Friday, March 24, 2006

Carework and Caregiving: Theory and Practice

Two abstracts were accepted for the upcoming Carework and Caregiving: Theory and Practice Conference at York.

This one's at 9am on May 6th, a Saturday morning:

Caregiving and Evolutionary Ethics: The guardians who undergird culture.


"For a moment, during their conversation, feeling the desperations they spoke of, the difficulties, she felt connected to millions of women over the globe who struggle with poverty, grief, racism, violence, but who keep going. Women who are the emotional centres for their families, who are anchors, who place food on the table miraculously out of almost nothing, who somehow dress their children, their spouses, themselves, who clean and maintain their homes, who work for menial wages, where they are essentially labourers, who never allow themselves to succumb to madness, or drugs, or a furious destruction of the world around them, who keep loving their families in profound ways. They grieve, yes, there is sadness, but they have hearts of compassion. It was here that she felt a bond with the strength of women throughout the ages. She knew she was alive, living in her generation, carrying the flame of continuous love through the marathon that history is, only because her foremothers had also carried it and passed it on. If mothering is a stable, conservative force, if that's what happens to women as they take on the responsibility and role of motherhood, then she was grateful for it. This was where there was meaning, the staying-with-it through everything, the power to endure, to continue." Brenda Clews, The Move.

Caregiving is a core ethical value. Unfortunately care of others, especially the most vulnerable and important for the future of 'the race,' children, often falls to women who are mothers, and who, one might say, because of this role, become the keepers of the continuous flame of evolution. Such processes as "natural selection" could not, I would argue, produce a highly complex species without the continuous care provided by women who take on the caregiving role, and so become, not just metaphorically but in a very real sense, 'guardians' who undergird the enterprise of culture. In this talk I will align caregiving with a discussion of evolutionary ethics and read a short selection from my unfinished novel, The Move.


Bio: Brenda Clews is a writer, artist, dancer and single mother living in Toronto. She has degrees in Fine Arts and English Literature from York, and an unfinished Interdisciplinary Studies thesis on the maternal body. She is currently writing an autobiographical novel about living in uncertainty, and about existing outside the dominant discourses, entitled, The Move.

This one's at 2:30 that afternoon:

The creative writing piece:

Towels hung on the door, an accidental spectrum

In these photopoems, I explore my daughter's relationship to her body. As a feminist and as a woman who struggled with bulimia many years ago as I came to terms with my own female body, it is hard to witness my daughter undergoing the same struggles. At 15 she is radiant as the sun who cannot see its own beauty. These prose poems explore the difficulties girls face with media and peer pressure to sculpt themselves into more perfect images of what is considered beautiful by the general culture.


I wrote to her... "Please use the same bio I sent with the other abstract. Am I aiming for 10-15 minutes of reading here?"
_________________

I've barely written anything. The first talk is 15-20 min, that's easy. The second panel seems to consist of only two of us, which means an hour and 15 minutes each! I had thought of writing 4 pieces, taking up 12 -15 minutes, so this is going to require some planning. I'll probably take a disc of my photopoesis pieces, or dig up some old work... though, oh dear, I can't. Lost in storage...

There are so many writers and poets and artists out there, how come this panel is so under-represented? The last time I joined a creative writing panel at one of these conferences, it was packed, with writers and audience, and we each got 10 minutes to read... some of those pieces were incredibly moving and became the highlight of the entire weekend.

7 comments:

  1. Congratulations, Brenda! I feel sure that this will come together for you in the way you wish -- you have time.

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  2. Thank you for being so, so sweet, mb. I have often finished a piece the night before presenting at one of these conferences, which is gruelling, but it gets stuff I want to do done -:)

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  3. Congratulations on the acceptances! You'll know how to do what needs to be done when the moment arrives. Maybe another presenter or two will show up - and if not, you can always end early.

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  4. Hi Richard, it'll be alright, maybe some other writers will join that panel, or I'll figure something out... perhaps find someone to film one of my performance pieces, whatever. Or maybe we'll read & then turn it into a workshop and create something as a group. It was just surprising to see only two of us. I think it was overload and more panels were created... the pressure to perform, ah. Sometimes it can be best... Thanks for the support and encouragement. xo

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  5. Congratulations! These things have a habit of working out -- I've got two students right now and there is so much they want to discuss as we go through the class. Even if you're only two on a panel, you may find yourselves fielding a wealth of questions. It could evolve into something even more wonderful.

    I recently read an article in the January 06 Scientific American on "The Maternal Brain" (Craig Howard Kinsley and Kelly G. Lambert). They write, "[S]ome researchers have suggested that the development of maternal behavior was one of the main drivers for the evolution of the mammalian brain. As mammals arose from their reptile forebears, their reproductive strategy shifted from drop-the-eggs-and-flee to defend-the-nest, and the selective advantages of the later approach may have favored the emergence of hormonal brain changes and the resulting beneficial behaviors. The hand -- or paw -- that rocks the cradle indeed rules the world."

    Researchers have found that mother rats are better than virgins at navigating mazes and capturing prey. Also, when given the choice between cocaine and newly-born pups, mother rats chose pups. Suckling might release endorphins and oxytocin: "Lower mammalian species such as mice and rats, which most likely lack the lofty principle and motivations of humans, may care for their pups for the simple reason that it feels good to do so."

    Certain brain cells also increase their complexity and connections during pregnancy and lactation, and this improvement seems to last well beyond the lactational period.

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  6. e_journies, thank you, & I'm sure it'll be fine. I'll probably get in touch with the other presenter and see what we might work out.

    I did a post on that article you're referring to, and took a different vantage on it, seeing it as an example of essentialism in neuroscience. It was a most interesting article... :)

    Thank you for mentioning it - perhaps we could get into a discussion on it.

    Your comments always insightful and rich with metaphor...

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  7. In fact, I wanted to do a paper on the emerging essentialism in neuroscience and how dangerous this new manifestation of it is. Should all women, therefore, become mothers because of the 'evolutionary advantage'? It's riddled with ontological problems. It's not my area, but I would be most surprised if all those same hormonal results didn't happen with other 'mind-altering' experiences, like falling in love. Anyway, I could get into a rant here... sorry! my area has been the maternal body and I could "use" this stuff to my advantage, but it's tooooo suspect.

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