch um just to get your thoughts on this both of you um and jane if you want to input you know working at great ormond street maybe you have an interest in this. Molly in Brighton says will the artificial womb include replica of a mother's heartbeat, voice, bodily

noises? She says she can't imagine a womb without this. What do you think Lisa? Yeah we definitely have thought about this for the first installation that we did it was more about like how it would look and um how you would um and we didn't kind of think about these connection but that came up a lot um so many many people uh talked about this uh the heartbeat or being able to um maybe even have like a blood connection or or something else to be hooked on this device several times a day. But you could always share it as well. So the father's heartbeat could become more important as well. It doesn't have to be only focused on the mother anymore

with a device like this. And yeah, it depends really how you imagine the context. So is it something like what Helen was saying, like that you carry with you? So then I can imagine that there's different ways that it's connected to your body and to heartbeats or something. But I could also imagine that it's something that you have, you keep at home, or it's something that you can go to in like a more controlled environment in a in a hospital and then you would have like um different times a day uh that you would be

hooked to the machine or maybe only on the weekends that you don't bring the stress in i don't know spend the weekend with my baby helen let's in that case let's let's get helen back in let's talk about the sort of positives then when you first thought about this and what it would do for equality and liberating women. How would it work? Well, I mean, I think it could completely change our mindset as a society because a huge amount of the inequalities we end up with, I think, are because of an underlying assumption that women must be the ones to bear children. And once we develop this technology, that's no longer the case. Anyone can

effectively bear children. And that will have to have an effect, I think, on the way everyone is thinking about women and men and reproduction in general. I also think it could be transformative for men, particularly if it is a kind of external womb that is very personal that you can cuddle and carry with you and feel very engaged with. Because we could then have men as well as women demanding better parental leave, flexible working conditions, all that kind of stuff. So I think it could really change our mindset and our assumptions that are underlying a lot of the inequalities in society shouldn't we that would be my hope anyway yes um it's interesting isn't it that we'd have to go to these lengths to get equality yes surely we need to be struck changing society so that women can fit having children around their their work life and their lives generally, rather than having to come up with these new techniques to have children?

Yes, that's certainly true. And of course, the technology is neutral. The technology on its own doesn't do anything. The question is, how are we going to use it within society? So society's attitudes cannot be disentangled from what this technology is going to mean for women, which is where a lot of the concerns come about. Could it perhaps be used to entrench existing inequalities rather than bring about a new equality?

So you can't separate the technology from the society. They have to go hand in hand, I think. Yeah. I mean, there's so many questions around this. where would it put the conversation around abortions that's a very good question a technology like this effectively changes the moment of viability potentially meaning that viability begins at conception so that is a huge uh a huge thing that could have impacts on all kinds of uh legislation women's rights and so on so it's a big issue we would need to think about. Jan has made in touch to say this is, she says, brilliant, but if it were the man who had the babies,

this technology would have been invented back in the 1960s. Jan is obviously in support of this. Jane, what do you think? You're listening away there. It's very interesting. There's so many political and economic questions, but I think from a mental health point of view, I think the idea of having a baby parked even in utero would be would be a worry. I would want the baby to be around a parent, partly because of a bonding experience for the parent and partly because babies hear in the womb. They hear voices and they start to recognize voices very early on

helen what do we do about that actually and barbara's been in such as say what about breastfeeding who would feed the baby helen how would that work and what about voices or lisa actually let's bring lisa in we'll come to you helen sorry let's bring lisa in on that uh yeah the breastfeeding. I don't know how that would work, but it is an interesting way of connecting after the baby is born, of course. So it is an important connection. I don't know how we could design that. And so what was the other question? Oh, the voices. Presumably you could go and talk to them at? Oh, the voices, voices. Presumably you could go and talk to them at the weekends, like you were suggesting.

Yeah, no, I definitely think that, I feel like it should be in an environment that there is voices, there are sounds, the heartbeat is an important sound. I've been thinking about like this when i think about this technology i try to kind of connect it to um other spaces or something like how we designed this um this uh installation i drew inspiration from like botanical gardens and from pumpkin fields and stuff so then you could also imagine that the the people that would

take care of the artificial wombs are like sort of gardeners that would you know how they would care for special plants or something um yeah when we try to kind of mimic how it how it how it now is then it would maybe feel uncanny so for, it's the opportunity to kind of completely redesign it and see what kind of new things we could come up with. Wow. Improve on nature. Fascinating stuff. All of this is amazing. I've got to ask you, Helen, you are a mother. Looking back on your own experience,

would you welcome the use of an artificial womb if it was made freely available? It would depend on what kind of artificial womb it was. Certainly the one that I imagined in my book, which was quite different. So that was something that you could carry and have with you all the time. So it was actually very close, as close as I could imagine a biotechnology being to the biological reality we have now. In that case, I would absolutely welcome it. Yes. Sign me up. I think we've not really touched on the health benefits,

but of course, pregnancy can be very dangerous. Childbirth can be very dangerous for women. It can also be very dangerous for babies, for the fetus, right? So there's a huge amount of sort of benefits in terms of the health of both mother and child that could come around from this. So I think that's important to recognize. This technology is being developed at the moment. It's very close to becoming a reality, I would say, within a generation. We will probably have it, but it's being developed as an incubator technology. So it's going to save the lives of premature babies. And that's, for me, the starting point. Can we save lives can

we make lives better it's been absolutely fascinating speaking to both of you helen cedric's book uh the growing season is out now and lisa mandame thank you so much for speaking to me um your thoughts are coming in on everything we're talking about today um artificial wombs are a great option as a choice and for a premise however my pregnancies have been the best times of my life and i wouldn't want to give that up i also worry about the generation who grow up without the human touch a baby skin to skin is so important but do babies need that another question so many questions uh but now we'll come back to some of your questions for jane as well if we can if we have time because there's so much more to fit into the show uh it's time now for some music. What does your grandmother mean to you?

And would you write a song about her if you could? Well, South African musician Toshi has done just that. Kokoba, which means getting old in her native language of Xhosa, the song is dedicated to her grandmother who played an important role in her life. In the Xhosa culture, elderly women are respected and protected and have a spiritual place in the family and community. Here's a snippet to give you a flavour of the song.

It's so beautiful. Toshi, welcome to Woman's Hour. Can you tell us what you were singing about there in Xhosa? What were you saying? Thanks for having me, Anita. I was singing about my grandmother, telling her that she's getting old and where are her children? Where are the people that she's given birth to now that she's all frail and old and alone? Why did you want to write a song about her? What does your grandmother mean to you? She means the world to me. She's like an answer, you know, she's somebody that anytime I have any problem with life that I cannot understand, then she's the person that I go to and I speak to.

And I wanted her to acknowledge that while she's still alive. What a beautiful, beautiful way of honouring your grandmother. You wrote it because you grew up with your grandmother. She brought you up, right? Yes, she raised me since I was very small. So she's the mother and the father that I know. So everything that I have and everything that I know is from her knowledge. And how important is that knowledge and the wisdom that she passed on to you?

And what was it? Because it's particularly about the culture right yes well the knowledge that she gave me was very important because it built it felt me up and it made me to be able to identify myself in the society of today because the things that she taught me are not in any textbook in any school that I've ever been. So like, for instance, culture, she taught me how important it was to know your inheritance, where you're from, and your ancestors, and how important it is to acknowledge them. Because due to colonization in our country we were taught that our ancestors and worshipping them and thanking them they are demons and that we should only believe in angels

so my grandma made me to understand that it's important to to know that our ancestors fought for us and they were the path for us and it's important for us to know where our bloodline and our core of our spirits where we're coming from as beings and as closer people that's really powerful um stuff toshi and it's i'm interested in the fact that you say none of it is written down in textbooks yes none of it was and so is so a lot of people don't know. They only live life according to what they do at school. And obviously, education, everything is very limited and everything is always focused on whatever it is the agenda is that the society or population needs to know.

So there is going to be a whole lot of things that aren't being taught that are important for human beings to know. So there is going to be a whole lot of things that I'm being taught that are important for human beings to know. And does your grandmother go to church as well as talk about? Yes, my grandmother goes to church and she believes in God and that she prays a lot. But also my grandmother believes her ancestors, like her great-grandfather, her great-grandmother, she's seen them. And she told me that my great-great-great-grandmother was a singer too, and my grandmother heard her mother, but also a singer. And she made me understand what used to happen there,

because my grandmother was born in 1938. So I'm sure there was a whole lot of things that happened those years. And I get to hear about those times and what's in that era, what used to happen. And I get to hear it from my grandmother too. So it's very beautiful. It is incredibly beautiful. I think you're incredibly lucky as well to have all this wisdom passed down to you. And she was born in 1938, so she grew up in apartheid South Africa. What has she told you about her life growing up?

Yes, she told me that it was very hard because she grew up in the village and she told me that she was the best daughter of her, she was a favourite of her father. Her father taught the world of her and she used to go to school at those times in the village in Transai, with the same village where Ted sent Mandela to school. So it was very hard, especially for young girls. In those times, they believed that young women's job was to take children to the kitchen, not to be running around wanting to go to school.

That was a waste of time. It was boys that needed to be educated. And, but my grandmother was very rebellious and her father didn't believe in that. So he took her to school, but then she said that she fell in love when she wanted to study to be a nurse but then she fell in love with my grandfather and then um then when she found out that my grandfather said he had three kids he went to the city to work in the mines at the time black men

used to leave villages and go and work in the mines for like a year or two and leave the family behind so obviously my grandmother is a very open-minded woman it's very strong world she went to find him and apparently he had mistresses so when my grandmother said that she she beats him up and then she beats up your grandfather for having a mistress. Yes, not mistress, mistresses. Oh, plural. And then told him that this marriage is over. And at that time, that kind of thing was not allowed. Like if you're a woman, you must just be grateful that you have a man.

She sounds remarkable, Toshi. She sounds remarkable and rebellious, we love a rebellious woman on Woman's Hour. What's her name? What's your grandmother's name? It's Irene but her English name is Irene but her real name is Montrodal Montrodal Vitello, that's her real name

And you know and I appreciate the line is a little bit bad but I just need to know, you know you've got this, I think you are so privileged and lucky to have this wisdom and relationship with your grandmother and to hear all these stories and to be taught about your identity and to know about the things that are passed down orally that aren't written in textbooks. It's so important to keep all of that alive. What's it done for you as a young woman and woman and and how is it sort of um informing your creativity and your music well it helped me a lot because in the beginning when i didn't know who i was i was just a follow follower you follow other people's ideas other people's concepts whatever

people think that was important for me but until I got time to actually sit and listen to what my grandmother said and I learned from who she was I realized that we are similar because I also don't like to be pushed around and I don't do things just because other people approve or disapprove I really couldn't care. I did things that made me comfortable because I've learned, she taught me that I comfort, my peace comforts. Amazing. So because of that, people read that as arrogance and pride and they give it different types of negative names. But I really don't really care. That is the best.

No, Toshi, I'm smiling and nodding. It's a great message for people to hear on a Friday as well to just be confident in who you are. And your music is beautiful. Toshi, I want to wish you all the best of luck. Thank you very much for speaking to me. Joining us from South Africa, Toshi's single Kocoba is out now. Now, I promised you sex parties.

Apparently they've expanded from fringe underground raves to large, well-established sell-out club nights in the last few years. But why? So we're just going to get into it. Joining me to talk about this are Dr. Kate Lister, sex historian and author of A Curious History of Sex, and Miss Gold, who runs One Night Parties, a sex party in London. We are stepping behind the velvet curtain.

First question to Miss Gold, what is a sex party in London we're stepping behind the velvet curtain uh first question um to Miss Gold what is a sex party actually for both of you what's a sex party a sex party is a space that you can go to socialize you can go to meet like-minded people um I think the perception that you're just going for sex is perhaps outdated or just not correct um you can go there to make friends forge friendships like many people but yeah i'll pass over to kate no all right um i don't think i could do much better than that so what happens at them and who goes what's happened of course that happens i'm not gonna lie like not um sex isn't just penetrative it's spanking it's kissing um there's often rope parties um it's it's so diverse where do you start where did you well why did you set up tell me why you set up one night parties so one night parties is a space that's just for women and non-binary people to explore their femininity.

So it's completely void of men. I started it initially when I started doing parties years and years ago, about kind of six, seven years ago, at a friend's house. And I just wanted to create a space that was purely for females um it was unticketed um and then fast forward a few years uh when I was pregnant I was at um an event and I was very heavily pregnant a man came up to me and touched my stomach without my permission and looked at my partner and was like can I touch um your woman and I just thought this is just so uncomfortable and I just was looking around the spaces and it was just such a male-dominated space I felt there should be a space where women can go non-men can go and they can explore themselves and their sexuality and their friendships without the male gaze there.

Let's bring Kate in to get some historical context in all of this because they're not a new phenomenon, are they, Kate? Oh, God, no. No, no, no, no, no. As long as people have been having sex, there's been people that thought, we should do this in a room together. It has a really, really long history. It's just, like like what's changed in recent

years is the rise of social media and the use of apps because the problem that faced everyone throughout history who thought i'd like to go to a sex party is where do you find it um i suppose you're risking your anonymity as well in order to try and find it but now with the rise of apps and websites and things like that is that you you don't need to do that there's a level of anonymity as well in order to try and find it. But now with the rise of apps and websites and things like that, is that you don't need to do that. There's a level of anonymity. So that's what's changed. It's been a huge seismic change.

But no, people have always wanted to go to parties and always have gone to parties. And why are we seeing, and are we seeing a resurgence now? And is it something about the time we're living in that this is happening? It's a bit, you'd need a bit more time to say that one you're gonna need to ask a story about 100 years but i would say yes because whenever you've got global catastrophes and we have just lived through one and we're still living through it you tend to get this kind of like everyone's just off the off the chain at the end of it like at the end of the bubonic plague there was italian priests and historians panicking because everyone was

rushing headlong into lust and there was a papal edict it issued because to try and stop people having sex in graveyards with each other and after the first world war and the spanish flu the roaring 20s happened and i think that with COVID and what we're coming through and the fact that it's so seismically shifted anything, I mean, nothing will change your attitudes to casual sex like the threat of impending death. That will do it every single time. So it doesn't surprise me in the least that after this,

everybody's kind of going, actually, do you know what? Life's short. Maybe we should, I'd like to do exciting things. So yeah, that doesn't surprise me. So we're living through fun times right now then. Are you seeing a resurgence? Are you seeing a rise? What kind of crowd come to one night parties, Miss Gold? Yeah, I totally think there's been a rise. And I think going back to what Kate said about social media, I think that we spent the last two years kind of sat at home um maybe masturbating a bit more um and thinking about our fantasies I know there's

been a huge rise in the the sell of sex toys like self-pleasure toys and I think um where we're at home and we've been allowed to allow our imaginations have gone wild um we're looking for a space to explore those things um I'm seeing such a vast array of women and non-binary people coming to one night uh from all walks of life it there's not one size fits all when when you think about who who goes to a sex party there's people that in their day-to-day life are a nurse or a teacher or they're an OnlyFans content creator. It's not anyone. Hikers, everyone. Even hikers.

How do you ensure the sex is consensual and that people feel safe at the party? Well, I think that all good parties have a list of rules that people should adhere to. When tickets go out, the rules are sent out as well. We do kind of, it's a very small party, so it's 45 people. And with that amount of people in the space, I can kind of keep going around and looking at everyone.

Each space tends to have dungeon monitors as well. We do kind of a group talk at the start to go through rules. People that want to be photographed can be photographed. If they don't want to be photographed, they wear a wristband. And the whole process of joining the party is via verification as well. So that helps as well. And it being a space where, unfortunately, a lot of problems are centred around men and kind of taking them out of the scenario means that we all feel a lot safer.

Yeah, what have women said to you about coming to your parties and what does it provide women? It's changed people's lives, honestly. I really think it has. I know that might sound like a crazy thing to say, but they've felt a liberation and an exploration of self. It just stretches like sexuality is the thing. I think it stretches you more than anything can. The amount of pain or pleasure you can feel, the endorphins, all of those things and they've been able to make friendships that I've seen friendships last a lifetime from the original parties that I hosted six seven years some of

those women are still my best friends you put a lot of women in a room wearing very little you're at your most vulnerable and you allow other people to see you like that and you experience those things together you create bonds that are incomparable to any other space, I think. Kate, let's get a bit more history on this. Was it easy to find this sort of sex scene historically? No, not really. I think it was once you knew where to look, it was okay. I mean, there'll be people listening today that remember the 1960s and 70s,

and in the Sunday papers and the tabloids, there was this constant panic about wife swapping, which was actually kind of like, you know, just loads of lurid titillating details for people to read and then go, oh, God, never do such a thing. So there was a real kind of anxiety around it, but a real curiosity as well. And so if you were in the 60s and 70s you would probably find a hostess so one of the more famous hostesses in London was Jenny Jones who was put in jail for doing it actually but she would basically do Miss Gold's job she would find people who wanted to a party she'd find a venue and you'd go to her. But they weren't, by its very nature, a sex party has to be discreet. The bad ones are the ones that get busted because they're not, they weren't being discreet enough.

So you'd need to know where to go. But it was very underground. It was, and it was risky because vice laws were in force and these parties were raided and people were arrested. It's interesting isn't it miss gold to think that someone was put away to do doing the job that you do um why is it important just uh oh do you think this is the future of sex very quickly last question we've got 20 25 seconds sex parties yeah i hope so um i think that yeah i think that the future of sex is there are more and more parties popping up.

And I think that parties have become more specific. There's parties for all genders, all sexual preferences. And I think that that's wonderful that there is now a space for every kind of human to go and express themselves as safely as possible um yes helen oh helen thank you very much and uh miss gold thank you both for joining me this morning to talk about that lots of you are getting in touch about various things someone's messaging to say cynthia pain uh love her was jailed for sex parties um and lots of you still getting in touch about the artificial wombs and also exam stress. I hope we've relieved some of that. Have a wonderful weekend. Emma will be back on Monday, but join me tomorrow for Weekend Woman's Hour. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time. Hello, I'm Lucy Worsley, and I want to tell you about Lady Killers. It's a new series from BBC Radio 4.

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I'm Sarah Treleaven, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy.

And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now.