Weaving Work And Motherhood

Emanating from a thesis, presents the outcome of interviews carried out in 1991-92 among women working in a private hospital in California. Covers the effects of night, shift and part-time work on child rearing and family life.

This examination of the extraordinary juggling skills of working women who balance obligations to work & family goes beyond description of possible conflicts of interest to seek an understanding of the decision-making process through which they accomplish this balancing.

A man, a woman, and their biological children, all of the same race, the mythical "nuclear family" has been the bedrock of American cultural, religious, social, and economic life since the Revolutionary War, and even with all the changes we have absorbed in the last sixty years, it essentially remains so. Current trends in adoption, however, have begun to shift the dominant paradigm of the family in ways never before imagined. Professional estimates show that in the United States today, seven million families have been formed by adoption, and 700,000 of them are interracial. These still-growing numbers have begun to radically change the face of the traditional American family. Barbara Katz Rothman, a noted sociologist who has explored motherhood in four previous books and has more recently explored the social implications of the human genome project, now turns her eye toward race and family. Weaving together the sociological, the historical, and the personal, Barbara Katz Rothman looks at the contemporary American family through the lens of race, race through the lens of adoption, and all-family, race, and adoption-within the context of the changing meanings of motherhood. She asks urgent and provocative questions about children as commodities, about "trophy" children, about the impact of genetics, and about how these adopted children will find their racial, ethnic, or cultural identities Drawing on her own experience as the white mother of a black child, on historical research on white people raising black children from slavery to contemporary times, and pulling together work on race, adoption, and consumption, Rothman offers us new insights for understanding the way that race and family are shaped in America today. This book is compelling reading, not only for those interested in family and society, but for anyone grappling with the myriad issues that surround raising a child of a different race.

Through a series of focus group interviews and an analysis of the media and popular culture, Mothers Work examines the institution of motherhood and the arenas in which mothering occurs. MichelleNapierski-Prancl explores shared and divergent experiences, perspectives, lives, and challenges through the voices of experts on the topic of motherhood: the mothers themselves. Mothers Work analyzes how mothers feel about themselves, each other, and the culture that situates them against one another.

Tami Longaberger is CEO of The Longaberger Company, the premier U.S. manufacturer of handcrafted baskets and other home and lifestyle products. With great tenderness, transparency, and candor, this book opens her heart, offering readers a glimpse of her unique “American Dream”—the kind not handed down or given freely—but earned by hard work and fierce tenacity. Whether sharing memories of her impoverished childhood in Appalachia or accounts of reaching out to business women of the Middle East, Longaberger evokes a balanced nostalgia for the sweetness of the past comingled with a passionate call for hope for the future. Weaving Dreams prompts readers to dream bigger, think more broadly, and risk taking the road less traveled in business and in life. The life lessons remind us that we are all much more similar than distinct, that we have much for which to be grateful, and that the love of family is a treasure to be valued above all else. In Weaving Dreams: The Joy of Work, the Love of Life, Tami Longaberger emerges as a clear voice of encouragement and inspiration, challenging us all to live each moment to the fullest.

The fascinating subject of handweaving is fully explored in this reference, which covers basic subjects such as warping a loom and making bobbins of weft, as well as more elaborate, highly decorative projects. Patterns are arranged by varying levels of difficulty and design so beginners and experienced weavers alike will discover new insights and concepts. Among the 40 step-by-step projects included in this volume are designs for baby blankets, shawls, table cloths, and linen hand towels.

Winner of a Foreword IndieFab Book of the Year Award Katrina Alcorn was a 37-year-old mother with a happy marriage and a thriving career when one day, on the way to Target to buy diapers, she had a breakdown. Her carefully built career shuddered to a halt, and her journey through depression, anxiety, and insomnia—followed by medication, meditation, and therapy—began. Alcorn wondered how a woman like herself, with a loving husband, a supportive boss, three healthy kids, and a good income, was unable to manage the demands of having a career and a family. Over time, she realized that she wasn’t alone; many women were struggling to do it all—and feeling as if they were somehow failing as a result. Mothers are the breadwinners in two-thirds of American families, yet the American workplace is uniquely hostile to the needs of parents. Weaving in surprising research about the dysfunction between the careers and home lives of working mothers, as well as the consequences to women’s health, Alcorn tells a deeply personal story about “having it all,” failing miserably, and what comes after. Ultimately, she offers readers a vision for a healthier, happier, and more productive way to live and work.

"Hattery′s book is an important contribution to this literature. The book is engaging and is well written. I would recommend this book and encourage Hattery to continue examination of this construct." - Psychology of Women Quarterly Women, Work, and Family: Balancing and Weaving is a fascinating examination of the extraordinary juggling skills of working mothers who balance their obligations to both work and family. Angela Hattery goes beyond a mere description of women′s conflicts of interest and seeks to understand the decision-making process through which they accomplish this balancing. Through intensive interviews with 30 married women, all with children under 2 years of age, Hattery uncovers a remarkable range of ways in which these women weave together the complex strands of their lives. The data in the volume are examined from a number of theoretical standpoints, including structural theory, motherhood theory, and feminist theory. A key variable that runs through the data is economic need, which has an obvious effect on work patterns. Women, Work, and Family will make a major contribution to family studies and will illuminate the difficult choices that women make within the family/work context.

Women are encouraged to believe that they can occupy top jobs in society by the example of other women thriving in their careers. Who better to be a role model for career success than your mother? Paradoxically, this book shows that having a mother as a role model, even for graduates of top universities, does not predict daughters progressing in their own careers. It finds that mothers with careers, whilst highly influential in their daughters’ choice of career path, rarely mentor their daughters as they progress. This is partly explained by ‘quiet ambition’ – the tendency of women to be modest about their achievements. Bigger issues are the twin pressures from contemporary motherhood and workplace culture that ironically lead career women’s daughters to believe that being a ‘good mother’ means working part-time. This stalls career progress. Based on a large, cross-generational qualitative sample, this book offers a timely and original perspective on the debate about gender equality in leadership positions.