Journal of the Motherhood Initiative for Research and Community Involvement (JMI - York University)
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Reproducing Empathy in Mothers Who Read Nanny Novels
Get PDFSeveral recent mainstream news articles have reported on studies that suggestreading novels (particularly physical books) may increase empathy in part bythe ways in which they ask readers to reproduce characters’ emotional landscape.English scholar Suzanne Keen’s research, however, troubles the connection madebetween the empathic experiences readers profess to experience and the prosocialbehavior novels are credited with creating. This article will argue that one approachtoward mediating differences between mother-employers and nannies isto engage in novels that highlight the intricacies of this relationship in ways thatcan help both mother-employers and nannies gain a deeper understanding of therole they play in the relationship as well as the ways in which the other memberof the dyad may experience the relationship. I will argue that one way that thisempathy can be developed is via repeated opportunities for readers to reproduce theemotional and cognitive landscape of characters in consciousness-raising nannynovels. I posit that this may make the act of reading consciousness-raising novelsan intrinsically prosocial behavior
How To Get a Girl Pregnant: An Autoethnography of Chicana Butch Reproduction
Get PDF“How To Get a Girl Pregnant” is a memoir documenting a butch lesbian’s questto become pregnant. This essay includes a short discussion of the text as autoethnographycoupled with an excerpt from the memoir. Throughout the memoir theauthor attempts to deconstruct normative conceptions of fertility and pregnancy.She explores the influence of gender and ethnic identities (butch and Chicana) onher experience in a fertility clinic, and on the lived conditions of reproduction. Herbody, at the intersection of gender, sexuality and ethnicity, produces knowledge forscholarly inquiry. The memoir was constructed through fieldnotes and reflectivejournaling. Her observations and analyses reveal insights into the sensibilities andvalues of fertility clinics, as well as those of the communities that have shaped her. Sheconsiders questions such as: How do heterosexist practices in fertility treatments leadto misunderstandings with lgbt clients? How does gender socialization influence abutch’s experience of fertility? How does one’s sense of individual power and desireoperate through reproduction treatments
Defending Depression: Intersectionality and American Infanticide
No full textIn the past decade, the diagnosis of postpartum mental illness has become the primaryway in which Americans understand the actions of murdering mothers. Thisunderstanding of maternal violence is not only recent in American history, it is alsoquite exclusive. The majority of mothers that have successfully employed a postpartumdefense in infanticide cases in the past century have been white, middle-class,married women, yet studies show that poor and minority mothers are significantlymore likely to experience postpartum depression. Only a privileged subset of newmothers can avail themselves of mental health care should they experience postpartumdisorders, and even fewer are able to use mental illness as a legal defense. Through thepostpartum defense, the legal system replicates the class and racial inequalities of themental health system: white, middle-class women are “good mothers” who tragicallysuffer from mental illness, while poor mothers are violent “deviants.” In this article,I review cases in which the postpartum defense has been used and examine the classand racial power dynamics that undergird the American discourse of postpartummental illness and infanticide
Mothers of Multiples’ Perspectives on Fetal Reduction and Medical Abortion: Medical and Non-Medical Reasoning
No full textThe issue of fetal reduction (aborting one or more fetuses in a multiple pregnancy) hasreceived much media attention in Canada (Blackwell), the United States (Hutchison;Padawer 2011b) and the United Kingdom (Newell; Padawer 2011a). Publicattention, combined with growing institutional and personal concerns about thehigh-risk nature of a multiple pregnancy (e.g., for the fetuses, the mother, healthcareresources, and marital strain) create the social foundation for this study. In interviewing41 mothers of multiples (e.g., mothers of twins and triplets) we sought toexplain how decision-making is based on medical and non-medical reasoning. Viewsof fetal reduction or fetal termination for non-medical reasons (e.g., the decision toterminate a pregnancy for lifestyle or personal reasons) were contrasted with views offetal reduction or fetal termination for medical reason (i.e., the decision to terminate apregnancy due to medical “problems”). Participants recognized that decision-makingrelated to selective reduction was a complex issue; however, all disagreed with theselective reduction of a twin to singleton pregnancy for non-medical reasons. A verysmall number of participants disclosed undergoing fetal reduction
