“I feel like I am betraying my child”: The socio-politics of maternal guilt and shame

Abstract

In this paper, we explore maternal shame and guilt as affective derivatives of social regulations of motherhood in Iceland, which is internationally perceived as a frontrunner in gender equality. We analyze 450 qualitative questionnaires completed by parents describing feelings of guilt and shame in connection to parenthood. We use 76 questionnaires completed by fathers to contrast and compare to answers from mothers to better understand the affective-discursive workings of motherhood. The affective-discursive analytical framework allows us to understand affective pulls, pushes, power dynamics and their social politics. The findings are contextualized in the Nordic welfare state, neoliberalism, the current ethos of intensive mothering. The recurrent thread running through the data is the idea of the ever-present mother, and under this umbrella concept, we have developed two affective-discursive themes: (i) the guilt of working (long hours) and having to arrange for childcare and (ii) failing to be 100% present for the child. We conclude that the emotions of guilt and shame are consistently present in mothers' lives, much more so than in fathers' lives, and that this gendered pattern is both caused by and serves to reinforce the age-old cultural mandate that mothers are primarily responsible for child rearing. The marks of intensive mothering are evident in mothers' description of feeling guilty for everyday tasks such as working, cleaning, studying, arranging for daycare, sending their children to preschool, and attending to their own needs. This gendered pattern suggests that the gender equality cornerstone of the Nordic welfare state might be at risk as important institutions, such as preschools, are perceived as inferior to mothers' constant attention.