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symbolic dialects and generations of women: variation in the meaning of post‐divorce downward mobility
Author(s) -
NEWMAN KATHERINE S.
Publication year - 1986
Publication title -
american ethnologist
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.875
H-Index - 78
eISSN - 1548-1425
pISSN - 0094-0496
DOI - 10.1525/ae.1986.13.2.02a00030
Subject(s) - meaning (existential) , variation (astronomy) , the symbolic , sociology , affect (linguistics) , social mobility , white (mutation) , demographic economics , demography , psychology , gender studies , social psychology , economics , social science , psychoanalysis , biochemistry , chemistry , physics , communication , astrophysics , psychotherapist , gene
This paper reports on a study of 30 white, middle‐class American women who have suffered severe losses in household income as the result of divorce. It argues that subjective interpretations of “downward mobility” following divorce differ for women from two different cohorts or generations. These differences are explained in terms of the dynamics of the domestic cycle that distinguish the two cohorts and in terms of variations in symbolic systems each group maintains as a result of historically specific experiences. The concept of symbolic dialects is developed to analyze these variations. The paper also identifies different adaptive strategies of adjustment to income loss and the ways these affect relations between children and divorced mothers. [American culture, symbolic analysis, income loss, life cycle, divorce, women's studies]