Document Type
Article
Publication Title
Geneaology
Abstract
The struggle for work–life balance amongst women in academia who are both mothers and scholars continues to be apparent during a global pandemic highlighting the systemic fissures and social inequalities ingrained in our society, including systems of higher learning. Women of color professors on the tenure track are vulnerable to the intersecting ways capitalism, sexism, and racism exacerbate the challenges faced by motherscholars, making it imperative to explore these nuances. While motherscholars may share advice about navigating family leave policies or strategizing scholarship goals, no one could have prepared us for our motherscholar roles during a pandemic. We were, in some ways, unprepared for giving birth with a heightened level of social isolation and feelings of loneliness, while racial unrest and loud exigencies to protect the lives of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) persist. Through three testimonios, we explore how ancestral/indigenous knowledge provides us with ways to persist, transform, and heal during these moments. We share letters written to each of our babies to encapsulate our praxis with ancestral knowledge on mothering. We reflect on matriarchal elders, constricted movement in our daily routines, and ongoing worries and hopes. We theorize this knowledge to offer solidarity with a motherscholar epistemology.
Pages
119
html
DOI
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/genealogy4040119
Volume
4
Issue
4
Publication Date
12-21-2020
Keywords
motherscholar; Women of Color; ancestral knowledge; testimonios; global pandemic; healing; academic mothering
Disciplines
Race and Ethnicity | Sociology
ISSN
2313-5778
Recommended Citation
Valdovinos, M.G.; Rodríguez-Coss, N.; Parekh, R. Healing through Ancestral Knowledge and Letters to Our Children: Mothering Infants during a Global Pandemic. Genealogy 2020, 4, 119. https://doi.org/10.3390/genealogy4040119
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