Posted 12:29 p.m. Wednesday, May 7, 2014
This Mother’s Day UW-La Crosse Professor Jodi Vandenberg-Daves celebrates being a mother and publishing her first book on motherhood.
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Jodi Vandenberg-Daves is a teacher, author and mother of three: Allison, Sylvia, 17, and Brad, 14. She earned her doctorate in history at the University of Minnesota in 1995 and has taught in the History and Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies departments at UW-L since 1998.[/caption]
This Mother’s Day UW-La Crosse Professor Jodi Vandenberg-Daves celebrates being a mother and publishing her first book on motherhood.
Vandenberg-Daves, a professor of History and Women’s Studies, wrote “Modern Motherhood: An American History.” The book — the first comprehensive history of motherhood in the U.S. — will be released May 19 by Rutgers University Press. The book is available to pre-order online.
The 344 pages explore the multiple and complex societal roles mothers have endured throughout history. Vandenberg-Daves shows how mothers have continued to innovate new ways to combine labor force participation and domestic responsibilities. She follows their challenge to male expertise in the 1960s on issues from abortion rights to childbirth practices, to confinement of women to maternal roles.
“Being a mother and talking to other women — most find this a compelling topic,” says Vandenberg-Daves. “They’ve absorbed a lot of conflicting messages about motherhood and want a deeper understanding.”
Vandenberg-Daves says her interest in motherhood started when she became a mother in 1992. It was fueled as she developed a course on the history of motherhood at UW-L. Since 1999, she has taught the popular UW-L course, noting students’ questions have contributed to her continued research and understanding.
During a sabbatical in 2009, she had time to synthesize the topic and realize the need for a comprehensive history. She had an immediate interest from publishers.
“I wanted to put mothers at the center of history and tell their untold stories,” she explains.
Vandenberg-Daves says her daughter Allison, a junior at MacCalester College, in Minnesota, served as her in-house editor, providing a college-student perspective on her work. She hopes to use her new book in the classroom.
“Even though I wrote it for University Press, I wanted to make it interesting to students and other non-specialists,” she notes. “I tell a lot of stories in the book.”
Vandenberg-Daves uncovered some surprising facts in researching her book. For instance, she writes about the sterilization of 63,000 Americans — primarily women — between the 1910s and the 1970s.
One of her favorite chapters is “Mother’s Resilience and Adaptation in Modern America” where she highlights the roles that women played in sustaining families in the early twentieth century when women were told they shouldn’t be the breadwinner.
“The past always gives perspective on the present,” notes Vandenberg-Daves. “I think that questions about motherhood are central to a lot of other questions about social justice. By looking at this history, we can see the ways women have struggled to have a voice in the job that society has assigned them to do.”
Pre-order “Modern Motherhood: An American History” for $37.95.
The book will be available in area bookstores in June.
Jodi Vandenberg-Daves is a teacher, author and mother of three: Allison, Sylvia, 17, and Brad, 14. She earned her doctorate in history at the University of Minnesota in 1995 and has taught in the History and Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies departments at UW-L since 1998.[/caption]
This Mother’s Day UW-La Crosse Professor Jodi Vandenberg-Daves celebrates being a mother and publishing her first book on motherhood.
Vandenberg-Daves, a professor of History and Women’s Studies, wrote “Modern Motherhood: An American History.” The book — the first comprehensive history of motherhood in the U.S. — will be released May 19 by Rutgers University Press. The book is available to pre-order online.
The 344 pages explore the multiple and complex societal roles mothers have endured throughout history. Vandenberg-Daves shows how mothers have continued to innovate new ways to combine labor force participation and domestic responsibilities. She follows their challenge to male expertise in the 1960s on issues from abortion rights to childbirth practices, to confinement of women to maternal roles.
“Being a mother and talking to other women — most find this a compelling topic,” says Vandenberg-Daves. “They’ve absorbed a lot of conflicting messages about motherhood and want a deeper understanding.”
Vandenberg-Daves says her interest in motherhood started when she became a mother in 1992. It was fueled as she developed a course on the history of motherhood at UW-L. Since 1999, she has taught the popular UW-L course, noting students’ questions have contributed to her continued research and understanding.
During a sabbatical in 2009, she had time to synthesize the topic and realize the need for a comprehensive history. She had an immediate interest from publishers.
“I wanted to put mothers at the center of history and tell their untold stories,” she explains.
Vandenberg-Daves says her daughter Allison, a junior at MacCalester College, in Minnesota, served as her in-house editor, providing a college-student perspective on her work. She hopes to use her new book in the classroom.
“Even though I wrote it for University Press, I wanted to make it interesting to students and other non-specialists,” she notes. “I tell a lot of stories in the book.”
Vandenberg-Daves uncovered some surprising facts in researching her book. For instance, she writes about the sterilization of 63,000 Americans — primarily women — between the 1910s and the 1970s.
One of her favorite chapters is “Mother’s Resilience and Adaptation in Modern America” where she highlights the roles that women played in sustaining families in the early twentieth century when women were told they shouldn’t be the breadwinner.
“The past always gives perspective on the present,” notes Vandenberg-Daves. “I think that questions about motherhood are central to a lot of other questions about social justice. By looking at this history, we can see the ways women have struggled to have a voice in the job that society has assigned them to do.”
Pre-order “Modern Motherhood: An American History” for $37.95.
The book will be available in area bookstores in June.