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From Refrigerator Mothers to Warrior‐Heroes: The Cultural Identity Transformation of Mothers Raising Children with Intellectual Disabilities
Author(s) -
Sousa Amy C.
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
symbolic interaction
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.874
H-Index - 47
eISSN - 1533-8665
pISSN - 0195-6086
DOI - 10.1525/si.2011.34.2.220
Subject(s) - archetype , battle , hero , intellectual disability , memoir , identity (music) , raising (metalworking) , gender studies , sociology , psychology , subject (documents) , developmental psychology , law , political science , aesthetics , history , literature , art , mathematics , archaeology , psychiatry , library science , computer science , philosophy , geometry
This article examines public performances of mothering children with intellectual disabilities through thematic discourse analysis of thirty‐three published memoirs. These data reveal presentations of self that, once consumed and interpreted by public interaction, emerge collectively as a “warrior‐hero” identity, a reformulated archetype in the social construction of a good mother. This archetype places a cultural expectation on mothers to do battle to attain resources and possible cures for their children, ultimately shifting the historical burden on mothers from causing the intellectual disabilities of their children to curing them. The article concludes with a discussion of how this hyperfocus on expert parenting has the potential to leave mothers of children with intellectual disabilities strained and subject to the pitfalls of systems of inequality.