Publication details
Arguing for Motherhood: the Role of Desire in the Re-production of Gender Subjectivity.
| Authors | |
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| Year of publication | 2007 |
| Type | Chapter of a book |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Description | In accordance with poststructuralist concerns with the processes of subjectification, the paper addresses the relationship between the meanings of motherhood and the desired subject positions. The aim is to understand the processes of the gender subjectivity re-production in the current context of proliferation of discursive practices and meanings. Based on the discourse analysis of interviews with three young Czech women, it firstly demonstrates the variability of employed meanings of motherhood, both within the same interview and after a one year period, and simultaneously the persisting relevance of motherhood to the subjectivity of the interviewed people. The author then employs the concept of desire as an analytical tool to understand why a specific construction of motherhood is or is not relevant to the particular individuals. On that ground, the delimited meanings of motherhood are compared with desires of the interviewed people as revealed in their fantasies. Whether specific desires support or challenge the longing for motherhood and/or the re-production of gender dichotomy is considered. Finally, the relevance of the concept of generation to the present analysis is discussed, primarily in respect to the plurality of the accounts of motherhood. An uneasy coalition between the concept of generation and discourse analysis is commented. |