Young low-income mothers’ identity work around infant feeding in the UK

Banister, Emma and Hogg, Margaret and Dixon, Mandy (2022) Young low-income mothers’ identity work around infant feeding in the UK. Artl@s Bulletin. ISSN 2264-2668 (In Press)

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Abstract

This paper focuses on young low-income mothers’ engagement with, and management of, potentially conflicting discourses within the context of maternal foodwork. Findings from qualitative, longitudinal interviews with 13 UK women illustrate the performance of identity and family work, in relation to infant feeding and wider maternal practices. Each participant was interviewed twice, once prior to, and then following, the birth of their first baby. We identify three rhetorical strategies. Adopting and resisting allow for the acceptance or rejection of prominent infant feeding discourses. Under reframing, young women transform the encouragement to breastfeed, subverting or reversing official discourses. Reframing thus provides an alternative means to appropriate and deploy versions of good motherhood, drawing on women’s lived realities and local maternal cultures, alongside wider experiences of building and managing family relationships.

Item Type:
Journal Article
Journal or Publication Title:
Artl@s Bulletin
Subjects:
?? BREASTFEEDINGDISCOURSESINFANCYLOCAL MATERNAL CULTURESLOW INCOMEYOUNG MOTHERSMATERNAL FOODWORK ??
ID Code:
178764
Deposited By:
Deposited On:
07 Nov 2022 14:00
Refereed?:
Yes
Published?:
In Press
Last Modified:
11 Sep 2023 23:31