Breaks and continuities in intensive mothering on Facebook. the case of Malasmadres and Pequefelicidad

Abstract

ABSTRACT Motherhood as the key to femininity did not appear until the eighteenth century, and it was not until the beginning of the twentieth century, together with the appearance of mass media, that the ideal of the “perfect mother” began to spread through the model of intensive mothering. The main objective of this work is to analyse, from a gender perspective, the messages and discourses on how to be a mother that are transmitted through Facebook. For this, two Spanish Facebook pages that discuss motherhood, Pequefelicidad and Malasmadres, have been selected. A total of 30 publications on these pages between the months of January and March 2019 have been analysed, and the results reveal that the intensive mothering model continues to be reproduced, despite progress in gender equality.