the Female Body GOVERNING

6
Productive Bodies
Women, Work, and Depression
KRISTIN A. SWENSON
Butler University
You took my joy; I want it back.
134
—Lucinda Williams
Depression as a modern phenomenon is culturally constructed
primarily as a feminine malady. According to the Prozac Web site, the
prime risk factors for depression include having low self-esteem, anxiety,
and feeling that life is out of control, all qualities commonly associated
with women. 1 Another risk factor is the biological workings of the
female body itself, including menstruation, pregnancy, childbirth, and
menopause. Not only is the female body a cause and a site for depression,
but the multiple roles of parent, spouse, employee, and homemaker
contribute to women being twice as likely as men to experience clinical
depression. 2
Antidepressants such as Prozac claim to regulate the chemical makeup
of the brain to alter the depressed person’s affective being. 3 Reversing
the symptoms of lethargy, Prozac is described often as a “productivity”
drug that transforms the medicated depressed person into an energetic,
enthusiastic, and productive subject (see Metzl, 2003). Prozac and other
antidepressants are prescribed for the production of an individual who
is able to keep pace with the multiple roles required of contemporary
women today. The traditional roles of married women have always
included housework and primary child-rearing responsibilities, as well
as lesser-acknowledged affective roles, such as the maintenance of
interpersonal and social relationships. In the last 50 years, married
women’s roles have expanded to include not only an active social and
family life, but also the demands of balancing wage and home labor. The