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Hamka's Great Story: A Master Writer's Vision of Islam for Modern Indonesia. By James R. Rush. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2016. xix, 286 pp. ISBN: 9780299308407 (cloth).

placed more emphasis on women’s professions in Vietnamese society. Chapters 5 and 6 discuss the science of motherhood and childcare during the Depression Era. Here Nguyen examines the administration’s focus on infant survival and goals to decrease the infant mortality rate. Nurseries were implemented to promote Western-style childrearing education, hygiene, and feeding schedule programs. Catholic churches played a role in managing crèches (day nurseries) and orphanages to cope with abandoned children due to economic hardships and illnesses, such as gastrointestinal diseases, that plagued children. The global food corporation Nestlé promoted infant care under the banner of science (p. 146) and provided orphanages and crèches with nutritional supplies. With the intention of assisting working mothers, the daycares benefited a certain class of families, thus the administration’s failure to acknowledge Vietnamese family traditions. Nguyen credits the administration for improving infant survival and health by implementing motherhood counseling programs and introducing puericulture (p. 145). Throughout the book, Nguyen emphasizes medicine as a tool of health improvement and posits that, through local resistance, Vietnamese women helped create a pluralistic system. Despite her reiteration of the key issues between colonial administrators and Vietnamese birthing practices, the book is strengthened by Nguyen’s use of French archives and comparative literature. Through the use of physician and midwife reports, and a memoir, the book offers insights into the clinicians’ and student-midwives’ experiences. In addition to colonial Vietnamese literature, she also draws from sources with perspectives on reproductive health history across cultures, including American, European, and African. Moreover, Childbirth, Maternity, and Medical Pluralism in French Colonial Vietnam provides a provocative obstetrical history that is valuable in understanding contemporary issues regarding women’s bodies and reproductive health governance.