‘For me, the children come first’: A discursive psychological analysis of how mothers construct fathers’ roles in childrearing and childcare

Abstract

Previous western studies have shown the division of domestic childcare work between fathers and mothers to be unequal but not always constructed as unfair. Following Dixon and Wetherell’s (2004) suggestion of applying a critical discursive psychology approach to the topic, I aimed to discover some of the discourses available to professional English women when constructing the contributions of the father at home. These included the ‘selfless mother’, the ‘shirking father’, ‘the father restores the “gender order”’ and the ‘high-status mother’. Findings suggest a possible application for discursive research, in raising women’s awareness of the potential for their discourses to perpetuate inequality.

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