Constructing the (M)other

Narratives of Disability, Motherhood, and the Politics of Normal

By: Susan L. Gabel, Scot Danforth, Priya Lalvani (Editor)

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Paperback | 22 October 2019

At a Glance

Paperback
266 Pages

Edition Type
New edition

Dimensions(cm)
22.86 x 15.24 x 1.42

Paperback

$54.99

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Constructing the (M)other is a collection of personal narratives about motherhood in the context of a society in which disability holds a stigmatized position. From multiple vantage points, these autoethnographies reveal how ableist beliefs about disability are institutionally upheld and reified. Collectively they seek to call attention to a patriarchal surveillance of mothering, challenge the trope of the good mother, and dismantle the constructed hierarchy of acceptable children. The stories contained in this volume are counter-narratives of resistance—they are the devices through which mothers push back. Rejecting notions of the otherness of their children, in these essays, mothers negotiate their identities and claim access to the category of normative motherhood. Readers are likely to experience dissonance, have their assumptions about disability challenged, and find their parameters of normalcy transformed.

Industry Reviews

"Priya Lalvani has curated a gift-a critical carnival of stories. In Constructing the (M)other we meet women weaving lives that blend joy and imagination, battling the ideological syrup of pity/grief/loss, seeking spaces for full recognition of complex, gorgeous, and sometimes struggling children, in a society drunk on fantasies of normal. Lalvani is a brilliant writer who holds together this book where soul-ful and truths-ful women across race/ethnicity/class/language/education/nations, and children with a sparkling range of abilities and needs, animate the pages. This volume is a mirror, a speak back, truth in a post-truth society, a protest, and a celebration. Grab a glass of wine and climb in. I promise you won't want to leave until you get to the most delicious epilogue, that lingers in every cell of my body."-Michelle Fine, Distinguished Professor of Critical Psychology, Gender/Women's Studies and Urban Education, The Graduate Center, CUNY

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