This journal will be discussing Valerie Walkerdine and Helen Lucey’s analysis of sensitive mothering. The authors state that sensitive mothers have two main characteristics. First, the sensitive mother takes every opportunity to educate her children within the home as they engage with daily domestic tasks. Second, the sensitive mother does not practice overt disciplining to keep her children away from any feelings of vulnerability (). Both these characteristics are expected to aid the intellectual development of a child.
After learning about the “ten ideological commandments” of the patriarchal institution of motherhood in the class lecture, I would like to dedicate the first section of this journal to discuss the ways in which sensitive mothering may enact many of the ten commandments. To start, it is argued that by attempting to make daily domestic chores a teaching opportunity for her children, the sensitive mother ultimately engages in gendered education in which she …show more content…
Walkerdine and Lucey provide an example of the ranking by comparing the practices of Amanda’s mother, a good mother who helps her child understand abstract concepts with Dawn’s mother, a supposed bad mother who ignores her child’s educational ambition (). This ranking is inaccurate because arguments of strengths and weaknesses can be made for both mothering practices. While Amanda’s mother, who practices sensitive mothering, is furthering the educational prospects of her child by never discipling the child overtly, she provides Amanda with a false sense of independence which may be threatened when Amanda enters the public sphere. Similarly, while Dawn’s mother may be raising her child to learn skills of independence by ignoring educational opportunities, she deprives her child of any opportunity in developing crucial intellectual skills at a young
After learning about the “ten ideological commandments” of the patriarchal institution of motherhood in the class lecture, I would like to dedicate the first section of this journal to discuss the ways in which sensitive mothering may enact many of the ten commandments. To start, it is argued that by attempting to make daily domestic chores a teaching opportunity for her children, the sensitive mother ultimately engages in gendered education in which she …show more content…
Walkerdine and Lucey provide an example of the ranking by comparing the practices of Amanda’s mother, a good mother who helps her child understand abstract concepts with Dawn’s mother, a supposed bad mother who ignores her child’s educational ambition (). This ranking is inaccurate because arguments of strengths and weaknesses can be made for both mothering practices. While Amanda’s mother, who practices sensitive mothering, is furthering the educational prospects of her child by never discipling the child overtly, she provides Amanda with a false sense of independence which may be threatened when Amanda enters the public sphere. Similarly, while Dawn’s mother may be raising her child to learn skills of independence by ignoring educational opportunities, she deprives her child of any opportunity in developing crucial intellectual skills at a young