Essentialism: women’s essence is maternal; to be fulfilled, a woman must be a mother and spend her life mothering. Which not only is ludicrous but dangerous to the life, liberty and freedom of all women to live their lives fully in any way they choose and to develop their talents, intelligence, capacities in any and every area of human endeavour, not just the one of raising children.This is not to deny the importance of having and raising children! Nothing could be more important for us as a species. But that one half of the human race should be limited to this role is essentialistic. As if it is her unchanging, eternal role…
That thought system has not only been challenged but overthrown in the Western world, surely. After half a century of feminism aren't we are well past it? Does it keep cropping up in various forms because to have clearly defined roles for people makes the workings of a society easier?
The latest incarnation is in the field of neuroscience. Did you know that “from pregnancy on, female mammals are brighter, bolder and better able to cope with life than their childless counterparts”? That “[t]hese brain improvements are permanent, lasting from childbearing years into senescence”? Basically it all seems to boil down to some hormones that increase the ability to bond and the capacity to love: cortisol (which is usually associated with depression but which appears in elevated levels during the first week post-partum and appears to be involved in initial mother-child bonding), the endorphins, oxytocin and vasopressin, or “love hormones.” And increased neuronal pathways in the hippocampus, the hypothalamus (a region claimed to "strongly" affect "maternal behaviour"), the amygdala (which is claimed to regulate "maternal love"). Much of the evidence for the necessity of maternalizing the woman because it makes her smarter is based on the fact that women can distinguish their own baby’s cry out of a multitude, or their own baby’s smell in blind smell tests. Oh, and mommy rats could do mazes faster than non-mommy rats. It’s all a dubious application of fascinating scientific research and leaves me palpitating with worry. Maternal neurotransmitters just sounds like jargon for yet another hydra-head of essentialism.
The deeper message of this research, it seems to me, is that falling in love itself increases intelligence, curiosity, daring, and the beautiful nurturing behaviour that follows naturally surely sends those “love hormones” skyrocketing.
If you can lay down the inherent essentialism of the article, the research is utterly fascinating.
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Article in question, and from which I quoted: Giving Birth to Supermom, by William Illsay Atkinson.
technorati tags: essentialism, essentialism in neuroscience, maternal hormones, Craig Kinsley, Kelly Lambert, Alison Fleming .
This is my first encounter with the term "essentialism" -- and, as you define it, it seems an horribly limited view of what it is to be a woman. The article brings up some interesting science, but then makes disturbingly terrible leaps in interpretation in terms of cause and effect, and scope and multiplicity of changes. I know I lost some brain cells by the time I was done birthing and nursing my child! Perhaps I gained some, too, I don't know. I certainly was changed by the experience permanently. But I don't believe for a minute that makes me better than any other woman.
ReplyDeleteEssentialism is a 2nd wave feminist term, often contrasted with Difference. Essentialism underlies stereotyping. It was supposedly done away with in the 70s, 80s, until 3rd wave feminism took over, with its focus on expansion in all areas and in all ways. 3rd wave has a very multi-cultural focus, as well as on gender and sexualtiy, queer theory, and so on.
ReplyDeleteI love what you responded with, mb. And I agree fully- motherhood did change me radically, but it's not something I would ever insist every other woman needed to experience, nor do I believe 'motherhood' is everyone's cup of tea even though one of my areas of research and artistic endeavour is the maternal body. I could use this stuff to buttress 'theories' if I didn't find it so repugnant.
What struck me as dangerous about this article was the sense of a biological imperative for women to have babies by promising them 'greater foraging skills' (I'm not sure how 'smartness' is defined any other way in the article). The 'proofs' for a 'superior' maternal brain were laughable. All those hormones flood in excess when someone is in love too... -:)
btw, that's a photo of me when I was pregnant with my first child -:)
I wondered. It's a beautiful photograph. The epitome of distended fertility!
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