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.