If the Tiger Mother has got you down and you really don't want to hear any more about the sacrifices mothers need to make to have a career, try this book by Claire Dederer, Poser: My Life in Twenty-Three Yoga Poses. Instead of getting jobs, getting divorces and getting out, like many women did in the 60s and 70s this book is about how our generation of 40 somethings is looking inward and seeking perfection through yoga.
Or at least this is what Judith Warner hypothesizes in the January 9, 2011 NY Times Magazine. And she should know having kicked off quite a debate herself in 2005 with her book Perfect Madness: Motherhood in the Age of Anxiety.
Bye, Bye, Baby Gear
It is with great satisfaction that a modern mother might clear her house out when her youngest child turns 2 (or 1, or 3). She will gladly wave good bye to the bouncy seat, the gymini, and baby swing. She will cheer as the exersacuer exits. And when she surveys the soon-to-depart pile of molded plastic and colorful fabric, she might wonder, what could she possibly have seen in all this junk? At the time, it seemed necessary for maintaining her sanity, but was it? Is it possible that keeping things simple, putting a 7 month old on a blanket with a few spoons, might have been a more satisfying arrangement for both mother and child? Didn’t the greatest generation spend their pre-verbal years sitting on the kitchen floor, banging a pot with a ladle and making hats out of newspaper?
While she lifts and hauls and divests herself of these baby-related contraptions, this modern mother might wonder if baby gear is making us all dumb. Perhaps all this gear primes mothers, fathers, all of us, to be dependent on a fix, the "perfect" piece of equipment to bring on the next developmental milestone, an app, a device to keep a child busy, a device to teach a child what we could teach them ourselves. For babies it might be standing or fine motor skills, but it quickly moves on as children get older: the alphabet, numbers, addition, reading. No doubt the list goes on.
Since she has definitively and happily closed the door on the family building stage of life, this modern mother/budding social scientist will not have occasion to test out a pared down approach with a baby, but perhaps she can re-think some of her strategies with her older children.
Since she has definitively and happily closed the door on the family building stage of life, this modern mother/budding social scientist will not have occasion to test out a pared down approach with a baby, but perhaps she can re-think some of her strategies with her older children.
Friday Frivolity - When the weather outside is frightful...
To survive what is shaping up to be a snowy 2011, we discovered these mittens from local Olive Green Apparel. This mother daughter team recycles old sweaters and turns them into gorgeous, soft and very, very warm mittens. We have it on good authority that it is much easier to be mannerly when your hands are warm.
Picture courtesy of
Will 2011 be the Year of the Tiger Mother?
Brace yourselves, modern mothers. Brace yourselves for another round of debate about parenting styles, children’s achievement, and how to raise happy and successful children. With Tuesday’s publication of the new book, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua, “western” suburban mothers will once again be called out. Who is “too soft” and who lets her children quit too soon? Who demands and expects success and achievement?
In a recent excerpt in the Wall Street Journal, “Why Chinese Mothers are Superior” Ms. Chua recounts her own extreme parenting practices, in which her daughters are never allowed to “have a playdate, be in a school play, complain about not being in a school play, not be the #1 student in every subject except gym and drama, play any instrument other than the piano or violin, not play the piano or violin.” She argues that her “Chinese mother” style “assumes strength” in children and produces achieving children while western style parents give up on their children too soon, failing teach them the value of sticking with something that might not come easily at first.
For many modern mothers, these comparisons may be a bit intriguing but mostly horrifying. The prospect of bringing up a tuxedo wearing, soul-less virtuoso through relentless hounding might be disturbing and yet the prospect of sending Beavis and Butt Head to college on the 8 year plan will doubtless be equally unappealing. Clearly, there must be some middle ground: one can encourage children to achieve their potential while also allowing the freedom to make mistakes and learn from them. Yet, it would be difficult for any parent reading Ms Chua’s excerpt not to contemplate her own parenting, however briefly.
The modern mother who teaches manners is also teaching standards of behavior. She expects her child to learn to greet others with more than a grunt, to say please and thank you, to approximate appropriate table manners, to write thank you notes and more. Is it such a stretch to extend standards and expectations to academic performance? Perhaps a well mannered mother might re-double her efforts to ensure minimum daily practice of a musical instrument; perhaps she will begin expressing expectations for grades or even household chores; perhaps she will sit back and feel confident in the status-quo. Whatever she may choose, we hope it won’t involve any of the denigration and deprivation Ms. Chua describes in her thought-provoking piece.
Are Good Manners Putting Our Daughters at a Disadvantage?
This video turned up on the WSJ's blog The Juggle and is above all else thought provoking. Sheryl Sandberg is the COO of facebook and has a lot to say about why there are not more women leaders in the world.
From a mannerly mother's perspective it is interesting to think about how our treatment and expectations of daughters may impact some of the behavior by which Sandberg suggests women are sabotaging themselves. A couple examples she gives of things women do are: not keeping one's hand up after a speaker has said no more questions, being modest and saying things like "it was a team effort" or "I had great help." when praised. Conversely a man might keep his hand raised until he is noticed and when praised a man may say 'Thanks, glad you liked my work' (in other words good for you for seeing how awesome I am).
The HBS case study she discusses is particularly telling. In 2002 a professor took a case about Heidi Roizen a venture capitalist and changed her name to Howard. He then gave the Heidi case to one group of students and the Howard case to another. While students found Heidi and Howard equally competent the students described Heidi as abrasive, out for herself and political. The group that had read the exact same case with the character named Howard found him to be likable, 'a great guy', someone you would want to work for.
Sandberg points out that this result is just one more example of the positive correlation between success and likability for men and the negative correlation between success and likability for women. No doubt a few readers have first hand experience with this paradox.
Is it possible that those qualities that make a woman likable also make her incapable of successful leadership? Yet, when a man is both successful and polite he is considered 'quite a catch'. The question of how we as mothers embolden our daughters in business while at the same time helping them navigate the world socially is a tricky one. "Be polite, don't brag, be kind, think of others, don't correct your elders, always work hard, do your best." Is this how Jack Donaghy got to be the Vice President of East Coast Television and Microwave Oven Programming for General Electric? Hardly.
From a mannerly mother's perspective it is interesting to think about how our treatment and expectations of daughters may impact some of the behavior by which Sandberg suggests women are sabotaging themselves. A couple examples she gives of things women do are: not keeping one's hand up after a speaker has said no more questions, being modest and saying things like "it was a team effort" or "I had great help." when praised. Conversely a man might keep his hand raised until he is noticed and when praised a man may say 'Thanks, glad you liked my work' (in other words good for you for seeing how awesome I am).
The HBS case study she discusses is particularly telling. In 2002 a professor took a case about Heidi Roizen a venture capitalist and changed her name to Howard. He then gave the Heidi case to one group of students and the Howard case to another. While students found Heidi and Howard equally competent the students described Heidi as abrasive, out for herself and political. The group that had read the exact same case with the character named Howard found him to be likable, 'a great guy', someone you would want to work for.
Sandberg points out that this result is just one more example of the positive correlation between success and likability for men and the negative correlation between success and likability for women. No doubt a few readers have first hand experience with this paradox.
Is it possible that those qualities that make a woman likable also make her incapable of successful leadership? Yet, when a man is both successful and polite he is considered 'quite a catch'. The question of how we as mothers embolden our daughters in business while at the same time helping them navigate the world socially is a tricky one. "Be polite, don't brag, be kind, think of others, don't correct your elders, always work hard, do your best." Is this how Jack Donaghy got to be the Vice President of East Coast Television and Microwave Oven Programming for General Electric? Hardly.
Can old dogs can learn new texts?
There are times in a mother’s life where she recognizes that she has fully traversed the great divide. As an urban, stroller-pushing mother of a baby and/or toddler, it might have been easy to deny, but sooner or later, the modern mother will have to confront the fact that she has crossed completely to the other side; she has become one of “them” – the middle aged, the mini-van drivers, the parents.
For some, a 40th birthday might invite reflection on how her life has changed. For others it might be happily going to bed before midnight on New Year’s Eve, stone cold sober. And for this particular modern mother, it might be the moment when she realizes she has been perusing the website, When Parents Text for pointers. No, she is not there to laugh at the expense of an anonymous college student’s anonymous parents. (O.K., some are really funny.) She is there to discover what NOT to do when texting with babysitters, or nieces and nephews, or her child’s guitar teacher. Could she pull off an LOL? Or sign off with G2G? Will she need to throw in a POS when the in-laws visit? The last thing she needs is a MIL involved.
She may have graduated from college when email was a novelty, but she can master new tricks. Convincingly. To preserve her dignity, she might want to steer clear of “c u l8ter” and just stick with sprinkling in a few emoticons. On second thought, scratch the emoticons too :( After all, her goal here is to retain some small smidgen of self respect. Maybe better to just text like it's an email; who is she kidding anyway? Besides, some of the posts on When Parents Text are really funny:
Constants
Tone
Chain Message pt. 2
Practicing
For some, a 40th birthday might invite reflection on how her life has changed. For others it might be happily going to bed before midnight on New Year’s Eve, stone cold sober. And for this particular modern mother, it might be the moment when she realizes she has been perusing the website, When Parents Text for pointers. No, she is not there to laugh at the expense of an anonymous college student’s anonymous parents. (O.K., some are really funny.) She is there to discover what NOT to do when texting with babysitters, or nieces and nephews, or her child’s guitar teacher. Could she pull off an LOL? Or sign off with G2G? Will she need to throw in a POS when the in-laws visit? The last thing she needs is a MIL involved.
She may have graduated from college when email was a novelty, but she can master new tricks. Convincingly. To preserve her dignity, she might want to steer clear of “c u l8ter” and just stick with sprinkling in a few emoticons. On second thought, scratch the emoticons too :( After all, her goal here is to retain some small smidgen of self respect. Maybe better to just text like it's an email; who is she kidding anyway? Besides, some of the posts on When Parents Text are really funny:
Constants
Tone
Chain Message pt. 2
Practicing
Home Alone
How might the mannerly modern mother best deal with extended guests? What dear reader, did you do? Does the hostess-with-the-mostess who has been flawless for 4 days straight break down in tears as her in-laws get off the phone with the airline? Or can she hold it all together for a few more days? Does the facade of the perfectly executed visit dissolve into pizza, red table wine and free movies passes for everyone? And would that really be so bad if it did? Because maybe if this snafu teaches the well mannered modern mother anything it is that things don't have to be spectacular and well organized. Maybe (just maybe) the best time of all is some unscheduled time devoid of holiday pressure and expectations.
Nonetheless, to most modern mothers it still probably feels nice to be home. Alone.
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