Unbecoming Mothers

Learn the “who,” “what,” and “why” of unbecoming a mother In a society where becoming a mother is naturalized, “unbecoming” a mother—the process of coming to live apart from biological children—is regarded as unnatural, improper, or even contemptible. Few mothers are more stigmatized than those who are perceived as having given up, surrendered, or abandoned their birth children. Unbecoming Mothers: The Social Production of Maternal Absence examines this phenomenon within the social and historical context of parenting in Canada, Australia, Britain, and the United States, with critical observations from social workers, policymakers, and historians. This unique book offers insights from the perspectives of children on the outside looking in and the lived experiences of women on the inside looking out. Unbecoming Mothers: The Social Production of Maternal Absence explores how gender, race, class, and other social agents affect the ways women negotiate their lives apart from their children and how they attempt to recreate their identities and family structures. An interdisciplinary, international collection of academics, community workers, and mothers draws upon sources as diverse as archival records, a therapist’s interview, a dance script, and the class presentation of a student to offer refreshing insights on maternal absence that are innovative, accessible, and inspiring. Unbecoming Mothers examines five assumptions about maternal absence and the families that emerge from that absence: the focus on parenting as highly gendered caring work done by women the idea that women share the same experience of unbecoming mothers and share the same circumstances and background the perception of maternal absence as a recent phenomenon the notion that women who want to manage their mother-work will make choices to overcome life’s obstacles the Western concept of womanhood being achieved through motherhood and the unrealistic ideal of the “good mother” Unbecoming Mothers: The Social Production of Maternal Absence is a rich, multidisciplinary resource for academics working in women’s studies, psychology, sociology, history, and any health-related fields, and for policymakers, social workers, and other community workers.

Learn the “who,” “what,” and “why” of unbecoming a mother In a society where becoming a mother is naturalized, “unbecoming” a mother—the process of coming to live apart from biological children—is regarded as unnatural, improper, or even contemptible. Few mothers are more stigmatized than those who are perceived as having given up, surrendered, or abandoned their birth children. Unbecoming Mothers: The Social Production of Maternal Absence examines this phenomenon within the social and historical context of parenting in Canada, Australia, Britain, and the United States, with critical observations from social workers, policymakers, and historians. This unique book offers insights from the perspectives of children on the outside looking in and the lived experiences of women on the inside looking out. Unbecoming Mothers: The Social Production of Maternal Absence explores how gender, race, class, and other social agents affect the ways women negotiate their lives apart from their children and how they attempt to recreate their identities and family structures. An interdisciplinary, international collection of academics, community workers, and mothers draws upon sources as diverse as archival records, a therapist’s interview, a dance script, and the class presentation of a student to offer refreshing insights on maternal absence that are innovative, accessible, and inspiring. Unbecoming Mothers examines five assumptions about maternal absence and the families that emerge from that absence: the focus on parenting as highly gendered caring work done by women the idea that women share the same experience of unbecoming mothers and share the same circumstances and background the perception of maternal absence as a recent phenomenon the notion that women who want to manage their mother-work will make choices to overcome life’s obstacles the Western concept of womanhood being achieved through motherhood and the unrealistic ideal of the “good mother” Unbecoming Mothers: The Social Production of Maternal Absence is a rich, multidisciplinary resource for academics working in women’s studies, psychology, sociology, history, and any health-related fields, and for policymakers, social workers, and other community workers.

Three women. Three generations. Three secrets. A Stonewall Honor Book!Katie's life is falling apart: her best friend thinks she's a freak, her mother, Caroline, controls every aspect of her life, and her estranged grandmother, Mary, appears as if out of nowhere. Mary has dementia and needs lots of care, and when Katie starts putting together Mary's life story, secrets and lies are uncovered: Mary's illegitimate baby, her zest for life and freedom and men; the way she lived her life to the full yet suffered huge sacrifices along the way. As the relationship between Mary and Caroline is explored, Katie begins to understand her own mother's behavior, and from that insight, the terrors about her sexuality, her future, and her younger brother are all put into perspective.Funny, sad, honest, and wise, this powerful multigenerational novel from international bestseller Jenny Downham celebrates life like no book before.

There are secrets in the wild country they call midlife You can do one night, Jo reminds herself as she follows five women into the Australian bush. Where are they going to sleep? And pee? Jo probably should have let her husband Frank know. Just in case. Because you never know what can happen in the wild. * * * While on her three-month marriage-and-motherhood sabbatical in the country, Jo bumps into an old friend, Fiona, who invites her on a ‘sacred’, silent walk to mark her 57th birthday – the first since her husband Ben died. The last thing Jo wants is to share anything about herself – these are Fiona’s friends, not hers. And what’s she going to say? That her young adult children have made life choices she doesn’t understand? That she has no idea who she is any more? That everything is falling apart – even her happy marriage to Frank? But the unexpected intrusion of a stranger into their secret location unleashes powerful and conflicting emotions in each woman, provoking conversations and confidences that stray into the shadowlands of motherhood, the mysteries of midlife, the future of monogamy and Mother Earth. Under the canopy of the open night sky, around a small, tended fire, the women share wise counsel, spill their secrets and offer up their stories, each exposing corners of truth the others need to hear. Unbecoming is a funny, heartbreaking and provocative homage to the midlife unravelling as women on the brink of elderhood speak honestly about their lives and wonder what the hell to do with vaginas that are not ready to be put out to pasture just yet.

This extraordinary graphic novel is a powerful denunciation of sexual violence against women. As seen through the eyes of a twelve-year-old girl named Una, it takes place in northern England in 1977, as the Yorkshire Ripper, a serial killer of prostitutes, is on the loose and creating panic among the townspeople. As the police struggle in their clumsy attempts to find the killer, and the headlines in the local paper become more urgent, a once self-confident Una teaches herself to "lower her gaze" in order to deflect attention from boys. After she is "slut-shamed" at school for having birth control pills, Una herself is the subject of violent acts for which she comes to blame herself. But as the police finally catch up and identify the killer, Una grapples with the patterns of behavior that led her to believe she was to blame. Becoming Unbecoming combines various styles, press clippings, photo-based illustrations, and splashes of color to convey Una's sense of confusion and rage, as well as sobering statistics on sexual violence against women. The book is a no-holds-barred indictment of sexual violence against women and the shame and blame of its victims that also celebrates the empowerment of those able to gain control over their selves and their bodies. Una (a pseudonym) is an artist, academic, and comics creator. Becoming Unbecoming, which took seven years to create, is her first book. She lives in the United Kingdom.

After a heist she planned lands two men she loves in prison, a woman flees Paris and assumes a new identity, furtively checking news from her hometown as her web of deception unravels.

This book explores the experiences of pregnant teenagers, their partners, and midwives, from pregnancy realisation through the early years of motherhood. It examines changing attitudes to female sexuality and moral discourses on adolescent subjectivity especially as these pertain to teenage motherhood.

Maternal research is a rapidly expanding, multi-disciplinary form of scholarship. Prior to second wave feminism most motherhood literature was written from a male perspective. This literature focused on telling mothers how to practice mothering without acknowledging the expertise of the mothers themselves. Research on motherhood as it is experienced in all its facets by mothers has only emerged in recent decades. This book is aimed at expanding academic knowledge of motherhood, from a feminist perspective, looking particularly at how maternal subjectivities can be represented and theorised. When mothers themselves (academic or not) are responsible for theorisation and representation of maternal ‘realities’, dominant theories and representations of motherhood are radically challenged. In Theorising and Representing Maternal Realities the contributors argue that it is no longer acceptable to regard mothers as mere objects of knowledge and research. They are primarily the subjects of knowledge and research.