Mothers' descriptions of their children in public interviews have changed a lot over the last 50 years. They are now described as talented, perfect, happy and spiritually fulfilling for mothers, where previously they were said to be independent and equality-minded. These are the findings of a new study by Auður Magndís Auðardóttir, lecturer at the School of Education, that were presented at the Menntakvika conference and Þjóðarspegill in October.
Auður's lecture at Menntakvika was entitled "Perfect and wonderful: Mothers' descriptions of their children in public interviews 1970-1979 compared to 2010-2019." Her data is based on the analysis of 130 interviews with mothers published in print media during these two periods.
"Motherhood has changed dramatically in recent decades. In the Nordic countries, most mothers now work full time and the female labour force participation rate in Iceland is among the highest in the world. At the same time, increasing demands are made of mothers as parents. They are expected to be like entrepreneurs, constantly thinking about how to maximise their child's attainment in all areas of life," explains Auður, who has been looking into the way our ideas about motherhood have changed over the past decades.
"There is a considerable amount of UK and US research showing that the demands we place on mothers have increased significantly over recent decades. Annadís Greta Rúdólfsdóttir, senior lecturer at the School of Education, and I wanted to see whether we could find evidence of similar ideas about motherhood here in Iceland. The method we chose was to analyse public discourse in the form of published media interviews with mothers over a long period.One of the things that drew my attention as I read the many hundreds of interviews I had collected was that not only our ideas about motherhood had changed, but also the way mothers described their children." Auður subsequently decided to conduct a study that focused on this aspect of the data. Her results have already been published in the European Journal of Cultural Studies.
The impact of intensive mothering and neoliberalism
Auður frames her analysis with scholarship on intensive mothering and the affective aspects of neoliberalism. The term 'intensive mothering' refers to the expectation that mothers should invest a significant amount of time, energy and money in rearing their children, an expectation that has been increasingly recognised by academics. "Research in other countries has shown that the media plays a huge role in presenting an unrealistic image of the perfect, happy mother – this image is also closely linked to middle-class, white, heterosexual and able-bodied ideals. Our culture and the ethos of intensive mothering put pressure on mothers to live up to this ideal, which is a completely unrealistic goal for most women," she explains.
Auður adds that neoliberalism, the dominant philosophy in Western societies, operates on the assumption that parents, especially mothers, weigh up and evaluate all potential choices when it comes to education, diet, extracurricular activities and other aspects of their children's lives, governed by capitalist perspectives. "This means that motherhood is now very complex and time-consuming. It is no longer enough to love your child and provide shelter and nutrition. This culture causes a lot of stress for parents, especially mothers."
Neoliberalism puts people under pressure to be the "best version of themselves" or "live their best lives" through personal choices, consumption, self-care and individual competitiveness. "This also involves adopting the right feelings, showing resilience in the face of adversity, and working towards happiness and positivity, while anger, emotional needs, tiredness and negativity are viewed as personal failures. People feel like they need to be happy, resilient and adaptable no matter how difficult or stressful their circumstances are."
According to Auður, less research has been conducted into the effect that intensive mothering and neoliberalism have on the way we view children and childhood and how those views have changed over the past 50 years. This study was an attempt to fill that gap.
"Motherhood has changed dramatically in recent decades. In the Nordic countries, most mothers now work full time and the female labour force participation rate in Iceland is among the highest in the world. At the same time, increasing demands are made of mothers as parents. They are expected to be like entrepreneurs, constantly thinking about how to maximise their child's attainment in all areas of life," explains Auður
Mothers' descriptions of their children have changed dramatically in 50 years
As explained above, this study was based on 130 interviews with mothers published in print media during two different periods, 1970-1979 and 2010-2019. "The way mothers describe their children has changed dramatically between these two periods. Descriptions in the 70s were rarer and shorter than in the 2010s, which is an interesting fact just by itself," she points out.
As she analysed her sources, Auður became aware of certain themes. In the earlier period, the theme she identified was independent and equality-minded children. "We can see the way in which descriptions of children reflect the fact that during this era, more and more women were going to university or out to work after having children. Society went through certain growing pains as a result, and there was considerable debate over whether or not these were positive changes. For example, the image emerged of the neglected latchkey kid coming back to an empty home after school, because the mother is at work. As a kind of retort to this, mothers often described their children as independent and equality-minded – meaning they would not be worse off because their mothers worked. On the contrary, they benefited from it, becoming more independent and equality-minded as a result," says Auður.
The child becomes the spiritual leader of the mother
For the later period, Auður identified three themes: the naturally talented child, the perfect and fun-loving child, and the child as the spiritual leader of the mother. "The children were very often described as talented, but generally not with reference to traditional schoolwork or extracurricular activities. Mothers instead talked about informal learning and creativity, especially that which took place through socialisation in the home. In line with the feeling-rules of neoliberalism, there is also a lot of emphasis on motherhood and childhood being suffused with a glow of happiness. The children are fun-loving and perfect. You don't see that kind of description in the earlier period," explains Auður.
With the theme of child as spiritual leader, children are described as teachers of the mother. "This is reminiscent of the feeling-rules of neoliberalism, with its emphasis on gratitude and spiritual awakening, which are the personal responsibility of the individual. This discourse leaves people poorly equipped to see systematic inequality and to recognise and process negative feelings. Children are burdened with the responsibility of teaching their parents," says Auður, stressing that with these descriptions of their children, the mothers are aligning themselves with the ethos of neoliberalism, which tells them to strive for perfection.
Auður says she was surprised to see such a dramatic change in the discourse between the two periods, which shows that in the latter era, society's focus on individualism, intensive mothering and competitiveness has affected the way we see children and childhood. "Children now seem to be a way for parents to achieve spiritual awakening, to the point of striving for a perfect family life where happiness and talent are on public display through media discourse," says Auður. She hopes that her findings will help people to better understand the parent-child relationship and how the zeitgeist affects communication within families and the demands we place on parents and children.
Auður presented her research in greater detail at the seminar "Mothers and fathers" at the Menntakvika conference at the beginning of October and at the Þjóðarspegill conference last week.