Accountable matters
Our final point of investigation concerns how motherhood is
interactionally relied upon and reinforced, such that gendered norms of
womanhood and motherhood become increasingly engrained facets of an
“intersubjectively knowable world” (Jayyusi, 1991, p. 236). In this
section we therefore consider moments in our data where members present
‘problems’ or vulnerabilities for motherhood. We describe these as the
barbed edges of motherhood.
In the following debate, the speaker Alice has been sharing her concerns
about the environment and future sustainability. It is against this
backdrop that she engages in a debate about opting out of motherhood.