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- Title
Mothers, Fathers, and “Mathers”.
- Authors
Padavic, Irene; Butterfield, Jonniann
- Abstract
This article argues that to gain a more complete understanding of how lesbian families experience parenthood outside of the heterosexual context, scholars must consider how co-parents negotiate a parental identity, rather than presuming that women parents want to mother. Drawing on in-depth interviews with 17 women in a state that denies them parental legal rights, this article asks how a non—biologically related and non—legally related woman parent determines a parental identity in a social system that continually reminds her of her liminal position. Interviewees divided roughly evenly into the self-identified categories of “mother” and “father” and a collectively generated category of “mather,” a hybrid of the two words. The word mather served to anchor co-parents in otherwise uncertain seas, but the other groups felt their parental identity was significantly constrained by ill-fitting role expectations based on gender. We conclude by addressing the possibility for alternative family forms to transform the institution of gendered parenting.
- Subjects
UNITED States; MOTHERS; FATHERS; GAY fathers; LESBIAN mothers; LESBIAN families; GAY families; CO-parents; INTERVIEWING; SOCIAL systems; ADOPTION; GAY rights
- Publication
Gender & Society, 2011, Vol 25, Issue 2, p176
- ISSN
0891-2432
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1177/0891243211399278