Becoming a mother is most often described as something natural and the qualities to be a mother is presupposed to exist in every woman. This paper presents the results of a qualitative study with the research question as to whether the image of ‘the good mother’ can be found in women's stories of becoming mothers. The data was collected through one group interview and two individual interviews and analyzed with Charmaz constructivist grounded theory as a method. In the analysis we found four theoretical codes that together answer our research questions. The result shows that there is still an ideal type of ‘the good mother’ after which women build their own identity as a mother. / Att bli mamma beskrivs ofta som något naturligt och egenskaperna att vara en god moder förutsätts existera i varje kvinna. Studiens syfte var att undersöka huruvida bilden av “den goda modern” kunde ses i kvinnors berättelser av att bli mödrar. Data samlades in genom en gruppintervju och två individuella intervjuer och analyserades med Charmaz konstruktivistiska grundade teori som metod. I analysen hittades fyra teoretiska koder som tillsammans svarar på forskningsfrågorna. Resultatet visar att det fortfarande finns en idealtyp av "den goda modern", varefter kvinnor skapar sin egen identitet som mamma.

This essay examines Harriet Jacobs’s autobiography Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl from the perspective of resistance theory. The essay uses the analytical framework created by Anna Johansson and Stellan Vinthagen in Conceptualizing 'Everyday Resistance': A Transdisciplinary Approach (2020) to concretize and understand different resistance methods and how black women resisted while navigating in society as slaves and as mothers. Resistance theory and methodology is a newer research area in literature studies, and this study attempts to add to that research field to broaden the understanding of Harriet Jacobs’s autobiography from a resistance perspective point of view. Johansson and Vinthagen’s analytical framework uses four different aspects to capture conceptual and situational combinations of everyday resistance and relationships existing between agents and powerholders. This study finds that motherhood and communal resistance motivate and influence Jacobs's will to continue fighting for liberty and explains how Jacobs’s everyday resistance actions create a feeling of meaning and agency in her life.

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[pt] Entre todas as mudanças que o sistema familiar enfrenta ao longo do ciclo vital, a transição para a maternidade é destacada como uma das mais dramáticas e intensas (Ngai & Ngu, 2013). A sociedade ainda romantiza a maternidade e espera que a mulher se sinta feliz e realizada ao tornar-se mãe, porém trata-se de um momento com muitas adaptações e desafios, podendo inclusive ser adoecedor. O objetivo deste trabalho foi compreender as transformações na subjetividade, na conjugalidade e na carreira que a mulher vivencia ao tornar-se mãe na contemporaneidade. O estudo de cunho qualitativo entrevistou 20 mulheres entre 25 e 40 anos, primíparas, com bebês entre 4 meses e 2 anos, em um relacionamento estável e que possuem atividade remunerada. Constatou-se dificuldade em se reconhecer após a maternidade, sobrecarga com acúmulo de funções, desafios para conciliar a carreira, declínio na intimidade e na vida sexual com o parceiro, importância da rede de apoio, além de autocobrança e sentimentos de inadequação devido ao excesso de informações na internet e comparação nas redes sociais. Atualmente, existem diversos estudos com recortes dessas temáticas - maternidade, conjugalidade e carreira, mas poucos que propõem correlacionar esses diferentes fatores. Por isso, acredita-se que os resultados do estudo podem contribuir significativamente para a compreensão de temas relevantes para a promoção da saúde e bem-estar da mulher na contemporaneidade. / [en] Among all the changes that the family system faces throughout the life cycle, the transition to motherhood is highlighted as one of the most dramatic and intense (Ngai & Ngu, 2013). Society still romanticizes motherhood and expects women to feel happy and fulfilled when becoming a mother, but it is a moment with many adaptations and challenges, which can even be sickening. The objective of this work was to understand the transformations in subjectivity, in conjugality and in the career that the woman experiences when becoming a mother in contemporary times. The qualitative study interviewed 20 women between 25 and 40 years old, primiparous, with babies between 4 months and 2 years old, in a stable relationship and who have paid work. It was found difficulty in recognizing oneself after motherhood, overload with accumulation of functions, challenges to reconcile career, decline in intimacy and sexual life with the partner, importance of the support network, in addition to self-demand and feelings of inadequacy due to excess of information on the internet and comparison on social networks. Currently, there are several studies with excerpts from these themes - motherhood, conjugality and career, but few that propose to correlate these different factors. Therefore, it is believed that the results of the study can contribute significantly to the understanding of relevant themes to the promotion of women s health and well-being in contemporary times.

This dissertation is composed of a critical preface, "Reconciling Art and Account in the Creative Essay," and the essay collection Resurrection Attempts: Essays. The preface situates the following essay collection within the genre of contemporary creative nonfiction. Specifically, it argues that genre-bending or genre hybridity are inherent and unavoidable features of creative nonfiction writing and should be celebrated, rather than denied or lamented. It points to other writers who deliberately challenge the bounds of genre, and discusses some of the collection's innovations in form and other ways it offers experimentation, such as use of unusual or borrowed points of view, disruption of chronology, and adoption of elements from other genres of writing, including fiction, poetry, and academic. Ultimately, embracing the artistic side of creative nonfiction (as opposed to its "purely" journalistic side) allows for heightened intimacy with the reader, a much wider breadth of storytelling, and a more vulnerable—and therefore more truthful—interrogation of legacy and the human experience. Resurrection Attempts is a collection of essays exploring the writer's rural Texas childhood and the early and tragic losses of her parents, including the effect of those experiences on her adult life and performance of motherhood. The voices of the writer's sisters sometimes intertwine with hers, especially as she examines the converging and diverging lenses of their shared experience. She works throughout to "resurrect" her parents and even to resurrect earlier versions of other family members, including herself. The collection is particularly fascinated with dreams, drawing a parallel between the subconscious lives of the dreamer and their waking constructions of their memories and experiences.

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<p>The adoption of children across international borders has emerged as an important cultural phenomenon. It shapes the way North Americans understand families, and forms relationships between sending and receiving countries. This dissertation explores the transnational adoption of children between Canada and China with a focus on the subjective experiences of Canadian women who have adopted children from China, their dreams, motivations and lived experiences of becoming an adoptive mother. Highlighting these narratives, this dissertation serves to balance critique with advocacy, and complicates the binary opposition in both scholarly and popular culture presentations of transnational adoption as either ‘good’ or ‘bad’. The dissertation also explores the social pressures that Canadian women endure and how gender expectations and cultural ideas of femininity depend on a woman experiencing motherhood. Through the window of transnational adoption this dissertation examines discourses about infertility, philanthropy, kinship, gender and the construction of transnational adoption as kidnap or rescue.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)