Motherhood ideologies

To explore ideologies of motherhood, it is useful to recognize that motherhood is not biologically determined or socially ascribed. Motherhood is a social and historical construction.

By Deirdre Johnston and Debra Swanson



Coontz (1992) argued that the "traditional family" with a wage-earner father and a stay-at-home mother is an historical and cultural aberration. Culture tells us what it means to be a mother, what behaviors and attitudes are appropriate for mothers, and how motherhood should shape relationships and self-identity.

Jayne Buxton (1998) described the adversarial climate of competing ideologies as the "mother war." She documented how stereotypical characterizations of the Superwoman (who efficiently manages her household and children with the same cold-hearted equanimity she employs in the business world) are pitted against the Earth Mother (who, barefoot and wearing kaftans, feeds her children home-grown organic foods with an everpresent beatific smile). Each motherhood camp justifies its own ideology by co-opting the values of the other: "I am a better mother if I work"; "I am resisting the dominant culture and exercising my free choice and power as a woman to stay at home with my children."

A dominant ideology supports the cultural hegemony by creating social expectations for a social group. For example, a patriarchial ideology of mothering denies women identities and selfhood outside of motherhood (Glenn, 1994). Feminist scholars have explored how current motherhood ideologies sustain patriarchy (Rothman, 1994), perpetuate the economic dependency of middle-class women and the economic exploitation of working-class and migrant women (Chang, 1994), and project White, middleclass mothers" experiences as universal and ideal (Collins, 1994). Culture defines and rewards "good mothers," and it sanctions "bad mothers."

There are many mothers who fall outside the club of "good motherhood" as defined by dominant motherhood ideologies. A number of scholars have noted the relegation of teenage mothers (Bailey, Brown, & Wilson, 2002), older mothers, single mothers, and lesbian mothers (Lewin, 1994) to the bottom rungs of the hierarchy of motherhood (DiLapi, 1989). A number of researchers have addressed both the historical and contemporary exclusion of African, Asian, and Latina American mothers from the cult of domesticity that defines American motherhood (Collins, 1994; Dill, 1988; Glenn, 1992).

MOTHERHOOD MYTHS

The building blocks of ideologies are myths. Barthes (1972) defined a myth as an uncontested and unconscious assumption that is so widely accepted that its historical and cultural origins are forgotten. As such, myths of motherhood are presented as "natural," "instinctual," and "intuitive'' as opposed to "cultural," "economic," "political," and "historical" (Hrdy, 2000). Ideologies are born when myths are combined into coherent philosophies and politically sanctioned by the culture. Myths of employed and at-home mothers abound in the culture.

In the last century, American culture promoted a romanticized ideal to which all mothers are supposed to aspire. The ideal is the full-time, at-home, middleclass White mother fully engaged and fulfilled in the private sphere (Boris, 1994). Yet, at the turn of the twenty-first century, a number of motherhood ideologies compete for ascendancy. Research on the sources of motherhood ideologies has led to the historical analysis of self-help literature (Zimmerman, Holm, & Haddock, 2001), child-rearing manuals (Daily, 1982; Eyer, 1996), and expert advice (Ehrenreich & English, 1978).

Other researchers have explored the role of socialized gender roles (Chodorow, 1978; Johnson, 1988) and cultural expectations (Daily, 1982; Maushart, 1999; Rich, 1976) on the construction of motherhood. Relatively little attention has been paid to the role of the media in constructing motherhood ideologies (Keller, 1994). The purpose of this study is to explore the portrayal of employed and at-home mothers in current women's magazines as a source of cultural myths and ideologies that define contemporary motherhood.