Sociology: family, kinship and relationships Books

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Book Synopsis A Next Big Idea Club Winter 2021 Must ReadThe ability to connect with another person's physical and emotional state is one of the most elusive interpersonal skills to develop, but this book shows you just how approachable it can be. In our fast-paced, tech-obsessed lives, rarely do we pay genuine, close attention to one another. With all that’s going on in the world and the never-ending demands of our daily lives, most of us are too stressed and preoccupied to be able to really listen to each other. Often, we misunderstand or talk past each other. Many of us are left wishing that the people in our lives could really listen, understand, and genuinely connect with us.  Based on cutting-edge neuroscience research and years of clinical work, psychiatrist Edward Brodkin and therapist Ashley Pallathra take us on a wide-ranging and surprising journey through fields as diverse as social neuroscience and autism research, music performance, pro basketball, and tai chi. They use these stories to introduce the four pillars of human connection: Relaxed Awareness, Listening, Understanding, and Mutual Responsiveness. Accessible and engaging, Missing Each Other explains the science, research, and biology underlying these pillars of human connection and provides exercises through which readers can improve their own skills and abilities in each.

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Book SynopsisTechnology has changed the way we date—a single swipe gives new meaning to being rejected. But no matter what the advances—good and bad—the ritual is pretty much the same: meet, connect, and fall in love. And while a positive chemical reaction can boost your confidence, a series of bad dates can lead to depression, giving up, or remaining stuck in a negative dating cycle. Beloved, world-renowned sex therapist Dr. Ruth will finally take the drama out of dating. She will help you figure out how and where to find someone (a Tinder hookup is not a date!), get you mentally and physically ready for that anxious first meeting, and prepare you for ghosting and other twenty-first-century rebuffs. With her trademark insight and compassion, Dr. Ruth’s commonsense guide will improve your prospects and help you weather the challenges and recognize when it’s time to transition from just you to you two.

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Book SynopsisThe case was closed, but for journalist Nancy Rommelmann, the mystery remained: What made a mother want to murder her own children? On May 23, 2009, Amanda Stott-Smith drove to the middle of the Sellwood Bridge in Portland, Oregon, and dropped her two children into the Willamette River. Forty minutes later, rescuers found the body of four-year-old Eldon. Miraculously, his seven-year-old sister, Trinity, was saved. As the public cried out for blood, Amanda was arrested, convicted, and sentenced to thirty-five years in prison. Embarking on a seven-year quest for the truth, Rommelmann traced the roots of Amanda’s fury and desperation through thousands of pages of records, withheld documents, meetings with lawyers and convicts, and interviews with friends and family who felt shocked, confused, and emotionally swindled by a woman whose entire life was now defined by an unspeakable crime. At the heart of that crime: a tempestuous marriage, a family on the fast track to self-destruction, and a myriad of secrets and lies as dark and turbulent as the Willamette River.Trade Review“Rommelmann employs compassion and emotional honesty in her investigation to try to comprehend the motivations behind the crime and its aftermath.” —Publishers Weekly “A painstaking and meticulous exploration of all the facts and conjectures surrounding a disturbing case.” —Kirkus Reviews “[To the Bridge] is a remarkable work: not a whodunit but an inquiry into why. Rommelmann doesn’t find an easy solution, but neither does she settle for platitudes about the unknowability of the human heart.” —Willamette Week “A painstaking and meticulous exploration of all the facts and conjectures surrounding a disturbing case.” —Willamette Week “What is particularly engaging isn’t so much the crime but Rommelmann’s look at why Stott-Smith did what she did.” —Bustle “What is offered…is a chance to understand the why and a real examination of how we hold killers accountable, but not always all those responsible. True crime readers or anyone interested in compelling nonfiction will find this an interesting read leaving them with a lot to think about long after they finish the book.” —Independent Publisher “An emotionally honest, meticulous examination of a confluence of circumstances that culminated in a deadly act, and the complicity of our own city and culture in its aftermath.” —Portland Monthly “…Rommelmann’s research and attention to detail often lead her to write sentences that feel like literary short stories all on their own…The book does usefully complicate a story that seemed, on its face, uncomplicated or impenetrable to many, helpfully reminding us to resist jumping to conclusions, even when the villain seems easy to spot.” —The Stranger “In To the Bridge, Nancy Rommelmann takes what many consider the most unforgivable of crimes—a mother set on murdering her own children—and delivers something thoughtful and provocative: a deeply reported, sensitively told, all-too-relevant tragedy of addiction and codependency, toxic masculinity, and capricious justice. You won’t be able to look away—nor should any of us.” —Robert Kolker, New York Times bestselling author of Lost Girls: An Unsolved American Mystery “Rommelmann’s investigation…manages to be both a tonic meditation on the limits of knowledge and a bracing defense of its pursuit.” —Reason, “The Best of 2018” “How do you understand the not understandable and forgive the unforgivable? So asks one of the characters in this clear-eyed investigation into something we all turn away from. To the Bridge is a tour de force of both journalism and compassion, in the lineage of such masterpieces as In Cold Blood and The Executioner’s Song. Word by word, sentence by sentence, Rommelmann’s writing is that good. And so is her heart.” —Nick Flynn, PEN/Martha Albrand Award–winning author of Another Bullshit Night in Suck City

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Book SynopsisLooking for love isn't easy, and it's never what you expect. WHAT WE DO FOR LOVE is a reminder of how true that is. Unlucky in love herself, "Gingy" Beckerman shows us there is always reason to keep trying. "Recaptures in words and line drawings young love in all its glorious agony and possibility."--Glamour; "Charmingly written and illustrated . . . this savory little truffle turns out to be surprisingly poignant, laced with the bitter, the rueful, and the sweet." --Good Housekeeping; "This book would make a perfect gift from a woman to her best woman friend."--Chattanooga Free Press. A BOOK-OF-THE-MONTH CLUB selection.

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Book SynopsisThe fathers in this heartfelt book offer advice to their sons and daughters, remember their own fathers, and reflect on parenthood, marriage, and family life. These are universal words of wisdom that have been passed down through generations of fathers to their children and each page contains gems on fathers and fatherhood from famous Americans, accompanied by biographical and historical information with beautiful photographs and illustrations. This extensive collection includes such famous fathers as Thomas Jefferson, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Bob Dylan, Martin Luther King Jr., and Bill Cosby. Whether witty, wise, or nostalgic, the reflections in Father's Wisdom will be cherished by fathers and children alike.

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Book SynopsisEvery parent will tell you it is no easy task raising a child in today's society and many would love to have a manual available to look up a solution to the problems that arise each day. The 10 Steps to Almost Perfect Parenting offers a path that parents can take that will help guide them through the formative parenting years offering up the details of how to navigate through parenthood while preparing your childhood for adulthood. The book is composed of 10 chapters; each describing one of the steps in detail. The chapters are designed to be easy to read and filled with life experiences that a parent can relate to, making the reading pleasant and at times funny. Each of the steps has present day psychological research to validate its significance and meaning, ensuring the reader understands why each step is an important one to follow when raising a child. With each step comes an explanation as to how following the step will help avert the myriad of problems that will arise during childhood as well as detailing what type of problems will arise if the step is not followed.Reading this book will help parents guide their children into adulthood as more confident, self sufficient problem solvers who can take no for an answer, navigate through failures, follow rules when needed and end up as happier more successful adults!

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Book SynopsisKinship systems are the glue that holds social groups together. This volume presents a novel approach to understanding the genesis of these systems and how and why they change. The editors bring together experts from the disciplines of anthropology and linguistics to explore kinship in societies around the world and to reconstruct kinship in ancient times. Kinship Systems presents evidence of renewed activity and advances in this field in recent years which will contribute to the current interdisciplinary focus on the evolution of society. While all continents are touched on in this book, there is special emphasis on Australian indigenous societies, which have been a source of fascination in kinship studies. One key argument in the book is that linguistic evidence for reconstruction of ancient terminologies can provide strong independent evidence to complement anthropologists’ notions of structural kinship transformations, and ground them in actual historical and geographical contexts. There are principles that we all share, no matter what kind of society we live in, and these provide a common “language” for anthropology and linguistics. With this language we can accurately compare how family relations are organised in different societies, as well as how we talk about such relations. Because this concept has often been denied by the trajectories in anthropology over the last few decades, Kinship Systems represents a reassertion of, and advances on, classical kinship theory and methods. Innovations and interdisciplinary methods are described by the originators of the new approaches and other leading regional experts.Trade Review“A much-needed volume in the revival of kinship analysis and of great importance to all that specialize in this field. I was very impressed with the high level of scholarship.”—Bojka Milicic, coeditor of Kinship, Language, and Prehistory: Per Hage and the Renaissance in Kinship Studies (The University of Utah Press, 2010)Table of ContentsList of FiguresList of Tables1. Introduction: Kinship Change in Anthropology and Linguistics - Patrick McConvell2. Kinship Terms: Typology and History - David B. Kronenfeld3. Comparative Phylogenetic Methods and the Study of Pattern and Process in Kinship - Fiona Jordan4. Reconstructing the Proto-Polynesian Terminology: Kinship Terminologies as Evolving Logical Structures - Dwight Read5. On Husband-Borrowing: The Linguistic Reconstruction of Ancient Yukatekan Marriage Practices - Eve Danziger6. Kin Terminologies as Linguistic Imprints of Regional Processes: The Socio-ecological Contexts of Close versus Distant Marriage Patterns in Indigenous Amazonia - Alf Hornborg7. The Evolution of the Yolngu and Ngarinyin Kinship Terminologies: Models of Cumulative Transformations - Ian Keen8. The Reconstruction of Kinship Terminology in the Arandic Languages of Australia - Harold Koch9. Desertification of an Arandic Dialect - Barry Alpher10. Proto-Pama-Nyungan Kinship and the AUSTKIN Project: Reconstructing Terms for Proto-Mother’s Father and their Transformations - Patrick McConvell11. Mama and Papa in Indigenous Australia - Rachel Hendery and Patrick McConvell12. Comparing Recordings of Warumungu Kinship Systems - Jane SimpsonList of ContributorsIndex

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Book SynopsisWhy do we experience recurring struggles in our relationships? And why do traumatic events—such as a physical injury, emotional threat, loss of a loved one, or other life crisis—so often awaken or amplify our sense of fear, anger, isolation, or helplessness? From our earliest years, teaches Diane Poole Heller, we develop an attachment style that follows us through life, replaying in our intimate relationships, with our children, and at work. And traumatic events can deeply affect that core relational blueprint. With Healing Your Attachment Wounds, a pioneer in attachment theory and trauma resolution brings together these two fields to help us understand and benefit from their complementary principles and methods. This in-depth audio learning program sheds light on the three styles of insecure attachment—Avoidant, Ambivalent, and Disorganized—and the ideal fourth style of Secure attachment, where we enjoy a foundation of safety, adaptability, and intimacy with others. The good news is that we can change, regardless of our early or current life experiences. "As we heal and move toward Secure attachment," teaches Heller, "we become aware of triggers and patterns in our relationships. Our nervous system learns to be more regulated. Things don't throw us off so easily. And we open our capacity to love and experience greater compassion." Through key principles, examples, and practical exercises, this program invites you to begin your own healing journey toward healthy vulnerability, wholeness, and connection with others.

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Book SynopsisThis collection of papers from a project of the National Museum of Ethnology in Japan, unites anthropologists in an international collaborative effort to reexamine the dynamics of family, ethnicity, and the nation-state in China and in overseas Chinese society. Using ethnographic fieldwork, this book sheds light on the interactions between state, society, and identity through a variety of channels, such as family, lineage, kinship or quasi-kinship network, national frameworks such as religion association, Minority Autonomous Regions, and ethnic dress. This research demonstrates that even for the same cultural phenomenon, the discourses at the common, the elite, and the institutional levels will be adjusted based on the needs of the social context, market economy, and global networks.

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Book SynopsisAward-winning journalist Anjan Sundaram, hailed as “the Indian successor to Kapuscinski” (Basharat Peer) and praised for “remarkable” (Jon Stewart), “excellent” (Fareed Zakaria), and “courageous and heartfelt” (The Washington Post) work, must reckon with the devastating personal cost of war correspondence when he travels to the Central African Republic to report on preparations for a genocide hidden from the world, leaving his wife and newborn behind in CanadaAfter ten years of reporting from central Africa for The New York Times, Associated Press, and others, Anjan Sundaram finds himself living a quiet life in Shippagan, Canada, with his wife and newborn. But when word arrives of preparations for ethnic cleansing in the Central African Republic, he is suddenly torn between his duty as a husband and father, and his moral responsibility to report on a conflict unseen by the world.Soon he is traveling through the CAR, with a driver who may be a spy, bearing witness to ransacked villages and locals fleeing imminent massacre, fielding offers of mined gold and hearing stories of soldiers who steal schoolbooks for rolling paper. When he refuses to return home, journeying instead into a rebel stronghold, he learns that there is no going back to the life he left behind.Breakup illuminates the personal price that war correspondents pay as they bear witness on the frontlines of humanitarian crimes across the world. This brilliantly introspective, grounded account of one man’s inner turmoil in the context of a dangerous journey through a warzone is sure to become a modern classic.

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Book SynopsisOur Culture Magazine Best Book of 2023 “Rushton's work is generous, thoughtful, and honest, taking care neither to romanticize nor to disparage the choice to become a parent.” —Jenny Hamilton, Booklist (starred review)A bold feminist investigation into the mother of all questions; whether or not to become a parent in these turbulent times.Should we become parents? This timeless question forces us to reckon with who we are and what we love and fear most in ourselves, in our relationships, and in the world as it is now and as it will be.When Gina Rushton admitted she had little time left to make the decision for herself, the magnitude of the choice overwhelmed her. Her search for her own “yes” or “no” only uncovered more questions to be answered. How do we clearly consider creating a new life on a planet facing catastrophic climate change? How do we reassess the gender roles we have been assigned at birth and by society? How do we balance ascending careers with declining fertility? How do we know if we’ve found the right co-parent, or if we want to go it alone, or if we don’t want to do it at all?To seek clarity on these questions, Rushton spoke to doctors, sociologists, economists, and ethicists, as well as parents and childless people of all ages and from around the world. Here, she explores and presents policies, data, and case studies from people who have made this decision—one way or the other—and shows how the process can be revelatory in discovering who we are as individuals.Drawing on the depth of knowledge afforded by her body of work as an award-winning journalist on the abortion beat, Rushton wrote the book that she needed, and we all need, to stop a panicked internal monologue and start a genuine dialogue about what we want from our lives and why.Trade Review"Moving . . . Showing equal kindness and compassion."—Jessica Winter, The New Yorker“Rushton's work is generous, thoughtful, and honest, taking care neither to romanticize nor to disparage the choice to become a parent.”—Jenny Hamilton, Booklist (starred review)"Rushton is asking a question that is likely to resonate with anyone paying attention: "I want to know how people parent without living in permanent denial or perpetual dread." [ . . . ] The Parenthood Dilemma, in its inability (or perhaps refusal) to offer a black-and-white response to a complex, messy inquiry, may actually be an answer in and of itself, inviting insight, reflection, and comfort."—Kerry McHugh, Shelf Awareness"As a woman who struggled with whether or not to have a child, I appreciated Gina Rushton's The Parenthood Dilemma immensely. I loved the beautifully written introspection and the meticulous reporting around considerations like climate change, fertility, genes, and reproductive rights -- even as Rushton comes to understand that ‘no one is going to write the ending for me.’ I hate the term ‘must-read,’ but damn it, everyone considering having kids in this chaotic era should read this book." —Amber Sparks, author of And I Do Not Forgive You"Gina Rushton brings her forensic journalistic eye to the question of whether we choose to be a mother or not. This is an honest, compelling, well-researched book that makes a valuable contribution to the contemporary discussion about reproductive choices and rights in a nuanced and thoughtful way." —Dr. Pragya Agarwal, author of Sway and (M)otherhood"With a journalist’s doggedness, a philosopher’s scope, and a thirtysomething woman’s sense of a deadline looming, Gina Rushton rips back the sentimental gauze of motherhood to confront a question as urgent as it is unmentionable: Should I -- should anyone -- bring a child into a world on fire? For parents and non-parents alike, this book is a call to arms to build a fairer, freer, more sustainable, and more truly feminist future."—Joanna Scutts, author of Hotbed and The Extra Woman"A fiercely intelligent meditation on the decision to have a child, and an interrogation of all that modern motherhood entails."—Leah Hazard, author of Womb: The Inside Story of Where We All Began and Hard Pushed: A Midwife's Story"Gina Rushton reports unflinchingly from the disjunction between received wisdoms about motherhood and received realities that continue to constrict the choices of women of her generation. A significant and vital book; a must-read." —Sarah Krasnostein, author of The Believer"The Parenthood Dilemma changed the way I view my life, myself, and the way I relate to the world. I say that without exaggeration. This is a vital, necessary read not just for those considering parenthood but for anyone who wants to live a more conscious, compassionate life and to more deeply understand the relation between individual and community, human and climate, and between our present lives and the past and future."—Emma Bolden, author of The Tiger and the Cage: A Memoir of a Body in Crisis"A vigorous interrogation of one of the most significant decisions of our lives. Exceptionally clever, unfearing, and tender. An important addition to a growing body of contemporary literature that examines the intersection between our personal lives and global justice."—Alice Kinsella, author of Milk: On Motherhood and Madness"A smart and insightful exploration of parenthood – both personal and political – that’s sure to move, stir and inspire."—Chloë Ashby, author of Second Self and Wet Paint"A passionate and punchy exploration of modern parenthood, mixing memoir with journalism, the personal and the political. A propulsive and powerful read."—Sam Mills, author of Fragments of my Father and Chauvo-Feminism: On Sex, Power & #MeToo

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Book SynopsisThis reassuring and practical handbook helps women navigate the seismic changesin identity and emotionthat motherhood brings

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Book SynopsisContracting surrogate mothers is no longer marginal. Nor is it secret. Surrogacy is growing rapidly even though no informed debate on the social impacts of its normalization has been conducted. It is even regarded as socially progressive, while those who question it are considered to be opposed to progress. The 'surrogacy process' - commissioning a woman to bear and give birth to a child and then surrender it - is vitiated by its contractual nature, be it in its so-called altruistic form (i.e., no exchange of money) or the straight-forward commercial form. It is an attack on the human dignity and equal gender rights of surrogate mothers, but also a denial of the rights of the contracted child to come, who is so often forgotten in the 'process.' Current inconsistent or contradictory legislation has led to a fait accompli approach to the question. It's being done, so let's just regulate it, say its defenders. Other countries that have followed that logic have seen an increase in both demand for surrogates and recourse to shrewd international brokers. In many cases, international simply means the surrogate mother is from a poor country with lax legislation, the commissioning parents, from rich countries. By examining the 'surrogacy process' and all its implications, Maria De Koninck reaches the conclusion that the best way forward is an international ban on surrogacy.

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Book SynopsisMothers and mothering have been a long-time focus of research and study in various academic disciplines, and common topics of interest in mainstream press and popular culture, yet the experiences of mothers and mothering in the area of sport have been less explored. This innovative, interdisciplinary collection provides a space for exploration of the complex dimensions of intersections between mothers, mothering, and sport, as athletes, players, participants, parents, and discursive figures. Topics discussed are wide-ranging, from motherwork in sport, mothers as athletes, the athlete mother in sports, representations and expectations of motherhood and health, legal regulation of sports and parenting, as well as sexuality and gender in sports and gaming.Trade Review“There is no other text like it. The articles provide watershed feminist theorizing about the process and practices of mothering athletes from intersectional feminist perspectives from all over the world. There are no other anthologies that I know of that critique the world of sports for children with a focus on gender from a mother’s point of view or a theoretical grounding in intersectional feminism. The chapters in this book challenge cissexism, interphobia, racism, classism, hegemonic feminism, and mother blame. These critiques turn the heteronormative, masculinist, cisgender world of competitive sports on its head. The authors approach the world of youth sports teams and individual sports from a myriad of voices—relational voices, embodied voices, voices of mothers, and mothers who coach. They challenge and resist masculinist and misogynist views of sports.” PAIGE EDLEY, Communication Studies Professor, Loyola Marymount UniversityTable of ContentsIntroduction: This Volume – Theoretical Foundations and Contributions “We changed her nappies. We saw that she was a girl.” Caster Semenya’s Femininity and the Power of Maternal Testimony Celeste E. Orr and Amanda D. Watson “Swim Coaches and Mothers: Exploring Pedagogy Through Oral History” Kindell Foley Peters “Quit Calling My Kid, Yao Ming: Reflections of Race and Class from a Chinese Basketball Mom” Catherine Ma “Ecofeminism Meets the Team Mom: Eco-Momma as Cultural Change Broker” Pamela Morgan Redela “Concussions in Sport and Girls in Women’s Rugby: Effectively Resisting and Moving Beyond Confining Gender Norms and Mother-Blame: A Critical Discourse Analysis of the Rowan Stringer Case” Rebecca Jaremko Bromwich What Keeps Me Running: Horatio Algiers, The Albatross We Cannot Shed and Maternal Values in Motherhood and Sport Judy Battaglia Sports, Moms, School and Stress: My Story - Helaina Bromwich

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Book SynopsisTo be a young mother is almost by definition to be considered an “unfit” mother. Thus, it is not surprising that young Canadian, U.S. and Australian mothers are often scorned, stigmatized and monitored. This is a book about being young, being a mother, and grappling with what it means to inhabit these two complex social positions. This book critiques the dominant, negative construction of young motherhood. Contributors reject the notion that the “ideal” mother is a 30ish, white, middle-class, able-bodied, married, heterosexual woman situated in a nuclear family. This collection privileges the insights and stories of a diverse array of young mothers such as; a young mother coerced into giving her child up for a adoption, a young queer mother who has been parenting a child borne by her trans partner and who is now pregnant herself and many more. The tales analyzed and recounted in the collection record experiences of pain and joy, frustration and success, struggle and resistance, oppression and empowerment. We invite readers to hear the all too often silenced stories of young mothers, to learn what prevents and what allows these mothers to lead lives of grit, determination, authenticity, and agency as they strive to lovingly care for themselves, their children, and in many cases, other young mothers.Trade Review“Feminist Perspectives on Young Mothers and Young Mothering is a ground-breaking and insightful book that explores the unique experiences of young mothers as they navigate complex patriarchal social structures, ideologies of mothering, and challenging and diverse social locations and circumstances. This book provides invaluable insight into the multiple and varied ways that young mothers experience mothering based on intersections of gender, race, social class, and age. The authors effectively highlight the voices, experiences, and counter-narratives of young mothers who challenge stigmatizing generalizations about young mothers’ capabilities, underscoring the need for greater support and empowerment of young mothers and young mothering. The personal narratives of young mothers discussed in the chapters are significant, moving, and though-provoking. Academics, students, service providers, and the wider general public would benefit from reading this book as it provides a greater understanding of the experiences of young mothers and young mothering, which has been invisible for far too long.” -- Caroline McDonald-Harker, PhD, Sociologist and Associate Professor, Department of Sociology & Anthropology, Mount Royal University, Calgary, Alberta

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Book SynopsisMotherhood is one of those roles that assumes an almost-outsized cultural importance in the significance we force it to bear. It becomes both the source of and the repository for all kinds of cultural fears. Its ubiquity perhaps makes it this perfect foil. After all, while not everyone will become a mother, everyone has a mother. When we force motherhood to bear the terrors of what it means to be human, we inflict trauma upon those who mother. A long tradition of bad mothers thus shapes contemporary mothering practices (and the way we view them), including the murderous Medea of Greek mythology, the power-hungry Queen Gertrude of Hamlet, and the emasculating mother of Freud’s theories. Certainly, there are mother who cause harm, inflict abuse, act monstrously. Mothers are human. But mothers are also a favourite and easy scapegoat. The contributors to this collection explore a multitude of interdisciplinary representations of mothers that, through their very depictions of bad mothering, challenge the tropes of monstrous mothering that we lean on, revealing in the process why we turn to them. Chapters in Monstrous Mothers: Troubling Tropes explore literary, cinematic, and real-life monstrous mothers, seeking to uncover social sources and results of these monstrosities.Trade ReviewThis collection asks us to do a hard thing: to look at, not away, from the monstrous mother. In probing essays, the contributors and editors ask readers to consider what conditions create the monstrous mother, and if so-called monstrous mothers really are monstrous. Products of the patriarchal construction of motherhood, victims of neoliberal privileging of the individual over community (and lack of societal supports), as well as personal variables create the monstrous mother, and all such mothers in this collection are deserving of another look, and often, our empathy. An important collection for those who study mothers, and those who wish to see social growth and change in the promulgation of empowered mothering. - Nicole L. Willey, Professor of English, Kent State University // Monstrous Mothers: Troubling Tropes is a difficult read, but that is only because the authors in this edited volume challenge readers to hear the stories of mothers who have been deemed irredeemable, transgressive, incomprehensible--in short, monstrous. In each chapter the authors trouble this narrative as they expose readers to maternal violences of loss, abandonment, ambivalence, abuse, and murder in historical and contemporary texts and media. The deeper we engage these rich, diverse analyses the more we come to understand that the horror is not the monstrosity of the mothers, but their scapegoating as bad mothers. By showing us who the mothers are, by unpacking the context within which they have mothered, the authors in this volume ultimately expose the unsustainable, nay, monstrous lies we have been told about motherhood itself. - Michelle Hughes Miller, Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies, University of South Florida // Monstrous Mothers peers into the dark cavern of mothers who are too often shunned without exploration or nuance. - Katie B. Garner, Executive Director, IAMASTable of ContentsAcknowledgements Introduction: Abigail L. Palko Part I: Precarious Mothering Chapter 1: “Patchwork Girl – fractured maternal monsters” by Anitra Hunter Chapter 2: “Laura’s Story: Applying De-colonial Love to Indigenous Mothers of Missing Children” by Josephine Savarese Chapter 3: “‘Science Put Babies in My Belly’: Mothering and Monstrosity in Orphan Black” by Susan Harper and Jessica Guillon Chapter 4: “The Maternal Maleficent” by Abigail L. Palko Part II: Maternal Violence Chapter 5: “Central Intelligence and Maternal Mental Health: The Apparently Aberrant Bad Mother in Homeland” by Aidan Moir Chapter 6: “Karla Homolka, A Mom of Three” by Rebecca Bromwich Chapter 7: “‘A Victim Twice’: Maternal Violence in the Poetry of Ai” by Jessica Turcat Part III: Mothers Made Monstrous Chapter 8: “The Monstrosity of Maternal Abandonment in the Literature of Women Writers from the American South” by Jennifer Martin Chapter 9: “‘What is Incomprehensible’: The Myth of Maternal Omniscience and the Judgment of Maternal Culpability in Sue Klebold’s A Mother’s Reckoning and Monique Lépine’s Aftermath” by Andrea O’Reilly Chapter 10: “‘She laughed at anything’: The Portrayal of the Monstrous Maternal in Anna Burns’ No Bones” by Shamira Ransirini Chapter 11: “Monster Mothers and Mother Monsters from Dracula to Stranger Things” by Melissa Dinsman Coda: “A Trace of What It is Not: The Hauntings of the Monstrous Mother” by Andrea O’Reilly Notes on the Contributors

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Book SynopsisThere has been little research on the specific impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mothers and motherwork. This collection is the first to explore the impact of the pandemic on mothers’ care and wage labour in the context of employment, schooling, communities, families, and the relationships of parents and children. With a global perspective and from the standpoint of single, partnered, queer, racialized, Indigenous, economically disadvantaged, disabled, and birthing mothers, the volume examines the increasing complexity and demands of childcare, domestic labour, elder care, and home schooling under the pandemic protocols; the intricacies and difficulties of performing wage labour at home; the impact of the pandemic on mothers’ employment; and the strategies mothers have used to manage the competing demands of care and wage labour under COVID-19. By way of creative art, poetry, photography and creative writing along with scholarly research, the collection seeks to make visible what has been invisibilized and render audible what has been silenced: the care and crisis of motherwork through and after the COVID-19 pandemic.Table of ContentsAcknowledgements Introduction Andrea O’Reilly and Fiona Joy Green I: Chapters “Academic Mothers and COVID-19” Lynn O’Brien Hallstein and sara hayden “Motherhood and Academia in Mexican universities: Juggling our path through the COVID-19 lockdown” Lidia Ivonne Blasquez Lilu B and Lucia Montes “Indigenous Mothers and COVID-19” Mary Jane Logan McCallum and Jaime Cidro “Smudging My Home and Family: An Anishinaabeg Mother’s Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic” Renée E. Mazinegiizhigo-kwe Bédard “Mothers and Agile Work During the COVID 19 Pandemic - Doubling Up on the Double Shift” Rebecca Bromwich “The skewed gendered burden of the pandemic on South Asian Mothers” Saba Karim Khan “Shades of Grey: A Black, Single Mother’s Reflection on Love, Caretaking, and COVID” Haile Eshe Cole “Delivering during a Pandemic” Rachel E. Silverman “Knowing that I had choice empowered me: Preparing for and Experiencing Birth During a Pandemic.” Dr. Alys Einion “‘A mother’s duty’ during two pandemics – Australian mothers in 1919 and 2020” Dr. Belinda Robson “‘The Burden of Care’: Exploring the Gendered Impact(s) of COVID-19 on Mothers’ Caring Labour” Gillian Anderson and Sylvie Lafrenière “Workplace and Social Justice for Mothers Who Work in the Time of Coronavirus” Jennifer L. Borda “Your “only” is my everything – mothers of children with disabilities navigate through Covid-19 Kinga Pozniak “Mother’s perceptions of success and struggle during Covid-19 “ Molly Wiant Cummins and Grace Ellen Brannon “I thought I was getting better at being a good mother… but then all that changed”: Mothering during a Pandemic” Aleksandra Staneva “Life in Lockdown: Single Mothering during the COVID-19 Pandemic” Punam Mehta “Motherhood, e-working and conciliation: a utopia in the time of Covid” Ana Lucía Hernández Cordero “Futures for Ghosts: Using traditional feminized skill, while adapting to the unprecedented, for a future unknown” Hillary Di Menna “Parenting Journeys: Together and Apart” Natasha Steer Jen Vasic “The Invisible Frontline Workers: Narratives of Young Indian Mothers’ Experiences through the Pandemic” Dr. Ketoki Mazumdar “Digitally mediated motherhood during COVID-19” Kate Orton-Johnson. “A Single-parent, Multigenerational Family Testimony: Living under Covid-19 & other orders in Silicon Valley” Perlita R. Dicochea “Professional perceptions of women’s ways to deal with pregnancy and motherhood amidst the Brazilian COVID-19 pandemic chaos” Margareth Santos Zanchetta et. al. “The hill I chose to die on: a feminist autoethnographic account of mothering throughCOVID-19, unacknowledged mental illness and emotional abuse” Dr Lauren Hansen “Navigating the care deficit and mothering beyond monogamy in COVID-19” Stevie Lang Howson “The First “Successful” COVID-19 Birth in the World: Feminist Reflections on the Medical Model of Birth in an Epidemic” Holly Zwalf “Pandemic mothering, bilingualism, and family language policy: a discourse analysis of immigrant mothers’ narratives” Dr. Hakyoon Lee “What We Left Behind: Reflections on parenting Black children through a pandemic” Brooke Harris Garad “And then we went outside: A Black mothering lens on quarantine, health disparities and state violence” Zaje A. T. Harrell “Reflections on the everyday work of navigating COVID 19 Elizabeth Brulé “Aging Mothers: Dependent Adult Children with Intellectual Disabilities During Covid-19 Pandemic” Rhonda Petrella “Planet COVID: living through a panic-demic” Autistic Parenting under Covid-19” Pseudonym Mothers and the Gig Economy of Dance” Susie Burpee “Navigating Family and Work during the COVID-19 Pandemic: What does Media say about Working Mothers in Qatar?” Ghadir Fakhri Al Jayyousi-Alsalim “Cross-cultural Mothering Work during Pandemic Times” María José “Mothers as front line workers and Covid-19” Andrea O’Reilly II. POETRY “20/20 Vision” Maya Bhave “For the Lockdown Babies” Gráinne Evans “smothered” “Era Fever” Victoria Bailey “Outside” Elsje Fourie “Women’s Witness” Cali Prince III. ART “caring” “vital line” “Dear Josefine” “Shut up!” “Net is working” Barbara Philipp “Pierro. Prayers can’t kill COVID19” Helen Sargeant “Thank you Heroes” Dara Herman Zierlein “Context Collapse” El Putnam “COVID19” Catherine Moeller “No room for family COVID19 fatigue” Tracey Farrington and Fiona Joy Green

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Book SynopsisDuring the pandemic, the focus has been on how education and social interaction with peers were integral to children? s functioning. However, very little regard was given to another very important question- how do our children feel about the pandemic and how do they process this experience? Why is it assumed that cognitive functioning and social interaction are the most significant areas of child development? What emotional factors are at play? Are the children alright? How are their families coping and does this have an impact on the children? What I hope to achieve by compiling this edited collection is to bring awareness to the child? s perspective, within the family unit, in addition to addressing other contributing factors that had an impact on their coping mechanisms. This collection will hopefully inform whether the choices, that were made and should be made related to children, have been sound ones and perhaps should be re-examined as a result of this book? s findings, conclusions and speculations

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Book SynopsisThe surrogacy industry is worth an estimated 1 billion dollars a year, and many of its surrogates work in terrible conditions, while many gestate babies for no pay at all. Should it be illegal to pay someone to gestate a baby for you? Full Surrogacy Now brings a fresh and unique perspective to the debate. Rather than making surrogacy illegal or allowing it to continue as is, Sophie Lewis argues, we should be looking to radically transform it. Surrogates should be put front and centre, and their rights towards the babies they gestate should be expanded to acknowledge that they are more than mere vessels. In doing so, we can break down our assumptions that children necessarily belong to those whose genetics they share. This might sound like a radical proposal, she admits, but expanding our idea of who children belong to would be a good thing. Taking collective responsibility for children, rather than only caring for the ones we share DNA with, would radically transform notions of kinship. Adopting this expanded concept of surrogacy, helps us to see that it always, as the saying goes, takes a village to raise a child.Trade ReviewRooted in historical, site-based, narrative, and political accounts, Full Surrogacy Now is the seriously radical cry for full gestational justice that I long for. This kind of gestation depends on realizing the implications of knowing that we all actually, materially, make one another, and that this labor continues to be exploited, extracted, and alienated-unequally-at every turn in Capitalism and Patriarchy. Full of brilliant, generative, and also shamelessly biting critique of both bourgeois and communist tracts, feminist and otherwise, Lewis's voice is unique and bracing. I need it; it fills my whole self with reimagined possibilities for making oddkin who are not property. Lewis set out to write an immoderate, utopian, partisan, anti-authoritarian communist defense of surrogates and surrogacy in ramifying registers of meanings and practices, and she has succeeded. Lewis asks the necessary questions, "Can we parent politically, hopefully, nonreproductively- in a comradely way?" Can we become full surrogates for and with each other? In a book full of fierce demystifications and sharp dissections of injustice masquerading as humanitarianism, nonetheless Lewis convincingly and radically affirms: "Everywhere about me, I can see beautiful militants hell-bent on regeneration, not self-replication." -- Donna HarawayGiving birth is commonly called labor. What happens if all of human pregnancy and gestation is thought from the labor point of view? That's the challenge of Full Surrogacy Now. If it is all labor, then how can that labor be freed from now global regimes of colonial and commodity exploitation? Lewis takes one of the most everyday things about being human and thinks it through from the point of view of a cyborg communism. This book goes far into places where few gender abolitionists have ventured and brings us a vision of another life. -- McKenzie Wark, author of A Hacker ManifestoFull Surrogacy Now is more than an intervention, it is a landmark text of visionary feminist thinking. Sophie Lewis tears down decades of essentialist and contradictory presumptions on labor, motherhood and ownership to offer us the possibility of new ways to live with and for each other. This book is as breathtaking as it is necessary. -- Natasha LennardFull Surrogacy Now arrived and I could not stop reading. The crises of our time are crises of reproduction. Radical that she is, Sophie Lewis gets right to the root of the matter--and, radical that she is, finds its roots to be intersecting and entangled, "lovely, replicative, baroque", as one of her own gestators, Donna Haraway, might put it. But the gestator? Lewis moves expertly through decades of debates, as well as a rapidly growing body of empirical research, on surrogacy to carry us beyond the by-now familiar refrain that this or that activity "is work." Her goal could hardly be more ambitious: to rethink the "natural" gestation that every one of us comes from. I will reread this book for the sense it gives me that new ways of making one another and the world new might, in fact, be possible. Its verve and wit make me feel sure that Lewis' reproductive commune will be fun. -- Moira Weigel, author of Labor of Love: The Invention of DatingAn instructive and moving book about the work of babymaking and the best possible future for birthing and raising children. It offers both a convincing polemic about surrogacy's past and present, and a vision of how to make it both more common and more mutually beneficial. Lewis treats surrogacy as a signal example of what will be integral to any common human flourishing to come: unmaking gender and the family as we know them, to build new kinds of sociality and care for what is not "biologically" "ours." I was floored by it. -- Sarah Brouillette, author of Literature and the Creative EconomySophie Lewis is at the top of a new generation of scholars and activists thinking the transformation of gestational labor within contemporary pharmacopornographic capitalism. Neither simply natural nor banally cultural, gestation appears as the unthought core of gender and sexual politics, and the key of a forthcoming womb revolution: trans-Marx meets mammal's politics! -- Paul B. Preciado, author of Testo JunkiePregnancy. Babies. Families. Nature itself. Like capitalism, communism knows no bounds. Relentless in the task of seizing of the means of reproduction, Sophie Lewis is the Right's worst nightmare. * George Ciccariello-Maher, author of Building the Commune *Sophie Lewis and her expansive vision of feminism are desperately needed right now. She makes the work of undoing what "womanhood" has come to mean look possible and irresistible. -- Melissa Gira Grant, author of Playing the Whore: The Work of Sex WorkFull Surrogacy Now makes a significant contribution to the pressing political project of advocating for the rights of those workers whose labour is so often delegitimised, exploited and criminalised... join[ing] such texts as Juno Mac and Molly Smith's Revolting Prostitutesin combating the white, liberal, trans-exclusionary, whorephobic, 'feminist' discourse which is currently dominating conversations around sex work and gestational labour. * Vector *Lewis is attempting to do for pregnancy what the Wages for Housework movement did in reconceptualizing the unpaid labor done by women in the home as work. And recognizing surrogacy as work and surrogates as workers is a necessary first step, for if surrogacy is work, then isn't, by extension, every pregnancy? -- Esther Wang * Jezebel *The radical openness of these dreams is alluring ... [Full Surrogacy Now]leaves one with the beautiful, liquid possibility of a world that recognizes "our inextricably surrogated contamination with and by everybody else". * Times Literary Supplement *A thrilling new intervention ... by placing reproductive labour at the centre of her vision in Full Surrogacy Now, Lewis confronts a central issue that continues to be sidelined in the male-dominated field of futurism. * New Humanist *Theoretical, devious, a mix of manifesto and memoir. -- Jessica Weisberg * The New Yorker *Incisive and exciting...a must-read for those interested in queer feminist engagements with family, reproductive labour and global class relations. * LSE Review of Books *For a business that deals in common ingredients and a mature technology, surrogacy is curiously expensive... Nevertheless, the price tag remains high, as do the hoops to jump through, adding to already compelling human drama. Full Surrogacy Now is a prosurrogacy tract that finds plenty to fault in the current situation. -- Lela Edlund * Population and Development Review, Vol 46, No 3 *

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Book SynopsisIn this searching, elegant essay, critically acclaimed writer Katherine Angel examines the place of fathers in contemporary culture with her characteristic mix of boldness and nuance, asking how the mixture of love and hatred we feel towards our fathers-and patriarchal father figures-can be turned into a relationship that is generative rather than destructive.Moving deftly between psychoanalysis from Freud to Winnicott, cultural visions of fathering from King Lear to Ivanka Trump, and issues from incest to #MeToo, Angel probes the fraught bond of daughters and fathers, women and the patriarchal regime. What, she asks, is this discomfiting space of love and hate-and how are we to reckon with both fealty and rebellion?As in her earlier Tomorrow Sex Will Be Good Again, Angel proves herself yet again to be one of the most perceptive feminist writers at work today.Trade ReviewThis is a brave and brilliant book by one of the most insightful and articulate writers at work today. Katherine Angel is unafraid to look head on at the forgotten figure in feminism's critique of patriarchy: the father. All of us, daughters and sons, mothers and fathers, are enriched by confronting these libidinal energies, these daddy issues at the centre of all of our lives. -- Lauren Elkin, author of FlâneuseIn this impressive and intelligent examination of the father figure, Angel expertly intersects the subject with feminism, mythology, Donald Winnicott, Brett Kavanaugh and more. Her unstinting eye and intellectual vigour make Daddy Issues an engaging interrogation. It feels utterly vital in the context of #MeToo and the political flux the world currently finds itself in. -- Sinéad Gleeson, author of Constellations: Reflections from LifeEffortlessly moving from the novels of Virginia Woolf to the theories of psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott, Angel demonstrates a sharp intellectual acuity in her elucidation of the cultural mythos surrounding "daddies." The result is a valuable contribution to the feminist understanding of fatherhood. * Publishers Weekly *In this cheekily titled feminist analysis, author Katherine Angel dissects the patriarchy with a sharp combination of individual psychology and cultural critique. An exciting follow-up to Tomorrow Sex Will Be Good Again. -- Alison Foreman * AV Club *Katherine Angel's astute observations on the impact of the #MeToo movement, the retrenchment of feminism by younger women, and our current state of gender relations is compelling. -- Roberta E. Winter * New York Journal of Books *An examination of our often prurient fascination with the dynamic, and that fascination's inherent misogyny. [Angel's] thought-provoking approach is to argue that our society has overlooked the place of daddies in 'daddy issues.' To prove the point, she dexterously analyzes a variety of literary works, historical figures like Virginia Woolf's father, Leslie Stephen, and contemporary tabloid examples, like Meghan Markle and Ivanka Trump. -- Annie Hamilton * New York Times Book Review *

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Book SynopsisChildren need to learn how to get attention without hitting or whining, deal with feelings without blowing up or giving up, establish and respect boundaries, and solve problems. Using the STAR Parenting process, this book gives parents tools to teach and reinforce these social skills. It offers tools to reduce a parent's role as referee, gives immediate help with a process to handle any sibling conflict, offers easy to understand examples of real-life situations, and gives parents insight into ways they may be encouraging the quarrelling they hate.

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Book SynopsisThe Ship of Birth records a father's responses in the days immediately before and after a child is born. Just as material significant to the dead is placed in a Ship of Death, so this Ship of Birth contains what is significant to the child: the parents' wonder and trepidation, the nature of the soul, the child's future growth. The poems draw on a rich inheritance from the worlds that Delanty moves among: Ireland and America, Gaelic and English, traditional verse forms and modern colloquial, to evoke the subtle interconnections of past, and future, people and places. Greg Delanty acknowledges the dark and difficult world that the child is entering, while affirming the sustaining continuity of life.

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Book SynopsisRecovering Origins is a healing program offered to adult children of divorced parents who now, with a certain distance from the practical difficulties that burden younger children, wrestle with the core problem at the heart of those difficulties. Having lost the community that brought them into the world, they have suffered a "primal loss." Children are the literal embodiment of that community. When it is voluntarily dismantled, and worse–wished never to have been–the effect is not negligible. Children of divorce, by their own description, are now "pulled apart" as if "between two worlds." They are "torn asunder."Paradoxically the idea for Recovering Origins was occasioned by this straight talk about divorce. For, by going to the depths of the loss of one's primal community one can be opened up to the Community that stands at the root of it. "Deep calls unto deep," as the Psalmist says. In short, Recovering Origins invites participants to move through the broken image of love that they see in their parents, to the loving Origin which is more fundamental than any human reflection of it, broken or not.Recovering Origins begins with an invitation to look honestly at the actual experience of divorce, beyond all the "happy talk" about the "good divorce." Participants are then invited to follow the path of the Lord's Prayer, to recover what is at once challenging and precious to those whose very identities are on uncertain ground: the memory of God the Father, the goodness of their lives, and the real possibility of a good future. In this way, the program offers adult children of divorce a path to healing in the deepest sense.Recovering Origins offers an occasion to encounter the Christian Faith more deeply, especially where it bears on fundamental question faced by children of divorce in a particularly dramatic way. Recovering Origins addresses adult children of divorce, then, not only as individuals in need of pastoral care, but as potential witnesses to something they can, perhaps, see more clearly: the goodness and fidelity of the One on whom their lives ultimately depend and the possibility (and need) that that be reflected in an irrevocable and fruitful love between the creatures made in his image.

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Book Synopsis

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