Mother of Invention: How Our Mothers Influenced Us as Feminist Acadamics and Activists

Book excerpt: Mother of Invention: How Our Mothers Influenced Us As Feminist Academics and Activists is an interdisciplinary collection that combines feminist theory with life writing to explore the diverse ways that mothers, whether or not they themselves identity as “feminist,” inspire feminist consciousness in their daughters and sons. It features creative and scholarly contributions from feminist academics, activists, writers and artists from different educational backgrounds, places and walks of life. While not an exclusive celebration of maternal relations, this collection provides an antidote to matrophobia and mother-blaming by critically exploring and affirming the myriad of challenges and complexities that constitute motherwork. It explores how the mothering of feminist daughters and sons intersects with issues of gender, sexuality, dis- ability, ethnicity, racialization, citizenship, religion, economic class, education, and socio-historical location. Collectively these essays explore the centrality of intergenerational matrilineal narratives in shaping feminist consciousness, they deconstruct dominant ideologies of patriarchal motherhood and womanhood, and they challenge the notion that there is a formulaic way to raise feminist daughters and sons, or a singular “correct” way to engage in feminist maternal practice.