In this paper I mapped the connections between historical discussions of deviant motherhood and how it provides context for MTV’s 16 and Pregnant. The connections I’ve made with media and government shows that they both are informed by the same ideologies that define young, single, mothers on welfare, and mothers who use crack as deviant. Since a deviant perspective informs government policies and media representations, consequently women are depicted as the source of deviancy degrading society with their “immoral” and “deviant” behavior. By revealing and analyzing these connections I have shown that the legacy of the Moynihan Report is still present in how teen mothers are represented on 16 and Pregnant.

The purpose of this mixed method study was to investigate the relationship between the narrative construction of self-identity and positive change in antisocial behaviour in pregnant and parenting young women. It focused on two related aspects of identity development: (1) individuals’ conceptualizations of their personally salient self-values; and (2) “self-action coherence”: the process of constructing self-narratives that establish coherence between one’s personally salient self-values and behaviour. This study also included a qualitative exploration of how becoming a mother in adolescence and early adulthood is related to processes of identity development and behavioural change. Participants were 27 pregnant and parenting young women (ages 16 to 22) recruited from youth-serving agencies in Toronto, Ontario. Participants completed a questionnaire on history of engagement in antisocial behaviour and a semi-structured interview that explored self-identity and critical life experiences. Analyses of participant interviews suggest that positive behavioural change in pregnant and parenting young women is related to active engagement in self-reflection motivated by a convergence of meaning gleaned from a variety of life experiences, including the transition to motherhood. Quantitative findings suggest that: (1) an orientation to relational values is related to lower reported recent engagement in antisocial behaviour; (2) self-action coherence develops across adolescence and early adulthood; and (3) self-action coherence is related to reported positive behavioural change. Overall, the findings suggest that an orientation to relationships is important for establishing positive patterns of behaviour and that positive behavioural change in pregnant and parenting young women involves a process of constructing personally salient self-values and establishing behaviours that cohere with these values. The findings have theoretical implications relating to identity development in adolescence and early adulthood and its relations to behavioural functioning. The findings also have implications for applied work with pregnant and parenting young women with histories of antisocial behaviour.

As I write this piece, I wonder how I got here. I began with an interest in adolescent mental health services in schools. Then I was captured by autoethnographic writing and Carolyn Ellis became my hero. I read everything I could find regarding autoethnography and mostly I read autoethnographic stories. This led me to wanting to tell my own stories, but I realized they were very difficult stories to tell and very difficult stories to hear. I became interested in why certain stories are difficult to tell. I wanted to know what made them difficult stories. I wanted to understand why we tell certain things more easily than others or why we dont tell at all. I then became interested in secrets. I realized that my personal secrets were mostly about mothering. I wondered what it was about mothering that made these stories so difficult to tell. I wondered what was unique and specific to the secrets of mothering. I read extensively about mothering and motherhood. I was exhilarated when I found the work of Andrea OReilly and the Association for Research on Mothering at a book fair at a local conference. I had found another hero. Then I read Susan Maushart (1999) and Adrienne Rich (1986) and I became immersed in the search for meaning about motherhood, mothering, the masks of motherhood and the normative discourse of mothering. I realized there was a disconnect between the discourse of mothering and the actual practice of mothering. I also began to realize that perhaps the masks of motherhood and the normative discourse contributed to and perpetuated the secrets of mothering. I tell my own secrets of mothering to examine this phenomenon. And I tell stories that I never thought I would tell in a public forum. My stories look behind my cool and competent mask of motherhood (Maushart, 1999), and expose the raw emotions of my secrets of mothering. I am often vulnerable and naked and I ask readers to appreciate this in context of their own nakedness and vulnerability. An exploration of the discourse and practice of mothering, and the secrets related to that, offers a means to disturb the normative discourse of mothering and a means to unravel my secrets of mothering. I offer no solutions only hope and possibility that the disturbing and unraveling will guide mothers and parents to decide which mask to wear (or not) and which secrets to keep (or not) and perhaps to awaken readers to the social and political issues related to these stories (both mine and the readers). I introduce and provide the background for the dissertation through my positionality in Tomasulos chair. I will give no other explanation of the chair except to say that I move in and out of the chair as I explore the purpose of my dissertation and position myself within that exploration.

<p>Advancement in education has ensured that there is parity in terms of enrolment for&nbsp / both females and males at tertiary institutions. However, women students continue to face challenges to advancing in education. Given that South African society remains highly gendered and that universities are historically male-dominated sites that do not necessarily cater for the particular&nbsp / needs of women (or children), one area of challenge may relate to having to balance parenting roles with the demands of being a student. For example, at the University of the Western Cape&nbsp / (UWC), students with children are prohibited from access to the residences, leaving them with no option but to seek alternative accommodation, where they can remain with their babies or look for childcare support from their relatives. While there is a growing body of work on the experiences of school-going pregnant and parenting learners, there is little work in the South African context of the experiences of women who are both parents and students at tertiary institutions. Since the national education system clearly supports and encourages life-long learning, an investigation into the conditions and experiences of learning for parenting students is important. The focus on women students was motivated by existing findings that show how normative gender roles persist and that women continue to be viewed as the primary nurturers with respect to the care of children. The purpose of this study was to explore the experiences of motherhood among young female students at UWC. The study was situated within a feminist social constructionist framework and a feminist qualitative methodology was employed. Two or more interviews were conducted with a group of eight participants, selected by convenient sampling, and aged between 18 and 30 years, each with a child or children under the age of five&nbsp / years. Interviews were conducted at the participants&rsquo / choice of location and at a time that was convenient to them. All interviews were audio-recorded and the tapes were kept safely in the&nbsp / researcher&rsquo / s home. All standard ethical procedures for research with human subjects were followed. Data was transcribed verbatim and a qualitative thematic analysis was conducted. Key&nbsp / themes&nbsp / were elucidated and data presented thematically. The key challenges cited included time management, self motivation and the social demands of being a mother. These tend to have adverse repercussions on academic excellence. The analysis revealed that though the young women are allowed to return to universities after becoming mothers, they face many challenges in trying to balance motherhood and the demands of schooling. Furthermore, the findings highlight the tension and ambivalence experienced by participants as they negotiate the social and cultural expectations of motherhood and their personal reality, in meeting the demands of motherhood as student mothers. In their struggle to meet the social and cultural expectations of motherhood, they placed tremendous emotional and physical stress upon themselves which manifested as guilt, physical exhaustion, psychological stress, physical illness and the desire to leave studies notwithstanding the value they attached to it. Although the participants challenged these expectations in various ways, the underlying nuances when they recounted their experiences, remain embedded in these societal and cultural expectations. However, in voicing their experiences, it was clear that they were not always simply accepting the status quo but at times challenging it, and thereby deconstructing the myths of motherhood that are so salient in current social and cultural contexts. The study also found that student mothers at UWC, at least on the basis of this small sample - do not appear to receive sufficient support on campus (physically, materially and emotionally). The study concludes that this group of&nbsp / student mothers face serious challenges as mothers and students and, further, that these challenges are exacerbated by the continued social expectations of women to be &lsquo / perfect&rsquo / mothers which, together with the material gender inequalities in sharing parenting care, could impede effective academic studies. The study recommends that universities play a stronger role in alleviating the challenges for such students. In addition, it recommends that more research be conducted in the area, possibly longitudinal studies, as well as studies that may be more generalisable.</p>

The purpose of this mixed method study was to investigate the relationship between the narrative construction of self-identity and positive change in antisocial behaviour in pregnant and parenting young women. It focused on two related aspects of identity development: (1) individuals’ conceptualizations of their personally salient self-values; and (2) “self-action coherence”: the process of constructing self-narratives that establish coherence between one’s personally salient self-values and behaviour. This study also included a qualitative exploration of how becoming a mother in adolescence and early adulthood is related to processes of identity development and behavioural change. Participants were 27 pregnant and parenting young women (ages 16 to 22) recruited from youth-serving agencies in Toronto, Ontario. Participants completed a questionnaire on history of engagement in antisocial behaviour and a semi-structured interview that explored self-identity and critical life experiences. Analyses of participant interviews suggest that positive behavioural change in pregnant and parenting young women is related to active engagement in self-reflection motivated by a convergence of meaning gleaned from a variety of life experiences, including the transition to motherhood. Quantitative findings suggest that: (1) an orientation to relational values is related to lower reported recent engagement in antisocial behaviour; (2) self-action coherence develops across adolescence and early adulthood; and (3) self-action coherence is related to reported positive behavioural change. Overall, the findings suggest that an orientation to relationships is important for establishing positive patterns of behaviour and that positive behavioural change in pregnant and parenting young women involves a process of constructing personally salient self-values and establishing behaviours that cohere with these values. The findings have theoretical implications relating to identity development in adolescence and early adulthood and its relations to behavioural functioning. The findings also have implications for applied work with pregnant and parenting young women with histories of antisocial behaviour.

Motherhood is an ideal that is ostensibly valued and rewarded in American culture. It is no wonder, then, that a disease which threatens a woman’s ability to adequately fulfill her motherly duties receives a great deal of attention. My study aims to explore how ideas about postpartum depression (PPD) are presented in popular media through an examination of the messages and advice in PPD self-help books. Findings reveal that self-help authors make two significant assumptions: motherhood is a woman’s job that should bring happiness, and when mothers are not happy medical intervention in necessary. Through their gendered assumptions about parents’ roles and their insistence on a biological explanation for PPD, self-help authors prevent a healthy dialogue that examines patriarchal structures in the institutions of family and medicine. By focusing solely on the biological factors at play when women have babies, self-help authors alienate fathers, adoptive mothers, and foster parents who experience depression without biological origins. Only when PPD is discussed within the context of our social realities can we truly understand parenthood and depression.

Background: About five percent of the infants being born in Sweden are cared for in a neonatal unit because of their prematurity. Breastfeeding and breast milk is considered to be the best nutrition for infants in general and for premature infants in particular. The premature infant, depending on how premature, may not be able to breastfeed effectively due to their immaturity. Stress, anxiety and fatigue are factors that affect breast milk production in a negative direction and these feelings are common in the neonatal unit. Aim: To illuminate mothers’ experiences of breastfeeding the premature infant in the neonatal unit. Method: A literature review of eight studies with a qualitative research approach, published between the year 2000 and 2012 was conducted. The studies have been analysed through a content analysis. Result: The findings showed that mothers perceived breastfeeding as a marker of motherhood and they felt guilt and began to question themselves as good mothers if it did not work. The mothers experienced lack of understanding, from the staff, concerning difficulties with breastfeeding, moreover the nurses where the ones who decided when and for how long the mothers should breastfeed. It also appeared that excessively focus on breastfeeding and breast milk by the staff resulted in objectification and the mothers would rather see breastfeeding as a natural process. Some mothers felt support and encouragement from the staff, while some mothers felt that the staff was constant present, which resulted in insecurity. Conclusion: Breastfeeding support for mothers of premature infants during their hospital stay is not satisfying and nurses’ actions have a major impact on mothers’ experiences. Therefore, nurses need to pay attention to mother’s individual needs of support and be aware of how her actions affect the mothers. Nurses also need to strength the mothers in their parent role so that they believe in their own ability to make breastfeeding work.

As I write this piece, I wonder how I got here. I began with an interest in adolescent mental health services in schools. Then I was captured by autoethnographic writing and Carolyn Ellis became my hero. I read everything I could find regarding autoethnography and mostly I read autoethnographic stories. This led me to wanting to tell my own stories, but I realized they were very difficult stories to tell and very difficult stories to hear. I became interested in why certain stories are difficult to tell. I wanted to know what made them difficult stories. I wanted to understand why we tell certain things more easily than others or why we dont tell at all. I then became interested in secrets. I realized that my personal secrets were mostly about mothering. I wondered what it was about mothering that made these stories so difficult to tell. I wondered what was unique and specific to the secrets of mothering. I read extensively about mothering and motherhood. I was exhilarated when I found the work of Andrea OReilly and the Association for Research on Mothering at a book fair at a local conference. I had found another hero. Then I read Susan Maushart (1999) and Adrienne Rich (1986) and I became immersed in the search for meaning about motherhood, mothering, the masks of motherhood and the normative discourse of mothering. I realized there was a disconnect between the discourse of mothering and the actual practice of mothering. I also began to realize that perhaps the masks of motherhood and the normative discourse contributed to and perpetuated the secrets of mothering. I tell my own secrets of mothering to examine this phenomenon. And I tell stories that I never thought I would tell in a public forum. My stories look behind my cool and competent mask of motherhood (Maushart, 1999), and expose the raw emotions of my secrets of mothering. I am often vulnerable and naked and I ask readers to appreciate this in context of their own nakedness and vulnerability. An exploration of the discourse and practice of mothering, and the secrets related to that, offers a means to disturb the normative discourse of mothering and a means to unravel my secrets of mothering. I offer no solutions only hope and possibility that the disturbing and unraveling will guide mothers and parents to decide which mask to wear (or not) and which secrets to keep (or not) and perhaps to awaken readers to the social and political issues related to these stories (both mine and the readers). I introduce and provide the background for the dissertation through my positionality in Tomasulos chair. I will give no other explanation of the chair except to say that I move in and out of the chair as I explore the purpose of my dissertation and position myself within that exploration.

Med rötter i 1970-talets kvinnorörelse, under parollen ”Det personliga är politiskt”, satte konstnären Mary Kelly moderskap, barnafödande och barnomsorg under lupp i samband med sitt verk Post-Partum Document, 1973-1979. För många kvinnliga konstutövare som gjorde sitt bästa för att, via konsten, frigöra sig från sociala roller och nedärvda beteendemönster, möttes hennes initiativ att ge en bild av denna för dem bromsande moderlighet, med förvåning. Mary Kelly delade konceptkonstens politiska patos för en distanserad reflektion över den kulturella diskursen men hon bytte den lingvistiska analysen mot psykoanalysen. Hennes råmaterial var den subjektiva erfarenheten: kroppen, dess rädslor och sexuella drivkrafter samt de institutionella och kulturella konventioner som tillfogades den. Hennes analysmetoder och omfattande teori banade väg för en mer akademisk, socialkonstruktivistisk feminism som gav ringar på vattnet efter att Post-Partum Document premiärvisades i London år 1976. I linje med den västerländska andra vågen-feminismen utforskade hon den kvinnligt levda erfarenheten men Post-Partum Document markerar också en vändpunkt mot en subjektiv psykoanalys i konstpraktik och teori, som inte minst den efterföljande tredje generationens feminister anammade under 1980-talet. Med verket, som består av sex sektioner och totalt 135 objekt, syftar Mary Kelly till att synliggöra hur den biologiska skillnaden mellan kön och sociala normer befästs via moderskapet och den barnomsorg som det medför. Verket beskriver hennes egen sons socialiseringsprocess fram till sex års ålder. Begreppet Post partum betyder ”efter förlossningen” och syftar till att beskriva moderns tillstånd efter barnets födelse. Denna term gäller således inte barnet vilket också bör understrykas i relation till verkets titel. PPD:s syfte är främst att beskriva modern och hennes känslor i form av oro, rädsla, makt och åtrå i relation till barnet. Modern representerar här samhället, kolonisatören, som tar det anspråkslösa, primitiva spädbarnet till sin barm i syfte att uppfostra det och ge det verktyg för att göra sig förstådd. I Post-Partum Document är hon, till skillnad från psykoanalysens teorier om fallos och kvinnans brist i relation till mannen eftersom hon inte utrustats med penis, ägare av den symboliska fallosen medan mannen, i detta fall sonen, är i underläge. Att Mary Kelly samtidigt bearbetade sin egen erfarenhet av sina respektive roller – som kvinna, konstnär, feminist och sedermera mor - samt polemiken dem emellan gjorde verket unikt i en samtid där konceptkonsten sällan adresserade subjektiva upplevelser medan feministerna, å sin sida, var upptagna med att frigöra sig från de roller som ansågs traditionellt feminina. Via differentierande uttryck av moderns känsloregister i relation till barnet tecknar konstnären en bild av ett moderskap fyllt av oro, nervositet, tvivel, upprymdhet och åtrå samtidigt som hon ställer frågor om föreställningen kring den naturliga modern och kvinnlig sexualitet.

Our purpose with the study was to investigate how the image of a mother’s role is created by the magazines Mama and Husmodern. Mama is an existing magazine, but Husmodern ceased to exist in 1988. Both magazines focus on children, fashion and housework. We wanted to know what qualities you need to become a good or a bad mother. Also who is allowed to give advices on motherhood? We compared the magazines to find out how the mother´s role has changed over time. For that we used six issues of Mama from the year 2011, and six issues of Husmodern from the years between 1941 and 1959. The result of the research shows that mothers, now as well as in the 1940-1950's, are expected to put their children first. Nowadays, in Mama’s context, she is also expected to work. It is no longer socially acceptable to live as a housewife, which was the ideal in the magazine Husmodern. The result also shows that mothers, according to Mama, are in a constant state of stress. The magazine tries to offer them solutions for their stress-related problems. Husmodern on the other hand, puts a greater emphasis on moral, and offers the readers their moral values.