'Engaging with the maternal: tentative mothering acts, props and discourses

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'Engaging with the maternal tentative mothering
acts, props and discourses

• Tina Miller, School of Social Sciences and Law.
  Oxford Brookes University.
• tamiller_at_brookes.ac.uk

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Introduction to research presentation overview

• Research approach
• exploring periods of significant personal
  transitions and qualitative longitudinal research
  
• Making sense and narrative construction
• Discourses, selves and doing mothering
• Weaving together threads of nature and
  nurture
• The good mother discourse and presentation of
  competent self
• Tentative accounts
• Antenatal preparation preparing appropriately
• Men, involvement, consumption and fathering
  acts
• buying and building baby things consumption
  and acts of involvement
• Tentative acts?
• Birth and early mothering performances and
  public/private spaces
• Unconvincing mothering acts? - props, risks and
  baffled selves
• Early fathering acts

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Two UK studies Transition to first-time
motherhood

• Qualitative longitudinal study 3 interviews (1x
  a/n and 2x p/n) and end-of-study questionnaire
• Sample 17 women (average age 26years)
• Sample white, heterosexual, most
  self-identified as middle-class, employed and
  partnered
• Data analysis focused on narrative construction
• Generated 49 interview transcripts
• Miller, T. (2005) Making sense of motherhood A
  narrative approach. Cambridge Cambridge
  University Press

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Transition to first-time fatherhood

• Qualitative longitudinal study same format as
  motherhood study (but ongoing)
• Sample 17 men (average age 30 years)
• Plus pilot study with 4 teenagers fathers
• Sample white, heterosexual, employed in
  skilled/professional occupations, partnered.
• Further follow-up interview at 2 years with
  participants further interviews at 5 years
  planned
• Generated 56 interview transcripts to date
• Miller, T. (forthcoming) Making sense of
  fatherhood Men constructing and practising
  gender. Cambridge Cambridge University Press

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Key findings from Motherhood study

• Before the birth women anticipate that they will
  naturally and instinctively know how to mother
• Birth experiences were all different to what they
  had expected/been led to believe
• Mothering did not come naturally for most of
  the women but they felt unable to talk about
  these normal difficulties
• Only retrospectively could the women challenge
  the myths of motherhood and risk talking
  about how things had really been
• See Miller, T. (2007) Is this what motherhood
  is all about? Weaving experiences and discourse
  through transition to first-time motherhood.
  Gender Society. 21 337-358

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Key findings from Fatherhood study

• Before the birth men positioned themselves as
  willing learners
• They emphasised being there as an important
  feature of involved fatherhood different to the
  fathering they had experienced
• They expressed a desire to share caring for their
  child in emotional and not (just) economic ways
• During the year after the birth men spoke of
  the hard work of caring, of needing to fit
  fathering in and eventually of the importance of
  their economic breadwinner role and their
  worker identity

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Discourses, selves and motherhood

• In the discourses that shape reproduction and
  motherhood, associations with truth and science
  powerfully reinforce their dominance and
  potential totalising effect (Cosslett 1994, 6).
  
• In anticipating first-time motherhood
  expectations are unlikely to be informed by
  personal, subjective experiences of mothering
  and so tenuous selves
• The taken-for-granted and natural base on which
  such discourse are premised have been challenged
  and the layers upon layers of socially
  constructed elaboration and reinforcement of this
  natural base exposed (Hays 1996, 13 Bobel
  2002).

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Tentative accounts in uncharted territory

• Women construct and present anticipatory and
  tentative accounts which demonstrate
  appropriate preparation
• This involves drawing on discourses which
  emphasise appropriate preparation
• Attendance at antenatal clinics/ preparation
  classes
• Engaging with /accepting expert advice
• Being healthy (diet, exercise)
• Consumption of information (expert knowledge,
  books, magazines and the internet)
• Purchasing of baby goods

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Preparing appropriately consuming expert
information

• I dont like getting information from other
  people because its always so subjective and they
  always want to harp on about their little story
  and so I have actually avoided other
  people.those are the most unhelpful, personal
  experiences that Ive steered away from. But I
  think the books, and the midwives and my doctor,
  my doctors been good (Rebecca)
• Well, a lot of the friends that have had babies
  say that they dont like to say too much because
  they could say the wrong thing (Faye)
• Im going for the breast first to see how I get
  on. I did actually say to the midwife that I
  wanted to do both, I wanted the bottle and but
  she said you cant actually do that(but) it has
  been good. They just tell you everything (Wendy)

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Anticipation and preparation

• Preparing, purchasing and (appropriate) timing
• I went out and bought (pregnancy book) after 12
  weeks once you know sort of the danger periods
  that you hear about were overwe didnt do
  anything until after 12 weeks, we didnt tell
  anybody until after 12 weeks, weve only just
  bought baby clothes (38 weeks pregnant). People
  said you must have everything by now - no!
  (Felicity)
• Preparation and nesting coinciding with
  maternity leave
• the sort of nesting thing (has) definitely
  taken over (Helen) but nesting more often
  used by men to describe aspects of partners
  pregnancy preparation

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Men preparing appropriately for fatherhood

• In the antenatal period mens tentative forays
  into the paternal/parental arena are often
  facilitated/mediated by their wife/partner,
• What information is accessed/ what is read and
  when
• Which classes are attended and by whom
• What is purchased in preparation for the baby
• But gendered modes of consumption and activity
• Men centrally involved in physical/structural
  aspects of preparing e.g. painting, building and
  buying the big stuff
• Physical, hands-on involvement as a demonstrable
  way in (an activity) for men
  anticipating/preparing appropriately for
  fatherhood
• These differences reinforce assumptions around
  biological determinism, gendered practices and
  the role of consumption in acts of appropriate
  preparation

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Preparing the house

• weve had to prepare the house and erect prams
  and cots and things and I guess financially weve
  directed money to this rather than other
  thingsThats definitely been (wifes) lead
  really and shes decided, well I supposed Ive
  had a hand in the big stuff like which pram will
  we go for, what does a cot look like and stuff
  and that was by virtue of a fact of 2 trips to
  John Lewis so I havent really invested a lot of
  kind of effort in to it or knowledge really. I
  think (wife) has done all the talking to other
  people whove had kids, shes found out whats
  required, what the list of newborn stuff is that
  we need and I havent really got involved in
  that.I could have made up a list which would
  have been so not comprehensive. It would have
  been such a partial list you know, obvious stuff
  like a pram and a cot I would have got but
  muslin cloths would have passed me by. How do I
  know about muslin cloths? (M.M)

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Men preparing appropriately

• I suppose (wife) brought books. She has been
  reading books all the way through and you know
  look that is what it looks like, look at the
  pictures sort of thing and .when we went to the
  ante-natal classes I didnt feel huge sort of
  drive to read books .but I just thought it was
  really interesting (Resp 5)
• I suppose Ive been trying to prepare the house.
  Weve been buying and building baby things
  trying to get rid of our junk, weve got a lot of
  it and weve only got a little house so just
  going through those sorts of things (Resp 14)
• But over the last few months weve been buying
  bits and pieces and Ive got a cot that I sort of
  lived in so to speak and Ive just sanded it down
  and painted it and that kind of thing and you
  sort of sit there thinking, blimey this is for
  our future (Resp 3)

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Men demonstrating involvement

• We have not bought much because we have got a
  lot of older brother and sisters who have kids
  already so that is great so we have sort of
  inherited a lot and we dont like sort of ..
  consumption anyway but the things we have bought.
  Actually there was an example where I wanted to
  become more involved .. just buying a mattress
  and sheets for a cot which we ended up buying
  early because we were having somebody visiting
  with a baby so it was just an interesting
  exercise how we go about things and I think
  (wife) was quite surprised that I wanted to get
  involved in that decision. She probably thought
  that was just something I would do quickly and we
  ended up having a discussion about it sort of in
  the shop and I think she was a bit taken back
  that I was interested (Resp 4)

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buying things

• It probably took a couple of months to really
  sink inI was thrilled because Id wanted kids
  for ages and I was desperate to start planning
  and telling people and buying things. Yes. The
  cot arrived today and Ive just put the cot up in
  the nursery and now the nursery has got
  everything whereas up to yesterday it was a room
  with lots of stuff in it, its now got everything
  in it. Yeah it could be any time (Resp 7)

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Men not the ones doing the research

• But I think most men are just literally the ones
  who carry the shopping to the car you know they
  go out to buy the buggy but are generally not the
  ones doing the research (Resp 11)
• I think its since weve started getting the
  nursery ready that Ive felt as if I can sort of
  contribute a lot more as well, go out and get
  things and build things like the cot and put all
  that sort of thing together. So yeah definitely
  through that respect Im very involved (Resp 9).

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Tentative acts of early mothering risks and props

• Birth - in all cases is different to what had
  been expected / led to believe
• Birth provides a narrative turning point from
  anticipation to lived reality (Miller, 2005)
• Leaving the house described as akin to a
  military operation in the early weeks involving
  taking all day to pack the baby bag but also
  experienced as potentially risky
• Giving a convincing performance was associated
  with having the right equipment and appropriate
  mother props baby, pram, baby bag, baby
  bottle as well as knowing how to do mothering.
  But the props might not be enough.

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they hate shopping

• So I didnt go out very much which made it
  hardI dont think I went out, literally set foot
  outside the door for 3 or 4 weeks or something
  which is quiteit was a long time, and that was
  too long actually, because I didntbut I just
  felt I didnt feel very confident taking her out
  because I just thought she was going to cry the
  whole time and I felt a bit sort of self
  conscious about it..I mean even now I feel, if I
  take her out shopping and she started
  crying.this woman in a shopping queue said to me
  they hate shopping, and theyre so sort of
  accusing and I felt like saying well, I have to
  eat.. (Philippa)
• but it has taken 8 weeks to be confident to walk
  along with a pram with a screaming child
  (Abigail)
• I know Im a motherbut I dont quite feel like
  a mother yetI went to the shop once and she
  screamed the whole way round, then I did feel
  like a mother because all these old ladies were
  there and they were going that baby shouldnt be
  out, its too hot for that baby to be out I
  could hear them rabbitting on behind me. So then
  I did feel very much like a mothera dreadful
  mother (Gillian)

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Ive got one of those baby bags like youre
supposed to (Felicity)

• We had to go to the doctors and both of us went,
  Robert and I went with the baby and then I got a
  prescription. Robert went to get the
  prescription. I said Ill come home because the
  estimators were coming for the removals. And Id
  doneyou know Id got one of the changing bags
  like youre supposed to, taken a bottle of milk
  with us in case he got horrible, and he had in
  the doctors, and Robert had started to feed him
  and then wed left and he was quite happy. But I
  was coming home and he started to get hungry
  again and Robert had the bottle in his pocket and
  had gone off to the shop to get the prescription,
  so I had this screaming child in the middle of
  townit was hot.and I felt like shit and I
  couldnt walk very fast, and I had to virtually
  run from the middle of town to hereand you could
  hear everyone was (saying) poor child, whats
  that woman doing with that child. And I thought,
  I was convinced somebody was going to like stop
  me and say youve pinched that child, thats
  not your child, you arent a mother, you dont
  look like you can cope with him, this baby, you
  should be doing something to stop it crying

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New fathers going out with baby

• Because men have not been so closely associated
  with hands-on caring going out with the new baby
  does not present the same risks
• Men are positioned as unpractised and not
  expected to display natural instincts
  (almost) any performance is positively received

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Men taking baby out

• Yeah just being a whole part ofchanging the
  nappies, dressing and putting her into her buggy
  and taking her round the block a couple of times
  or whatever and then when you get all the friends
  and family and villagers (saying) oh lets have a
  look and stuff like that and it just kind of
  makes you stand up straight and think
  yeahthats my daughter (Resp 3)
• took them (twin sons) out in the pram one time
  and a woman walked past and looked and looked
  again oh twins and will suddenly talk to you.
  So its like one baby, thats interesting but
  two, wow! now thats a talking point (Resp 15)

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Concluding comments

• Preparing appropriately is highly gendered and
  experienced in the context of different
  discourses and moral frameworks
• Acquiring goods for the baby is one of the ways
  in which appropriate preparation can be
  demonstrated (the right way). This is a
  dominant theme in mens accounts of preparation
  and involvement
• Yet in the early weeks following the birth the
  acquired props can help to present a veneer of
  appropriate mothering but (for women)
  subjective experiences often feel very different
• Forays into public spheres with the new baby is
  experienced in very different ways by new mothers
  and new fathers one is expected to
  instinctively know how to mother, whilst any
  public display of involvement by new fathers is
  applauded
• Note These findings are explored further and
  theorised in the forthcoming text Miller, T.
  (2010) Making sense of fatherhood Men
  constructing and practising gender. Cambridge
  Cambridge University Press.

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Sources

• Bobel, Chris. (2002). The paradox of natural
  mothering. Philadelphia Temple University Press.
• Cosslett, Tess. (1994). Women and writing
  childbirth. Manchester, UK Manchester University
  Press.
• Doucet, A. (2006). Do Men Mother? Fathering, Care
  and Domestic Responsibility Toronto University
  of Toronto Press
• Hays, Sharon. (1996). The cultural contradictions
  of motherhood. New Haven, CTYale University
  Press.
• Hearn, J and Pringle, K (2006). European
  Perspectives on Men and Masculinities National
  and Transnational Approaches Basingstoke
  Palgrave Macmillan.
• Hobson, B. (2002). Making Men into Fathers Men,
  Masculinities and the Social Politics of
  Fatherhood. Cambridge Cambridge University Press
• Miller, T. (2005). Making sense of motherhood A
  narrative approach. Cambridge Cambridge
  University Press
• Miller, T. (2007). Is this what motherhood is
  all about? Weaving experiences and discourse
  through transition to first-time motherhood.
  Gender Society. 21 337-358
• Miller, T. (forthcoming) Making sense of
  fatherhood Men constructing and practising
  gender. Cambridge Cambridge University Press