Throughout all of the reading for this week, perhaps the most interesting part to me was exploring the juxtaposition between traditional and modern midwifery. Dixon opens the introduction by speaking about two “traditional” midwives; an older one who uses predominately biomedical methods and a younger one who utilizes “traditional” plant remedies. This comparison made me wonder, what do we consider to be “traditional” and how is it determined? Our present, of course, is inextricably tied to our past, and as such our values are molded by those historical realities. Dixon speaks on the comparison of the traditional midwife and the modern physician saying, “the pre-modern midwife–who is associated with the nation’s underdeveloped past, with poor training and poor settings–and the modern physician, who is associated with development, Westernization, and technical expertise.” (23) The promotion of biomedical knowledge above that of traditional midwifery is certainly a result of colonization and has impacted what we consider to be “traditional” medicine. Both the older biomedically based midwife and the younger “traditional” one have emerged as a response to the acknowledgment of medical authority in each of their generations.