Book Announcement by Petra Beuskens (Australia)
Why do women in contemporary western societies experience contradiction between their autonomous and maternal selves? What are the origins of this contradiction and the associated ‘double shift’ that result in widespread calls to either ‘lean in’ or ‘opt out’? How are some mothers subverting these contradictions and finding meaningful ways of reconciling their autonomous and maternal selves?
In Modern Motherhood and Women’s Dual Identities, published by Routledge, Petra Bueskens argues that western modernization consigned women to the home and released them from it in historically unprecedented, yet interconnected, ways. Her groundbreaking formulation is that western women are free as ‘individuals’ yet constrained as mothers, with the twist that it is the former that produces the latter.
Drawing on political philosophy, feminist theory and sociology, Bueskens’ theoretical contribution consists of the identification and analysis of modern women’s duality, tracking the changing nature of discourses of women, freedom and motherhood across three centuries. While the current literature points to the pervasiveness of contradiction and double shifts for mothers, very little attention has been paid to how (some) women are subverting contradiction and ‘rewriting the sexual contract.’ Bridging this gap, Bueskens’ interviews ten ‘revolving mothers’ to reveal how periodic absence, exceeding the standard workday, disrupts the default position assigned to mothers in the home, and in turn disrupts the gendered dynamics of household work.
A provocative and original work, Modern Motherhood and Women’s Dual Identities will appeal to graduate students and researchers interested in fields such as Women and Gender Studies, Sociology of Motherhood and Social and Political Theory.
PART ONE: SETTING THE SCENE
CHAPTER 1: Introduction
CHAPTER 2: Methodology
PART TWO: PHILOSOPHICAL, HISTORICAL AND THEORETICAL CONTEXT
CHAPTER 3: The social and sexual contracts
CHAPTER 4: The invention of motherhood and the ‘new woman’: 1750-1920
CHAPTER 5: What is the new sexual contract?
PART THREE: EMPIRICAL RESEARCH
CHAPTER 6: Becoming a mother: or, revisiting the sexual contract
CHAPTER 7: Leaving the default position in the home
CHAPTER 8: Reconstructing the sexual contract
PART FOUR: CONCLUSION
CHAPTER 9: Concluding the contract: women in the twenty-first century
Dr Petra Bueskens is an Honorary Fellow in the School of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Melbourne, a psychotherapist in private practice and a freelance writer. She has published articles in New Matilda, The Huffington Post, The Conversation, Haaretz, Arena Magazine and OnLineOpinion. Her books include Mothering and Psychoanalysis (2014), Modern Motherhood and Women’s Dual Identities: Rewriting the Sexual Contract (2018) and the forthcoming co-edited books: Nancy Chodorow and The Reproduction of Mothering: 40 Years On (2019) and Mothering Australia (2019).
Petra Bueskens, PhD
School of Social and Political Sciences / Faculty of Arts
The University of Melbourne
Victoria, Australia
Email Petra Bueskens