The More Things Change⦠the More We Need Child Care
PART V – FAMILIES Chapter 18 – The More Things Change… the More We Need Child Care: On the Fortieth Anniversary of the Report on the Royal Commission on the Status of Women -
-
-
The creation of a national child care program is a step toward gender equality (for all women, not just the poor) o UNICEF ranked Canada at the very bottom of the 25 developed countries that were compared o While Canada as a whole falls short in the quality, access, financing, and policies of early childhood education, individual provinces have been attempting to improve access and quality at the provincial level Quebec brought in a publicly funded ($7-a day child care) early childhood education program, full-day kindergarten, and low-fee after-school day care spaces for all families with school-aged children o High-quality, affordable child care remains out of reach for many Canadians Four principles of the Royal Commission o Women should be free to choose whether or not to take employment outside their homes o Child care is a responsibility shared by the mother, the father, and society o Society has a responsibility for women because of pregnancy and child birth, and special treatment related to maternity will always be necessary o In certain areas, women will for an interim time require special treatment to overcome adverse effects of discriminatory practices Albanese’s position o Rapid social and economic changes means that more women with young children have to enter the labour force, while nothing about child care has been done to facilitate the changes o Many of the recommendations by the Royal commission have never been put into action Women are not free to choose whether or not to take employment outside their homes Women are not given special treatment Children and child care are treated as private matters and individual lifestyle choices Children are not socially valued Mothers bear the weight of social reproduction
Chapter 19 – Keeping the Family Intact: The Lived Experience of Sheltered Homeless Families -
-
The experience of homeless families living in the shelter (EFS) by collecting ethnography data relying on participant observation and in-depth interviews with shelter guests, staff, and board members The social organization of the shelter (policies, rules, practices) in helping the lived experience of homeless families The families are unable to maintain housing because of high rents and shortage of affordable housing o Most did not go to the shelter directly after losing their home (e.g., utilized other resources) o Most turned to the shelter for accommodation as a last resort There are negative aspects of shelter life (e.g., no privacy, struggle with interpersonal relationships and family dynamics) o Most people are thankful for having their partner’s support Shelters may serve to keep families together that otherwise might have separated, and it may cause tensions that break apart families that otherwise might have stayed together
Chapter 20 – Love and Arranged Marriage in India Today: Negotiating Adulthood -
-
Indian society has maintained the tradition of arranged marriages Two opposing hypotheses o Modernization theory predicts the collapse of the arranged system and its replacement with Western-style individual choice (e.g., individualism, romantic love) o Neo-traditionalism predicts that Indian youth will see individualism as destructive of Indian family and religion, and thus strengthen the arranged marriage system Research is based on open-ended interviews o Arrangements have evolved into a system of introductions First, parents pre-approve potential partners Parental criteria is based on education, income (of the man), religion, caste, and reputation Parents reserve the right to terminate any relationship of which they disapprove Then, parents formally introduce the young people The potential bride or groom can veto someone at the start or can hold several subsequent private sessions, which are more like interviews than dates
o
o
o o
o
o
o
The pair are expected to announce their engagement after six weeks During the engagement period, the couple is allowed to go out together frequently but is expected to refrain from sexual activity There is a competing underground system of romantic relationships (e.g., meet at college or work) Mostly not acceptable in Indian culture (e.g., incompatibility of the partner’s family, boy was too young and without a stable job, reasons internal to the couple) Although a self-chosen marriage provide more equality and intimacy, parental introduction guaranteed similarity of backgrounds and ongoing parental support The predictions of modernization have been realized Parents still play a decisive role, but they put more emphasis on achieved characteristics Arranged marriage has evolved to allow more input from youth There exists a parallel system of dating The predictions of neo-traditionalism are present to a lesser extent Horoscopes, premarital virginity, and the requirement of parental support remain important Most young people are living within the intersections of the familial and the individualistic systems Self-arranged marriage is when a young person accepts the rules and values of an arrangement, but manages to control the procedure Love-cum-arranged marriage is widely considered It includes the emotional high of falling in love, continues into an extended period of getting to know each other, and concludes with the winning of parental support Decisions about marriage are made in the context of changes in the pace and pattern of growing up The desire for a greater share in the marriage decision is a growing demand for more equality Young women want the rights to continue their careers, to have small number of children, and to maintain responsibility for their own parents after marriage Young men want more freedom of sexual expression before and during marriage They will use their voices not as selfish individualists but as responsible members of a family unit They will listen to their parents They want their parents to listen to them They want to be treated as full adults Love is considered a romantic passion and quiet trust They hope to create an intimate space where emotion, sexuality, ideas, and needs, could be expressed This conjugal relationship is problematic in India because it is not a major goal of patrilocal multigenerational family They want a partner who is caring, understanding, honest, and respectful The tone expressed by Indian youth about marriage is one of conscious attention to their own needs and empathy for those of their parents They want to renovate their home to accommodate modern requirements They want freer communication between generations, based on respect and trust They want assured space for intimacy between marriage partners
Chapter 21 – Gender Equality and Gender Differences: Parenting, Habitus, and Embodiment -
On the one hand, feminists argue that gender should not matter in parenting o This is grounded in equality feminism and liberal feminism On the other hand, feminists and fathers’ rights groups argue that men do not mother o Gender differences in parenting is theoretically informed by difference feminism Research on men as primary caregivers o When men take on most of the family care giving responsibilities, they are said to be mothering o Maternal demands include preservation, growth, and social acceptability o Maternal responsibility include emotional, community, and moral Emotional responsibility You have to have knowledge about others to care others, which is acquired through attentiveness to the needs of others Three forms for men to connect with their children o Play o Going out every day, doing a lot of physical activities, and being involved in sports o Promote their children’s independence Community responsibility
-
-
You need to social network, coordinate, balance, and negotiate with others who are involved in your children’s lives Three ways for fathers to create and maintain community networks o Talk to other parents as they stand in sites where children cluster o Connect with other stay-at-home mothers o Network around their children’s sports Moral responsibility You are always actively working out your own course of action with reference to other people Fathers are being judged on their earning capacity Fathers are negatively judged as carers (e.g., community centres, schoolyards, girls’ sleepovers) o You have to be very careful around preteen and teenage girls o Reasons for gendered divisions in parental responsibilities include hegemonic responsibilities, embodiment, material gatekeeping, gendered friendship patterns, habitus, and gender ideologies Habitus is having “grown up as a boy” or “grown up as a girl” Fathers tend to exhibit masculine qualities in their parenting approach (e.g., risk-taking) Mothers tend to exhibit feminine qualities in their parenting approach (e.g., cautious) Gendered socialization is becoming deeply ingrained so that they become almost automatic o Gendered habitus is informed by deeply ingrained assumptions about women as primary caregivers and men as secondary caregivers Embodiment differences in parenting are by different social perceptions of fathers’ and mothers’ acceptable physicality with children (e.g., kissing, hugging) When fathers are primary caregivers, gendered embodiment can be largely negligible However, embodiment of fathers depends on time and social spaces Five concluding points o The issue of responsibility is where gender differences persist in parenting o The assumption that gender differences are bad features in domestic life may need to be re-examined o Fathers’ narratives through a maternal lens means that paternal forms of parenting are ignored and obscured o The differences between parental responsibilities also vary across class, ethnicity, and sexuality o While it is useful to differentiate between mothering and fathering, they recur at the level of community and interhousehold practices as embodied identities, and within social relations and discourses Main conclusion on gender equality and gender differences in parenting o Rather than using a maternal lens and comparing fathers to mothers, we need new ways to theorize about fathers’ st approaches to parenting and how they are reinventing what it means to be a man and a father in the 21 century
-
-
The creation of a national child care program is a step toward gender equality (for all women, not just the poor) o UNICEF ranked Canada at the very bottom of the 25 developed countries that were compared o While Canada as a whole falls short in the quality, access, financing, and policies of early childhood education, individual provinces have been attempting to improve access and quality at the provincial level Quebec brought in a publicly funded ($7-a day child care) early childhood education program, full-day kindergarten, and low-fee after-school day care spaces for all families with school-aged children o High-quality, affordable child care remains out of reach for many Canadians Four principles of the Royal Commission o Women should be free to choose whether or not to take employment outside their homes o Child care is a responsibility shared by the mother, the father, and society o Society has a responsibility for women because of pregnancy and child birth, and special treatment related to maternity will always be necessary o In certain areas, women will for an interim time require special treatment to overcome adverse effects of discriminatory practices Albanese’s position o Rapid social and economic changes means that more women with young children have to enter the labour force, while nothing about child care has been done to facilitate the changes o Many of the recommendations by the Royal commission have never been put into action Women are not free to choose whether or not to take employment outside their homes Women are not given special treatment Children and child care are treated as private matters and individual lifestyle choices Children are not socially valued Mothers bear the weight of social reproduction
Chapter 19 – Keeping the Family Intact: The Lived Experience of Sheltered Homeless Families -
-
The experience of homeless families living in the shelter (EFS) by collecting ethnography data relying on participant observation and in-depth interviews with shelter guests, staff, and board members The social organization of the shelter (policies, rules, practices) in helping the lived experience of homeless families The families are unable to maintain housing because of high rents and shortage of affordable housing o Most did not go to the shelter directly after losing their home (e.g., utilized other resources) o Most turned to the shelter for accommodation as a last resort There are negative aspects of shelter life (e.g., no privacy, struggle with interpersonal relationships and family dynamics) o Most people are thankful for having their partner’s support Shelters may serve to keep families together that otherwise might have separated, and it may cause tensions that break apart families that otherwise might have stayed together
Chapter 20 – Love and Arranged Marriage in India Today: Negotiating Adulthood -
-
Indian society has maintained the tradition of arranged marriages Two opposing hypotheses o Modernization theory predicts the collapse of the arranged system and its replacement with Western-style individual choice (e.g., individualism, romantic love) o Neo-traditionalism predicts that Indian youth will see individualism as destructive of Indian family and religion, and thus strengthen the arranged marriage system Research is based on open-ended interviews o Arrangements have evolved into a system of introductions First, parents pre-approve potential partners Parental criteria is based on education, income (of the man), religion, caste, and reputation Parents reserve the right to terminate any relationship of which they disapprove Then, parents formally introduce the young people The potential bride or groom can veto someone at the start or can hold several subsequent private sessions, which are more like interviews than dates
o
o
o o
o
o
o
The pair are expected to announce their engagement after six weeks During the engagement period, the couple is allowed to go out together frequently but is expected to refrain from sexual activity There is a competing underground system of romantic relationships (e.g., meet at college or work) Mostly not acceptable in Indian culture (e.g., incompatibility of the partner’s family, boy was too young and without a stable job, reasons internal to the couple) Although a self-chosen marriage provide more equality and intimacy, parental introduction guaranteed similarity of backgrounds and ongoing parental support The predictions of modernization have been realized Parents still play a decisive role, but they put more emphasis on achieved characteristics Arranged marriage has evolved to allow more input from youth There exists a parallel system of dating The predictions of neo-traditionalism are present to a lesser extent Horoscopes, premarital virginity, and the requirement of parental support remain important Most young people are living within the intersections of the familial and the individualistic systems Self-arranged marriage is when a young person accepts the rules and values of an arrangement, but manages to control the procedure Love-cum-arranged marriage is widely considered It includes the emotional high of falling in love, continues into an extended period of getting to know each other, and concludes with the winning of parental support Decisions about marriage are made in the context of changes in the pace and pattern of growing up The desire for a greater share in the marriage decision is a growing demand for more equality Young women want the rights to continue their careers, to have small number of children, and to maintain responsibility for their own parents after marriage Young men want more freedom of sexual expression before and during marriage They will use their voices not as selfish individualists but as responsible members of a family unit They will listen to their parents They want their parents to listen to them They want to be treated as full adults Love is considered a romantic passion and quiet trust They hope to create an intimate space where emotion, sexuality, ideas, and needs, could be expressed This conjugal relationship is problematic in India because it is not a major goal of patrilocal multigenerational family They want a partner who is caring, understanding, honest, and respectful The tone expressed by Indian youth about marriage is one of conscious attention to their own needs and empathy for those of their parents They want to renovate their home to accommodate modern requirements They want freer communication between generations, based on respect and trust They want assured space for intimacy between marriage partners
Chapter 21 – Gender Equality and Gender Differences: Parenting, Habitus, and Embodiment -
On the one hand, feminists argue that gender should not matter in parenting o This is grounded in equality feminism and liberal feminism On the other hand, feminists and fathers’ rights groups argue that men do not mother o Gender differences in parenting is theoretically informed by difference feminism Research on men as primary caregivers o When men take on most of the family care giving responsibilities, they are said to be mothering o Maternal demands include preservation, growth, and social acceptability o Maternal responsibility include emotional, community, and moral Emotional responsibility You have to have knowledge about others to care others, which is acquired through attentiveness to the needs of others Three forms for men to connect with their children o Play o Going out every day, doing a lot of physical activities, and being involved in sports o Promote their children’s independence Community responsibility
-
-
You need to social network, coordinate, balance, and negotiate with others who are involved in your children’s lives Three ways for fathers to create and maintain community networks o Talk to other parents as they stand in sites where children cluster o Connect with other stay-at-home mothers o Network around their children’s sports Moral responsibility You are always actively working out your own course of action with reference to other people Fathers are being judged on their earning capacity Fathers are negatively judged as carers (e.g., community centres, schoolyards, girls’ sleepovers) o You have to be very careful around preteen and teenage girls o Reasons for gendered divisions in parental responsibilities include hegemonic responsibilities, embodiment, material gatekeeping, gendered friendship patterns, habitus, and gender ideologies Habitus is having “grown up as a boy” or “grown up as a girl” Fathers tend to exhibit masculine qualities in their parenting approach (e.g., risk-taking) Mothers tend to exhibit feminine qualities in their parenting approach (e.g., cautious) Gendered socialization is becoming deeply ingrained so that they become almost automatic o Gendered habitus is informed by deeply ingrained assumptions about women as primary caregivers and men as secondary caregivers Embodiment differences in parenting are by different social perceptions of fathers’ and mothers’ acceptable physicality with children (e.g., kissing, hugging) When fathers are primary caregivers, gendered embodiment can be largely negligible However, embodiment of fathers depends on time and social spaces Five concluding points o The issue of responsibility is where gender differences persist in parenting o The assumption that gender differences are bad features in domestic life may need to be re-examined o Fathers’ narratives through a maternal lens means that paternal forms of parenting are ignored and obscured o The differences between parental responsibilities also vary across class, ethnicity, and sexuality o While it is useful to differentiate between mothering and fathering, they recur at the level of community and interhousehold practices as embodied identities, and within social relations and discourses Main conclusion on gender equality and gender differences in parenting o Rather than using a maternal lens and comparing fathers to mothers, we need new ways to theorize about fathers’ st approaches to parenting and how they are reinventing what it means to be a man and a father in the 21 century
