Феминистская концепция материнства Адриенны Рич: материнство как личный опыт и как социальный институт

Abstract

This article discusses the concept of the American “second wave” feminist, writer and poet Adrienne Rich, who had a strong influence on the American feminist tradition of understanding motherhood. Rich describes motherhood through personal experience and as a social institution. The work of Rich is known for its provocative nature, as well as for its depiction of prosaic motherhood experiences and personal details. The book has become a classic feminist text, and motherhood has become an integral issue of feminism. Rich combines examples from literature, research and real-life evidences in her text; she describes the experience of motherhood, from the period of childbearing to the growing up of children. A. Rich also talks about the hatred that mothers feel towards their child and the depression she personally experienced while raising three children. The author concludes that being a mother is one aspect of female identity, and not the only one. Instead of dismissing the problems of motherhood as unimportant, Rich delves into the problem of the crisis or loss of identity of a woman as a mother and the problem of that overwhelming sense of inadequacy that many mothers feel when raising children. The purpose of this article is to describe the main ideas of the American feminist A. Rich regarding motherhood as an experience and as a social institution. The scientific significance of the work is in the fact that A. Rich problematizes the fact that women themselves, being mothers, write little about their experience of motherhood and therefore the vast majority of knowledge and visual images of motherhood come to us through patriarchal culture as a collective or individual male consciousness. Adrienne Rich offers a feminine perspective on the fulfillment of motherhood when it is perceived as critical and problematic. The value of this study is in an attempt to comprehend the influence of A. Rich’s concept of motherhood on the feminist analysis of motherhood as a female practice and as a social institution