Mothering Redoux: Agency and Joy in Negotiating Capitals of Shame

• In Event: 34.064 - Soundscapes, Poetry, Mothering, and Marginalization: Arts-Based Educational Research Methodological Possibilities and Praxis

Abstract

This paper argues that shame can be used as a form of capital rooted in sociocultural norms to declare people and groups incompetent or impotent in their interactions, possibilities, and their ways of being, knowing, and doing. Like many forms of social capital, capitals of shame provides privilege to some at the expense of others. Using the example of mothers becoming m/others through shame as a means to maintain patriarchal norms and values, this paper unpacks questions of oppression, agency, and refusal that are entangled in this form of capital.

Author

• Boni Wozolek, Loyola University Maryland