Reconsidering “Advanced Maternal Age”: communicating about pregnancy, disability risk and ageing

In this paper, I consider the term “Advanced Maternal Age” (AMA), which appears in various avenues of information for pregnant women, including medical literature and more “common knowledge” avenues of communication, such as government websites and online forums. I explore the increasingly routine use of this phrase, and I problematize its usual definition, to mean “35 or older.” I argue that this definition—rather than being a neutral, medical fact—is socially constructed, and the number 35 is arbitrarily chosen, in a way that perpetuates stigma against older women and their bodies. The definition ignores many relevant factors for considering medical “risk” and contributes to discourses that continue to frame pregnancy as risky, requiring expert surveillance and intervention. I also argue that the widespread use of this phrase in medical literature as well as other sites of discourse perpetuates the ableist idea that children with disabilities are undesirable or less valuable.