Mothering Through Precarity: Women’s Work and Digital Media

Description

In Mothering through Precarity Julie A. Wilson and Emily Chivers Yochim explore how working- and middle-class mothers negotiate the difficulties of twenty-first-century mothering through their everyday engagement with digital media. From Facebook and Pinterest to couponing, health, and parenting websites, the women Wilson and Yochim study rely upon online resources and communities for material and emotional support. Feeling responsible for their family's economic security, these women often become "mamapreneurs," running side businesses out of their homes. They also feel the need to provide for their family's happiness, making successful mothering dependent upon economic and emotional labor. Questioning these standards of motherhood, Wilson and Yochim demonstrate that mothers' work is inseparable from digital media as it provides them the means for sustaining their families through such difficulties as health scares, underfunded schools, a weakening social safety net, and job losses. Julie A. Wilson is Assistant Professor of Communication Arts and Theatre at Allegheny College. Emily Chivers Yochim is Associate Professor of Communication Arts and Theatre at Allegheny College and the author of Skate Life: Re-Imagining White Masculinity. Cover......Page 1 Contents......Page 8 Acknowledgments......Page 10 Introduction. The Digital Mundane: Mothering, Media, and Precarity......Page 14 1. Mother Loads: Why “Good” Mothers Are Anxious......Page 44 2. Mamapreneurialism: Family Appreciation in the Digital Mundane......Page 78 3. Digital Entanglements: Staying Happy in the Mamasphere......Page 116 4. Individualized Solidarities: Privatizing Happiness Together......Page 150 Conclusion: Socializing Happiness (or, Why We Wrote an Unhappy Book)......Page 182 Afterword: Packets and Pockets......Page 198 Notes......Page 202 Bibliography......Page 218 D......Page 226 L......Page 227 P......Page 228 Z......Page 229