Australian Mothering

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xxi

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2. Introducing and Analysing Maternal Studies

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 1-1

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   2. Contextualising Australian Mothering and Motherhood

      • Carla Pascoe Leahy, Petra Bueskens

      Pages 3-20

   3. Defining Maternal Studies in Australia: The Birth of a Field

      • Petra Bueskens, Carla Pascoe Leahy

      Pages 21-65

3. Constructing Mothers as Citizens, Workers and Wives

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 67-67

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   2. State Socialism for Australian Mothers: Andrew Fisher’s Radical Maternalism in Its International and Local Contexts

      • Marilyn Lake

      Pages 69-93

   3. Mothering Reshaped: Fertility Decline, ‘the Selfishness of Women’ and the Smaller Family

      • Alison Mackinnon

      Pages 95-110

   4. Imagined, Intended, Forsaken: The Status of the Mother in a Century of Australian Adoption Advertisements

      • Shurlee Swain

      Pages 111-126

   5. What Mary Bennett Knew: The Whispering in Her Heart

      • Anne Manne

      Pages 127-152

4. Remembering Families: Mothers, Fathers and Children

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 153-153

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   2. Mothers-in-Waiting: Maternographies of Pregnancy in Australia since 1945

      • Carla Pascoe Leahy

      Pages 155-177

   3. ‘The Most Radical, Most Exciting and Most Challenging Role of My Life’: Lesbian Motherhood in Australia 1945–1990

      • Rebecca Jennings

      Pages 179-200

   4. Historicising Domestic Violence in the Family: Pearlie McNeill and Jimmy Barnes Remember Their Mothers

      • Catherine Kevin

      Pages 201-218

   5. New Wave Fathers? Oral Histories with Australian Fathers from the 1970s to 1990s

      • Alistair Thomson

      Pages 219-235

5. The History and Politics of Childbirth and Breastfeeding

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 237-237

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   2. Violence and Trauma in Australian Birth

      • Paula A. Michaels, Elizabeth Sutton, Nicole Highet

      Pages 239-255

   3. Maternalism to Consumerism and Beyond? Mothers and the Politics of Care in Childbirth

      • Monica Campo, Kerreen Reiger

      Pages 257-278

   4. Breastfeeding Bodies and Choice in Late Capitalism

      • Alison Bartlett

      Pages 279-293

6. Becoming a Mother: Identity, Emotion and Time Use

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 295-295

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   2. Reflecting on the Past: The Role of Biographical, Familial and Social Memory in New Mothers’ Interpretations of Emotional Experiences in Early Parenthood

      • Kate Johnston-Ataata

      Pages 297-316

This collection defines the field of maternal studies in Australia for the first time. Leading motherhood researchers explore how mothering has evolved across Australian history as well as the joys and challenges of being a mother today. The contributors cover pregnancy, birth, relationships, childcare, domestic violence, time use, work, welfare, policy and psychology, from a diverse range of maternal perspectives. Utilising a matricentric feminist framework, Australian Mothering foregrounds the experiences, emotions and perspectives of mothers to better understand how Australian motherhood has developed historically and contemporaneously. Drawing upon their combined sociological and historical expertise, Bueskens and Pascoe Leahy have carefully curated a collection that presents compelling research on past and present perspectives on maternity in Australia, which will be relevant to researchers, advocates and policy makers interested in the changing role of mothers in Australian society.

• history
• family
• policy
• sociology
• identity
• social practice
• breastfeeding
• childbirth
• health
• LGBT

“This volume offers a kaleidoscope of case studies and debates that speak to the heart of mothering in Australia’s past and present. Taken together, the essays in Australian Mothering simultaneously describe a rich field of research dating to the 1960s and illustrate how much remains to be done. … Australian Mothering’s essays are beautifully – often creatively – expressed. The volume is testament to the quality of both Maternal Studies scholarship and its editors’ curation.” (Charlotte Greenhalgh, Australian Historical Studies, Vol. 53, June, 2022)

“An incisive and compelling study of Australian motherhood that discerningly examines it’s trajectories from Federation to contemporary times and perceptively explores its many permutations across diverse themes and perspectives. The collection meticulously takes up and engages with the key theories and topics in motherhood studies and astutely employs them to curate a rich compendium of Australian motherhood. The volume will guide Australian Motherhood Studies for years to come.” —Andrea O’Reilly, York University, Canada

"A wonderfully rich and important collection of scholarly perspectives on the experiences and meanings of motherhood in the Australian context. Petra Bueskens and Carla Pascoe Leahy have significantly broadened the field of maternal studies, insisting that ’the maternal’ is a political, historical and social term, one that tells us as much about colonial and domestic violence, fatherhood, migration, citizenship and the state, as it does about motherhood, care, and the female body. Essential reading for anyone interested in the politics of motherhood." —Lisa Baraitser, Birkbeck, University of London, UK

• University of Melbourne, Parkville, Australia

  Carla Pascoe Leahy, Petra Bueskens

Petra Bueskens is an Honorary Fellow in Sociology at the University of Melbourne, Australia, a psychotherapist in private practice, and a freelance columnist at New Matilda.


Carla Pascoe Leahy is an Australian Research Council DECRA Fellow at the University of Melbourne, Australia and an Honorary Associate at Museums Victoria.

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