Motherhood and Pregnancy in Popular Culture

The following discussion of ways in which motherhood and pregnancy are
represented in popular culture took place on WMST-L in November 2001.  For
more WMST-L files available on the Web, see the WMST-L File Collection.

I have a group of students in an introduction to women's studies course who
are doing a class project on representations of motherhood and pregnancy in
the media and popular culture. Does anyone know of some books or articles
accessible to undergrads in an intro WS course that might be suitable?

Thanks,
Dorie Geissler
Department of Kinesiology, Women's Studies
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

Try the following article:

Martinez, Renee, Johnston-Robledo, Ingrid, Ulsh, Heather M., & Chrisler, Joan
C. (2000).  Singing 'the baby blues": A content analysis of popular press
articles about postpartum affective disturbances.  Women & Health, 31(2/3),
pp. 37-56.

Also - this chapter that was written for undergraduates:

Johnston-Robledo, Ingrid (2000). From postpartum depression to the empty nest
syndrome: The motherhood mystique revisited.  In Joan C. Chrisler, Carla
Golden, & Patricia Rozee (Eds.), Lectures on the Psychology of Women (2nd ed.)
(pp. 128-147).  New York: McGraw-Hill.

Joan

try della pollock's book _telling bodies, performing birth_.

You might want to try Souling C. Wong's ôDiverted Mothering:
Representations of Care-givers of Color in The Age of
Multiculturalism.ö Mothering: Ideology, Experience , and
Agency. Eds. Evelyn Nakano Glenn et.  al., Routledge, l994.

Wong explores the cultural significance of images of mothers and
care-givers of color in popular culture.

Karen Bojar
kbojar  @  ccp.cc.pa.us

Kaplan, E. Ann.  Motherhood and Representation: The Mother in Popular
Culture and Melodrama. New York: Routledge, 1992.

Ruthe Thompson
Asst. Prof. of Journalism
Roosevelt University
Chicago
ruthomps  @  home.com

If any of your students are interested in an historical approach, my book,
Like Our Very Own: Adoption and the Changing Culture of
Motherhood,1851-1950, contains two chapters that examine representations of
adoptive mothers in popular magazines and fiction.

Julie Berebitsky, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Department of History
Director, Women's Studies Program
University of the South
735 University Avenue
Sewanee, TN  37383

Phone (931) 598-1725

Check out Matthews and Wexler, Pregnant Pictures (Routledge 2000).  Also E.
Ann Kaplan, Motherhood and Representation: The Mother in Popular Culture
and Melodrama  and Ruth Feldstein, Motherhood in Black and White; Michie
and Cahn, Confinements, also looks at advice books and their presentations
of motherhood.

Eileen Boris
Hull Professor of Women's Studies
Women's Studies Program
University of California, Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara, California 93106
805 893 2727 (ph) 805 893 8676 (fax)
boris  @  womst.ucsb.edu

Breeder: Real -Life Stories from the New Generation of
Mothers, edited by Ariel Gore and Bee Lavendar, from
Seal Press.

Another suggestion, a wonderful book,  Kahn, Robbie Pfueffer.1996.
Bearing Meaning, the Language of Birth. Urbana and Chicago:
University of Illinois Press.

Margaret Lazarus
Cambridge Documentary Films, Inc.
P.O. Box 390385 Cambridge, MA 02139-0004
ph (617)484-3993  fx (617)484-0754
http://www.shore.net/~cdf
cdf  @  shore.net

The book "Pregnant Pictures," co-edited by Sandra Matthews and published by
Routledge Press is excellent.

Gail Rebhan
Associate Professor of Photography
Northern Virginia Community College
Woodbridge, VA

Mitchell, Lisa M. Baby's First Picture: Ultrasound and the Politics of
Fetal Subjects.  Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2001.

Fiona

--
Fiona Nelson

Assistant Professor
Faculty of Communication and Culture
Social Sciences Building, Room 301
University of Calgary
2500 University Drive NW
Calgary  AB

Hello

        The Association for Research on Mothering (ARM) last month hosted
an international conference on Mothering, Literature, Popular Culture and
the Arts with more than 90 papers on the subject of representations of
motherhood. A full conference programme is available on our website at
www.yorku.ca/crm. The journal of the Association for Research on Mothering
will be publishing a journal issue on Mothering and Literature
(fall/winter 2002) and one on Mothering, Popular Culture and the Arts
(spring/summer 2003). The CFPs are listed on our website.
        Several articles in our past journal issues have explored this
topic. Again please see our website for full listing of articles. As well,
several books on this topic have been reviewed in previous journal issues.
Finally, my edited book on _Mothers and Daughters: Connection,
Empowerment and Transformation_ (Rowman 1999) has some chapters on this
subject. Hope this information helps

best;

Andrea O'Reilly, PhD,
Assistant Professor,
School of Women's Studies,
President, Association for Research on Mothering (ARM),
726 Atkinson College,
York University,
Toronto, Ontario,
Canada, M3J 1P3
Phone: 416 736 2100; Ex. 60366
Fax: 905 775 1386
Email: aoreilly  @  yorku.ca
Website; www.yorku.ca/crm

Thank you for all the responses to my query about texts on representations
of motherhood and pregnancy. I have complied a list that I thought might be
of interest to some list members.

Dorie Geissler
Department of Kinesiology, and Women's Studies
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign


The Association for Research on Mothering (ARM) last month hosted an
international conference on Mothering, Literature, Popular Culture and the
Arts with more than 90 papers on the subject of representations of
motherhood. A full conference programme is available at www.yorku.ca/crm.

The Glow:  A Journey to Motherhood_ by Danica Perez, This is a
photography-book with pictures of celebrities while pregnant.

Motherhood is not a rehearsal, written by a mother, Dr. Noya Ostrowiak
(2001) by Southern Charm Press.

"Are Mothers Persons?" of Susan Bordo's book,Unbearable Weight: Feminism,
Western Culture, and the Body_

"Bad" mothers: The politics of blame in twentieth-century America.  New
York: New York University Press. 1998

Holcomb, B.  (1998).  Not guilty!  The good news about working mothers.  New
York: Scribner.

Carol Tavris's chapter on "The Pregnant Person: Woman as Flowerpot" (in a
section of _The Mismeasure of Woman_ that's called "The 70-Kilogram Man and
the Pregnant Person: Why women are not the same as men")

Natalie Angier's book _Woman_ - a chapter called "Suckers and Horns:  The
Prodigal Uterus."

Ariel Gore (editor of Hip Mama) books:  _The Mother Trip_ and _Breeders_.
Both focus on alternative motherhood, esp young mothers, and their struggles
with family, the medical establishment,and society because they are seen as
so obviously not June Cleavers.

The Girlfriends' Guide to Pregnancy_

Mitchell, Lisa M. Baby's First Picture: Ultrasound and the Politics of Fetal
Subjects.  Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2001.

"Pregnant Pictures," co-edited by Sandra Matthews and published by Routledge
Press (2001).

Kahn, Robbie Pfueffer.1996. Bearing Meaning, the Language of Birth. Urbana
and Chicago: University of Illinois Press.

Breeder: Real -Life Stories from the New Generation of Mothers, edited by
Ariel Gore and Bee Lavendar, from Seal Press.

Ruth Feldstein, Motherhood in Black and White

Michie and Cahn, Confinements

Julie Berebitsky Like Our Very Own: Adoption and the Changing Culture of
Motherhood,1851-1950, contains two chapters that examine representations of
adoptive mothers in popular magazines and fiction.

Kaplan, E. Ann.  Motherhood and Representation: The Mother in Popular
Culture and Melodrama. New York: Routledge, 1992.

Souling C. Wong's  "Diverted Mothering: Representations of Care-givers of
Color in The Age of Multiculturalism."  Mothering: Ideology, Experience ,
and Agency. Eds. Evelyn Nakano Glenn et.  al.,  Routledge,l994.

Martinez, Renee, Johnston-Robledo, Ingrid, Ulsh, Heather M., & Chrisler,
Joan C. (2000).  Singing 'the baby blues": A content analysis of popular
press articles about postpartum affective disturbances.  Women & Health,
31(2/3), pp. 37-56.

Johnston-Robledo, Ingrid (2000). From postpartum depression to the empty
nest syndrome: The motherhood mystique revisited.  In Joan C. Chrisler,
Carla Golden, & Patricia Rozee (Eds.), Lectures on the Psychology of Women
(2nd ed.) (pp. 128-147).  New York: McGraw-Hill.