Media Work, Mothers and Motherhood: Negotiating the International Audio-Visual Industry (Routledge Studies in Media and Cultural Industries)

This interdisciplinary and international volume offers an innovative and critical exploration of the impact of motherhood on the engagement of women in media and creative industries across the globe. Diverse contributions critically engage with the intersections and overlap between the social categories of worker and mother, and the work of media production and maternal caregiving. Conflicting ideas about, and expectations of, mothers are untangled in the context of the working world of radio, film, television and creative media industries. The book teases out commonalities between experiences that are evident across a number of countries, from Hollywood to Bollywood, as well as examining the differences between class, religion, maternal status and cultural frameworks that surround working mothers in various nation states. It also offers some possibilities for ways forward that can improve the lives of women workers who are also mothers. A timely and valuable contribution to international debates on equality, mothers and motherhood in audiovisual industries, this book will be of interest to scholars and students of media, communication, cultural studies and gender, programmes engaged with work inequalities and motherhood studies, and activists, funders, policymakers and practitioners. Cover Half Title Series Title Copyright Dedication Contents List of figures and tables 1 Motherhood and media work: an introduction Part 1 Who cares in screen production? 2 Inequality, invisibility and inflexibility: mothers and carers navigating careers in the Australian screen industries 3 Managing Wollstonecraft’s Dilemma: matriarchs in the Nigerian broadcast news media and the politics of childcare 4 Representing and experiencing motherhood on- and off-screen in Swedish film 5 The mother of a famous child: the media representation of Shirley Temple’s ‘Mother’ in Hollywood, 1934–1940 Part 2 Intersectionality and media mothers 6 Negotiating motherhood in the Colombian audiovisual industry: a matter of capital 7 The future of Muslim women behind the scenes of the Malaysian TV industry 8 British television production and women without children: exclusionary practice in the turn to care Part 3 Stigma, subjectivity and celebrity 9 The operation of maternal stigma in the creative and cultural industries 10 Mothers’ subjective experiences of negotiating caring responsibilities with work in the Scottish film and television industries 11 Bollywood mothers: work-life imbalance Part 4 Solutions for better futures 12 The gendered practice of the TV opt-out 13 Negotiating motherhood: the search for solutions List of contributors Index "This interdisciplinary and international volume offers an innovative and critical exploration of the impact of motherhood on the engagement of women in media and creative industries across the globe. Diverse contributions critically engage with the intersections and overlap between the social categories of worker and mother, and the work of media production and maternal care-giving. Conflicting ideas about, and expectations of, mothers are untangled in the context of the working world of radio, film, television and creative media industries. The book teases out commonalities between experiences that are evident across a number of countries, from Hollywood to Bollywood, as well as examining the differences between class, religious, maternal status and cultural frameworks that surround working mothers in various nation states. It also offers some possibilities for ways forward that can improve the lives of women workers who are also mothers. A timely and valuable contribution to international debates on equality, mothers and motherhood in audio visual industries, this book will be of interest to scholars and students of media, communication, cultural studies and gender, programmes engaged with work inequalities and motherhood studies, as well as activists, funders, policy makers and practitioners"-- Provided by publisher