We found a match
Your institution may have access to this item. Find your institution then sign in to continue.
- Title
Determinants, Costs, and Meanings of Belgian Stay-at-Home Fathers: An International Comparison.
- Authors
Merla, Laura
- Abstract
Data gathered from 21 at-home fathers living in Belgium were analyzed and compared to results from research conducted in Australia, Sweden and the USA on fathers taking primary responsibility for childcare. The dynamic process of managing the tension between assigned norms and personal identity was studied through a comparative overview of how at-home fathers come to assume the primary responsibility of childcare, the norms they are confronted with in their daily interactions and the strategies used by these fathers to (re)construct a positive self-image. The fathers' increased involvement in childcare challenged masculine self-definitions and self-presentations in normative contexts where men's predominant involvement in paid work is privileged and childcare is largely defined as feminine. In response, Belgian fathers developed strategies and discourses that drew on a multiplicity of masculinities that appear in many cases to be both transgressive and yet complicit with hegemonic definitions of masculinity.
- Subjects
BELGIUM; HOUSEHUSBANDS; FATHERS; FATHERHOOD; FAMILY roles; SOCIAL structure
- Publication
Fathering: A Journal of Theory, Research & Practice about Men as Fathers, 2008, Vol 6, Issue 2, p113
- ISSN
1537-6680
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.3149/fth.0602.113