Motherhood

1. According to Hays, in the Middle Ages, adults believe that children are demonic, animalistic, ill-formed and physically fragile. It is believed that “if they are left to their own devices, these demonic creatures would harm not only others by also themselves”. Therefore, adults during that time period did not do restrain them with anything, tight clothes, for example; and this will allow the children to grow properly. Adults also “administer[ed] opium to troublesome children and treatment through alchemy.”

In the 17^th and 18^th centuries, there was a change in the notion of appropriate mothering. During this period, the “innocence” of children emerged in a small segment of the population. The words “mama” and “papa” were more commonly used; mothers began breast-feeding their children; reputable people began boasting about their domestic virtues on their graves; and no more swaddling clothes. The children were also more protected from the “real world” and avoid them from becoming corrupted by removing servants from their homes. However, this change only happened in Europe, but not in New England. The people in New England believed that children should be molded by physical punishments, religious instructions and participation in work life and the goal is to “overcome the ‘sin nature’ of the child.” Mothers were guided by the Bible for childrearing.

Childrearing changed dramatically toward the end of the 19^th century. A mother has to be scientifically trained; her instincts, virtues and affection were no longer adequate for the upbringing of a child. Mothers not only have to be a good role model, but they have to be able to “keep abreast of the latest information on child development and to practice the methods experts suggested.” This led to an “era of strict scheduling, regularity, and letting the child ‘cry out loud’ than calming him with affectionate nurture.”

The last stage took place throughout the 19^th century and early 20^th centuries. Mothers emphasized the following: center around the good of the family and the good of the nation; “imprinting adult sensibilities on children from th emoment of birth; and the making of a proper adult that was understood as the basis for training the child.” This was known as the “permissive era” and was strongly believed that “the natural development of the child and the fulfillment of children’s desires are ends in themselevs and should be the fundamental basis of childrearing practices.”

2. The role of motherhood has traditionally been considered immateral and is equated with “doing nothing.” Many women can not work when they decided to become stay-home mothers and it becomes a handicap when they decide to look for a job later in life. The economists believe that the time mothers spent with their children is wasted; they do not believe that the skills required to raise a human being, the development of human character as well as the instillation of the desire and ability to learn are of any value.

Once women have children, they have no choice but to cut back on or to quit their jobs at inflexible workplaces. Additionally, marriage is stll not an equal financial partnership where in most families, “family income belongs soley to ‘he who earns it.” Therefore, if there is a divorce, the spouse who stayed home will be worse off financially than the spouse who devoted its life to a career. Lastly, “government social polices don’t even define unpaid care of family dependents as work.” For example, they can’t earn Social Security programs, but nannies do. As a result, motherhood is not very attractive, especially in the United States and is the “single biggest risk factor for poverty in old age.”

I believe that it takes a lot for a woman to drop her career and become a stay-home mother. Society seems to not favor this way, but I believe that it’s really a personal choice for the women. I personally would never want to become a stay-home mother; I would work less but not totally abandon my career. I guess as a woman who is college-educated, I’ve been taught and told many times that women should have their own careers. I also believe that women went through nine months of pain to give birth already, men should try to help out with caring the child. I believe that men and women should take care of the child equally and not have one spouse bear all the responsibility.

3. According to Collins, there are two types of mothering, which are the controlling type and the expressing type. The first type includes images of matriah, mammy and the welfare mother and they struggle to be good mothers. These mothers do not enjoy motherhood, because they find it burdensome, it stifles creativity, it exploits their labor and “makes them partners in their own oppression.” The latter type includes the mothers who can “express and learn the power of self-reliance, the importance of valuing and respecting ourselves, the necessity of self-reliance and independence, and a belief in Black women’s empowerment.” They believe that motherhood gave them self-actualization, status in the Black community and a catalyst for social activism.

4. Women as well as men oftentimes admit that they do not believe that bearing children while poor and unmarried is the ideal thing to do. Most women prefer to have children after they graduate from school and secure a job. However, most do not follow this ideal path due to their limited economic perspective – “the poor have little motivation to time their births as precisely as their middle-class counterparts do.” This segment of the population highly anticipates the coming of new children and do not regret their pregnancies at all. In fact, they believe that their children “saved” them and before their arrivals, their lives were out-of-control, having numerous fights with their families and peers. Most mothers become more responsible after the births of their children because they gave them “a compelling sense of purpose.” Additionally, around the birth of children, most parents shape their lives up for the sake of their children and they believe that they will eventually get married. However, very few couples actually marry. Poor women do not reject the notion of marriage, but they adore this notion because they believe that divorce is the worst thing that can happen to them, even worse than having a baby outside of marriage. Most poor women regain a sense of purpose even after the ill-timing of the births and became more responsible.

I believe that mothers who claim the births of the babies gave them a purpose to life and became more responsible are the worst mothers there can be. Why do they need a baby to tell them that they need to change the lifestyles they have right now? Why can’t they shape up themselves? Don’t they know that the babies deserve more and they are bringing them into a world that they made no efforts to improve? They just began another vicious cycle of pregnancy births and their babies will probably end up like their parents. I believe that parents who do not attempt to improve their lives will not be good parents. Many poor people blame the government, schools, and other people for their economic situations but it doesn’t seem like they even attempted to try to improve their situations. Most of them probably had the opportunity to graduate from school, go to college and find a job where they will earn more than a job if they don’t graduate from school.