Women's Rights Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Why do women in contemporary western societies experience contradiction between their autonomous and maternal selves? What are the origins of this contradiction and the associated ‘double shift’ that result in widespread calls to either ‘lean in’ or ‘opt out’? How are some mothers subverting these contradictions and finding meaningful ways of reconciling their autonomous and maternal selves?

In Modern Motherhood and Women’s Dual Identities, Petra Bueskens argues that western modernisation consigned women to the home and released them from it in historically unprecedented, yet interconnected, ways. Her ground-breaking formulation is that western women are free as ‘individuals’ and constrained as mothers, with the twist that it is the former that produces the latter.

Bueskens’ theoretical contribution consists of the identification and analysis of modern women’s duality drawing on political philosophy, feminist theory and sociology tracking the changing nature of discourses of women, freedom and motherhood across three centuries. While the current literature points to the pervasiveness of contradiction and double-shifts for mothers, very little attention has been paid to how (some) women are subverting contradiction and ‘rewriting the sexual contract’. Bridging this gap, Bueskens’ interviews ten ‘revolving mothers’ to reveal how periodic absence, exceeding the standard work-day, disrupts the default position assigned to mothers in the home, and in turn disturbs the gendered dynamics of household work.

A provocative and original work, Modern Motherhood and Women’s Dual Identities will appeal to graduate students and researchers interested in fields such as Women and Gender Studies, Sociology of Motherhood and Social and Political Theory.

Endorsements:

Petra Bueskens has been in the forefront of the new, and very welcome field of motherhood studies. In Modern Motherhood and Women's Dual Identities: Rewriting the Sexual Contact [she analyses] the psychic, social, cultural and political challenges posed by the dual identities of mother and citizen, elegantly and capaciously ranges across 400 years of theory, up to the present, that address them, as well as providing psychologically-attuned interview documentation of how women feel and think, daily and throughout their maternal lives.
Nancy J Chodorow
Author, The Reproduction of Mothering, The Power of Feelings, Individualizing Gender and Sexuality, and other works Professor Emerita of Sociology, University of California, Berkeley

This creative and theoretically rich book re-examines the social contradictions and penalties faced by women who want to be both caring mothers and autonomous public individuals. Taking us beyond the logic of the "sexual contract," Bueskens introduces us to the "revolving mothers" who offer a glimpse of the social revolution required to undo the gendered separation of spheres. A fascinating and compelling study.
Dr. Sharon Hays, author of the The Cultural Contradictions of Motherhood

In this lucid, timely and important new book, Petra Bueskens takes up the formidable task of investigating the 'new sexual contract' in late modernity that leaves women strung out between the promise of autonomy in the public sphere, and the demands of motherhood that isolate and intensify mothering work in the home, both freeing and constraining women at once. Bueskens brings into view this impossible contradictory duality by producing both a new social theory of dualism, and the empirical evidence to show that it is possible to force changes in the sexual contract at the level of individual family organization. Through tracking a small group of women who both choose to mother and also spend protracted periods of time away from the family, she shows how these women produce radical shifts in the gendered dynamics of the household. Her bold and vital claim is that we can rewrite the sexual contract only if we understand the historical and contemporary double-bind that produces women's liberty as it undermines it, making motherhood still the unfinished business of feminism.
Dr. Lisa Baraitser, Reader in Psychosocial Studies, Birckbeck University, author of Maternal Encounters

Modern Mothers' Dual Identities: Rewriting the Sexual Contract cogently and compellingly elucidates a central debate in motherhood studies and a persistent dilemma in most mothers' lives; namely the contradiction between women's maternal and individualized selves. Through her lucid theoretical ruminations on the 'new sexual contract' in late modernity and by way of an innovative empirical study on 'revolving mothers', Bueskens delivers the needed blueprints to actualize the potential of what she incisively terms 'the individualized mother'.
Dr. Andrea O'Reilly, Professor of Women's Studies, York University, Toronto, Founder and Director of the Motherhood Initiative and author of Matricentric Feminism.

In this engaging and timely book, Petra Bueskens tackles a central challenge of modern life - how to reconcile the contradictory roles of women as citizens, individual workers and mothers. She traces the history through the theoretical views of motherhood, integrating the multiple strands in a sophisticated and fascinating synthesis. She highlights periodic maternal absence as a bridge between individualism and constraint, revealing both the ambiguities and a potential way to progress women's liberation. The book is an absorbing read that makes an invaluable contribution to our understanding of contemporary motherhood.
Dr. Lyn Craig, Professor of Sociology/ARC Future Fellow, The University of Melbourne, author of Contemporary Motherhood.