Abstract
This chapter analyses how the myth of motherhood was construed and enforced on Romanian women in two recent epochs. While in the latter part of communism women were expected to be “mothers of the nation” and produce five or more children for the country and the party, due to an infamous decree passed in 1966, the postcommunist period saw the same pressure put on women to fulfill their “patriotic duty,” this time in the neoliberal logic and in congruence with the Western model. Women imagery is consistent with this role, and this chapter provides insights into how primary school textbooks, together with the main documents and legal initiatives of the two periods, impacted the social expectations of motherhood and affected the Romanian women.
TopPerfect Women, Perfect Mothers, Perfect Citizens
The myth of motherhood is a reality accepted as such in contemporary Western societies, and we can look at ways in which “the good mother” (Thurer, 1995; Nathman, 2013) or the “mommy myth” (Douglas & Michaels, 2005) were construed by patriarchy in order to condition and control women into fulfilling often impossible social standards. The ideal mother is culturally and historically specific and has been extensively promoted in the Western world, so that women feel compelled to shape themselves socially and personally primarily according to this construct.
In the Forward to The Good Mother Myth (2013), Christy Turlington describes the ideal of the Good Mother as “the insidious burden working against our empowerment and freedom” (p. x). In the same vein as Adrienne Rich, quoted above, she separates women’s capacity to create a solidarity network and empowerment through motherhood from the constraints imposed to them by patriarchy, in the form of a myth:
It’s a myth that is largely predicated on patriarchal constructs, one that creates false standards that sets women up for failure, not success, and for judgment instead of support. It is an attempt to disempower the experience of motherhood. It tells us we are not worthy of our power to create, and that we must conform to narrow ideals of what makes a mother “good”. (Turlington Burns, 2013, p. x)
Key Terms in this Chapter
Motherhood: A systematic way of controlling women’s reproduction, presented as the norm.
Mothering: The personal experience women have of motherhood and which has the potential to empower them.
Traditional Gender Roles: Set of behaviors which a society conceives men and women should typically have, for example, nurturing and caring for women and being ambitious, assertive, and competitive for men.
Gender Analysis: A social and economic analysis which considers the different roles that women and men play in society and the relationships between them, as well as their access to resources.
Empowerment: A process of increasing one’s self-esteem and autonomous action to control one’s life.
Reproductive Policies: A set of guidelines for the implementation of rights connected to the health of women: fertility, sexually transmitted infections, maternity, etc.
Patriarchy: A social system in which men hold the power and privilege and impose them on women.