I was involved in a very interesting discussion on women, motherhood and feminism this weekend that I thought I would share with the class.
On Saturday morning Sara F. and I went to brunch with our moms (yay parents weekend! yay moms!). As people usually do when they first meet, our mothers spent some time sharing what they have done in their lives—where they are from, what they do for a living, when they had kids, etc. Not surprisingly, we got onto the subject of motherhood, of methods of raising children in today’s society. In my experience, it is fascinating to hear mothers discuss this because everyone has such strong ideas—truly fundamental to whom they are—about what it means to be a mother. Our mothers were discussing the idea of having a career/being a housewife, of staying home with children/pursuing their dreams in business, art, the working world, etc. My own mother had me when she was 25 and my brother when she was 27. She stayed home with us through elementary school. She has a Masters in business and a BA in fashion design, but waited (for the most part, apart from smaller business ventures) to start her own company until we were in high school. Sara’s mom initially balanced working and raising kids until her kids were in high school, when she had the opportunity to have raising her kids as her primary “job.” In some ways, our mothers have had opposite experiences. What is really interesting and common between them is that they both agree that motherhood is the most important job that one can have (they both explicitly said this). They both agree that having a husband who values one’s role as a mother is extremely important. When my own mom decided to stay home with kids, she was subject to criticism from many of her friends for not pursuing a “career.” Both of our moms agree that such criticism has become a huge problem in society. Because so many people do not see motherhood as a valuable, full-time job, women are expected to have another full-time job and raise kids on the side. Sometimes, this is just a financial necessity. But in their experience, it is not always the best way to do things. Women cannot really be expected to be mothers AND full-time workers and do both things well. Our mothers were saying that one is lucky to have a husband that either contributes equally to the household and to parenting, or values their own primary contribution as valuable and necessary.
It was so interesting to have this conversation as it made a lot of the theory tangible. I made me re-consider some of what we have been discussing (especially Friedan). It was fascinating to hear what these women/mothers think about feminism and how the ways we view women, men and responsibility have changed, for good and bad.
I would love to hear other people’s thoughts/experiences with their own mothers. What is motherhood? What is parenting? How does this work in our society today? How should it look/be looked at?
Interesting post! Both experiences that you relate are very different from what my family experienced.
ReplyDeleteMy folks entered college just a little bit later in life, so my mother ended up being a senior at CU in her mid 20s, which was the same year that she quit. I remember her being a stay at home mother throughout my youth, always ferrying us kids around from activity to activity, plus making dinner for us, and taking care of the house. My mother insists that motherhood was the most important thing in her life, but honestly i have doubted her somewhat (she regrets not finishing college, but refuses to go back).
However, my parents did end up divorcing when I was still in high school, and from that point things changed for us quite dramatically ...
She ended moving away and working for a number of years at various jobs (mainly in the art industry .. her degree would have been something in art history, i believe).
Throughout my childhood, I can remember her volunteering for just about every cause that she could, and that hasn't changed a bit since i left the house. My mother grew up in a very well-to-do family steeped in southern tradition - there were certain jobs that women just did not do. But at the very top of the list of jobs that women were permitted to do -- motherhood.
Interestingly enough, my grandmother (my mother's mother) had expressed to me that she had wished that she had the opportunity to pursue some sort of career in her life. To some degree, my mother has hinted at the same, though I think it might be awhile before she actually admits it.
I think that both of them are extensions into an old lifestyle and belief system that is being slowly squeezed out of American society, especially with the unfortunate shrinking of the middle class. Personally, I don't necessarily see this as a bad thing (with the exception of the shrinking middle class).
I've heard in Europe that many countries offer fathers comparable time off (called paternity leave) as they do mothers for maternity leave. The focus on motherhood (and parenting) in this country has been eclipsed by the focus on accumulating wealth through work. I think that mothers have been forced to bear the burden of being the heart of the family, and that has been to the detriment of society at large. I suppose the real question is, how much time ought parents sacrifice from work, in order to spend with their families, etc.
i disagree with the notion that "Women cannot really be expected to be mothers AND full-time workers and do both things well." i know quite a few people who i would regard as having been over-parented (don't know how to do basic things like laundry, cleaning, or cooking) despite the fact that both their parents work full-time. there is a difference between neglect and encouraging independence.
ReplyDeletei personally was not raised by either my mother or my father, but rather by both. my mom delivered full-time for fedex and maintained a career as a fiber artist and my dad worked full-time as a carpenter and they raised me fine precisely because they allowed me and my brother to partially raise ourselves.
children are capable of more resilience autodidaction than the popular ideals allow for. the american transition from rural to urban and suburban life blundered in removing children from work and making them more dependent on their parents.
I completely agree that children can and should be independent and a work around the household. Even though my mom stayed at home with us, we were responsible for laundry, making lunches, doing dishes, cleaning the house, etc. My mom taught us about responsibility by making us help out with the house and the family. Still, she was very busy. What I mean by my statement is that if mothers are responsible for ALL of the parenting, as well as a 40+ hours a week job, than they will have to compromise in some way. My father helped raise us--I think that sharing in the parenting/working responsibilities is a good way to go about parenting and family life.
ReplyDeleteI agree that this is a really interesting post as it questions all the different roles a mother can play in one's life. My personal experiences with my own mother resemble various aspects of all these stories actually. My parents had me when they were 26 but I am the oldest of 4. My sister is ten years younger than me and this age difference is a testament to the fact that we were raised under very different household conditions.
ReplyDeleteGrowing up, my brothers (2 and 5 years younger than me) experienced a series of au pairs (only one of seven every actually lasted the full year). A lot of my friends find it horrendous that I was forced to spend my days with these women while my parents worked but I was actually indifferent to it. My parents had to work so it was just the reality of our situation. And it wasn't like my parents weren't around. They both worked incredibly hard balancing our family and their work.
My dad would get us ready for school in the morning and drop us off at the before-school program so that my mom could go in early. In exchange, my mom would pick us up at night (usually after dinner), take us home, and get us ready for bed. I spent a lot of time at after/before school programs with my brothers but so did a lot of our friends, it was a reality of the 90s where I grew up. This wasn't bad though either. Some of my favorite memories are of me and my brothers grocery shopping with my mom at 10pm when the store was practically empty because this is the only time we could fit it into our schedule.
My sister, on the other hand, has always grown around with my mom as a presence around the house. She was born when I was in the 4th grade and this is when my mom quit her job to take on the family, it just wasn't working anymore with the nannies. After this point, my entire family became completely dependent on my mom to organize our lives and coordinate our schedules. My dad had to increase his hours so my house started to fit the stereotypical model of the father as the bread-winner and the mother as the home-maker.
However, my mom is the most original home-maker anyone has ever met! She has so much spunk and enthusiasm that I don't know how she does it. She has made several attempts to start her own businesses because she is a very motivated person, however, the family tends to impede her ability to ever really take these off the ground. She recently started a part-time job (I think she misses working because she had a GREAT job before my sister was born). It has definitely made things more complicated around the house, such that, they're lucky they're down to just 3 kids now and my brothers can both drive.
Anyway, that's how my family developed and changed over the years. It's kinda cool though, I think, to see the variety of roles my mom has played and how my father has adapted his role around this. But Peyton's post also reminded me of a headliner I saw over the weekend while looking on the New York Times website for information for another class. I attached the article below and I think it's really interesting to see the CULTURAL difference regarding the role of the mother. Additionally, this article mentions that she was hesitant to embrace her culture after moving to America, the same way many women (I think) can be hesitant to embrace the role of motherhood now a days as it is not considered "fulfilling" enough anymore to just be a mother - a notion I believe to be a bunch of bologna! It does show an interesting similarity though between cultural and gender roles as they are influenced by society.
http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/01/modernity-and-tradition-merge-in-motherhood/?scp=2&sq=motherhood&st=cse
"Women cannot really be expected to be mothers AND full-time workers and do both things well."
ReplyDeleteThe disagreements with this notion are interesting to me because I would say "over-parenting" can be just as harmful as "under-parenting." I am not a mom, but a full time job among many other intrinsic factors can be part of what may push a mother to overcompensate at home and "over-parent," so they feel as though their children are taken care of even though they are working.
Just a caution - these are very personal issues - and no one wants to feel that whatever his or her mother did (or whatever one is doing as a mother) is somehow less than adequate. It's great and crucial to talk about - and to tell the story and reflect on your own story. Just be careful not to make value-laden statements about what is better or best. Believe me, I've been in many such conversations and they don't go well. Perhaps mothering inspires an even more difficult conversation than sexuality. Let's think about the larger political and cultural pressures on women to stay home - (or 30 years ago, to go to work, and 20 years before that to stay home again). Let's just think it through as much as we can without judgments directed, even unintentionally, at each other or each other's mothers!
ReplyDeleteI think I understand what Peyton is trying to say with the comment that "Women cannot really be expected to be mothers AND full-time workers and do both things well" and I don't think that it is mutually exclusive to Winn's remark. I think that as women's professional horizons expanded, the notion of a domestic problem (as discussed in Friedan) sort of fell by the wayside. In this way, second wave feminism may have, at times, contributed to women having two full-time jobs--one in the professional sphere, and one in the domestic sphere. These women are praised as super women. I see it all the time on reality TV and in advertising. The mentality is something like "Look how much she can do! She's a successful business woman! And a mom! And she has a great marriage! She has nothing to complain about."
ReplyDeleteI don't want to sound disparaging, nor do I want to discount the increased role that men play in raising a family "these days," but I also think it's important to note that there is still a certain cultural expectation that a mother will be the primary nurturer in her children's lives, no matter how much her husband helps with laundry, and dinner, and dishes. That's why our culture has an archetypal Super Mom, and when women fail to live up to this expectation they are often seen as either a neglectful mother (who favors her career over her children) or somehow opposed to the project of feminism because they have foregone the professional success their foremothers fought to secure. In both scenarios, women are favoring their personal desires (driven by Lorde's notion of the erotic, perhaps?) over the desire of culture as a whole. Obviously there are exceptions - a great many of them if we delve into personal histories - but on a cultural level, the belief in an essential mother role is still pervasive, despite women's inclusion in the workforce. For that reason it is important to acknowledge that motherhood IS time consuming and it DOES require extensive effort; otherwise we are just railroading the feminist project with the same old mantra that we saw in Friedan, that of "Women should be happy with everything they have now."
Let me re-phrase because it did not come out as I meant it:
ReplyDeleteThe discussions about these different family dynamics are interesting to me because I would say "over-parenting" could potentially be just as harmful as "under-parenting" because of the examples Winn mentioned. I am not a mom, but a full time job among many other intrinsic factors may be part of what pushes a mother to 'overcompensate' at home and "over-parent," so they feel as though their children are taken care of even though they are working.
Interesting conversation! Just wanted to add my own two cents about my mom, as well as a little bit about some child psychology that I've studied...
ReplyDeleteBased on her own childhood experience, my mother decided from an early age that she was never going to rely on her husband--or anyone, really--to support her financially. Her first goal in life was to be able to take care of herself. My parents had my sister and I later in life and my mom told me that when they decided to begin their family, she made a conscious decision that she wasn't going to choose between pursuing her career and being a mother. She was going to do both.
And she did! At one point in her life, Mom was working full time as the breadwinner of the family, earning an MBA at night, and raising a newborn and a three year old. The burden was even heavier as my dad travelled constantly for his job. Mom continued this crazy lifestyle up until my sister left for college this year and my parents became empty-nesters. In a recent conversation about this very topic, my mother admitted to me: "I don't know how I did it all." Moms are amazing!
I agree that still today the weight of parenting is primarily placed on the mother. And I think that studies in child psychology have a lot to do with this. Proponents of stay-at-home-motherhood use certain studies about how much time children should spend with their mothers to keep women at home. I took a child development class a few years ago and something that has stuck with me over the years is one such collection of studies about the bonding time between mothers and newborns. These studies proved that if a mother can spend one intense, attention-giving hour a day with the child, the child develops a similar attachment to the mother as s/he would if the mother were to spend all day with her/him.
While these studies are always being confirmed and/or disproved, I think it is an interesting thing to consider when one is deciding to become a mother and how she should handle raising a family and pursuing her career.
Yay Moms!
ReplyDeleteWow, This was really interesting to read. I think a valid point to make about the "mom's can't do both" debacle, is to point out that today women are having to assess whether or not they have a "mother-instinct" inside of them. I think the fact that many women have doubts, or make resolutions to themselves about maintaining the career they always dreamed of, is proof that the role of a mother is largely a social construction. Setting aside biological factors and experiences, women are raised with the idea that being a mother is something you will experience, and that you will love so much you wont want to pursue other life goals any more, and that if you don't...well you're wrong. Obviously people are creating unique family structures these days, i doubt any of use were raised in the exact same fashion. What I have gleaned from all of this is that parenting should(and is starting to be) considered similarly to a relationship in that it is a team effort, unique to each couple and family circumstance. I like the scientific info natalie provided us with, because I think that the "workaholic mother" vs the "stay at home" could easily create either abandonment or dependency issues depending on the child, and the fact of the matter is that parents attend to their children the best they know how and seem to make it work. The issue for me is if a man and a woman have different qualms about what 'sacrifices' will have to be made in order to have a child.
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