Twenty-First Century Motherhood ─ Experience, Identity, Policy, Agency

A Pioneer of Modern Motherhood Studies, Andrea O'Reilly explores motherhood's current representation and practice, considering developments that were unimaginable decades ago: the Internet, interracial surrogacy, raising transchildren, male mothering, intensive mothering, queer parenting, the applications of new biotechnologies, and mothering in the post-9/11 era. Her work pulls together a range of disciplines and themes in motherhood studies. She confronts the effects of globalization, HIV/AIDS, welfare reform, politicians as mothers, third-wave feminism, and the evolving motherhood movement, and she incorporates Chicana, African-American, Canadian, Muslim, queer, low-income, trans, and lesbian perspectives.

"Andrea O'Reilly's coverage is comprehensive. Her book reflects current trends in the field, particularly the examination of reproductive technologies and the Internet and their implications for motherhood and mothering."---Heather Hewett, State University of New York, New Paltz, writer and editor of the Global Mama column for Girl with Pen (www.girlwpen.com)

"Maternal theorizing must take into account the way in which mothers and mothering are uniquely situated in the twenty-first century. Andrea O'Reilly offers a scholarly, accessible, and effective interdisciplinary collection that attends to these truths and nuances in the study of mothering today."---Amber Kinser, author of Motherhood and Feminism

Andrea O'Reilly is associate professor in the School of Women's Studies at York University and the editor or coeditor of more than fourteen books on motherhood. She is the author of Toni Morrison and Motherhood: A Politics of the Heart and Rocking the Cradle: Thoughts on Motherhood, Feminism, and the Possibility of Empowered Mothering. She is also the founder and director of the Motherhood Initiative for Research and community Involvement, formerly the Association for Research on Mothering and the founder and editor in chief of the Journal of the Motherhood Initiative, formerly the Journal of the Association for Research and Mothering.