This article reports on and analyses data from a situated and in-depth project on the experiences of six cisgender South Asian-Australian women/people who gave birth during the COVID-19 pandemic. Prior to the pandemic, negatively racialized women experienced barriers to health care and a lack of social support, which were further exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic. International border closures in Australia combined with local mitigation strategies inhibited social and cultural support from families, impacting many migrant mothers/birthing people who gave birth for the first time in Australia. Many hospitals in the states of New South Wales and Victoria instituted restrictions to birthing services as a way of reducing exposure to the coronavirus during the pandemic. Our research suggests that pre-existing limitations of health care providers, digital platforms, and apps with regard to culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) women in Australia have been amplified during the pandemic. Online Facebook groups from the mothers’ countries of origin or cultural backgrounds, or for mothers who had babies due in the same month, represented a significant source of information and support for the participants. This was particularly important at a time when women’s capacities to engage in traditional cultural practices, which provide practical, emotional, and informational support, were compromised by the inability to garner familial support. We situate these findings in the literature on “performing good motherhood” in neoliberal times and via reliance on digital devices and platforms and what it means for CALD women’s sociality, sense of agency, and negotiations with cultural practices.

中文翻译：

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在 COVID-19 期间使用怀孕和育儿应用程序以及社交媒体：澳大利亚南亚裔女性的缺席和社交、代理和文化谈判


本文报告并分析了一个关于在 COVID-19 大流行期间分娩的六名顺性别南亚裔澳大利亚妇女/人的经历的定位和深入项目的数据。在大流行之前，消极种族化的女性在获得医疗保健和缺乏社会支持方面遇到了障碍，这种情况在 COVID-19 大流行期间进一步加剧。澳大利亚的国际边境关闭与当地的缓解策略相结合，抑制了家庭的社会和文化支持，影响了许多首次在澳大利亚分娩的移民母亲/分娩者。新南威尔士州和维多利亚州的许多医院都对分娩服务实施了限制，以减少大流行期间接触冠状病毒的一种方式。我们的研究表明，在大流行期间，澳大利亚医疗保健提供者、数字平台和应用程序在文化和语言多元化 （CALD） 女性方面先前存在的局限性被放大了。来自母亲原籍国或文化背景的在线 Facebook 群组，或针对同一个月预产期的母亲的在线 Facebook 群组，为参与者提供了重要的信息和支持来源。这在女性参与传统文化实践的能力（提供实际、情感和信息支持）因无法获得家庭支持而受到损害的时候尤为重要。我们将这些发现置于关于新自由主义时代“表现良好母亲”的文献中，并通过依赖数字设备和平台，以及这对 CALD 女性的社会性、代理感和与文化习俗的谈判意味着什么。