Reframing Academic Work through Maternal Epistemologies: A Collective Autoethnography of (M)othering in North America

• In Event: Mothering as Methods: Centering Care, Storying Experience, and Re-envisioning Knowledge in Education

Abstract

Objectives:
This co-authored presentation explores how experiences of mothering shape scholarly identity, labor, and knowledge production in academia. We aim to illuminate the intellectual, emotional, and embodied work of mothering as a generative methodological stance. Our goal is to challenge deficit framings of motherhood in academic contexts and to articulate new possibilities for more humane, relational academic cultures.

Theoretical Framework:
Our work is grounded in feminist, critical race, and decolonial theories that center embodied knowledge, relationality, and care (Isgro & Castañeda, 2015; Wong & Tiu-Wu, 2014). We draw from Lundgren’s (2024) framework of mothering in higher education as a site of epistemic and institutional critique. We also draw from published scholarship on mothering and academia, including recent studies that document systemic barriers and strategies of survival and thriving. In recognizing the intersections of gender, race, and professional identity, we also engage Black feminist and woman-of-color epistemologies (Benitez Hemans et al., 2021) to frame mothering not as a barrier, but as a vital source of insight.

Methods:
We use collaborative autoethnography (Chang, 2007; Chang et al., 2013) and collective storytelling as methods that foreground lived experience and allow for layered, multi-voiced inquiry. As three transnational motherscholars at different stages of our academic careers, we come together to explore how our shared racial, ethnic, and linguistic backgrounds, alongside our distinct mothering and academic experiences, shape our perspectives and practices in academia. This approach resists individualistic academic norms and honors knowledge creation and mobilization from traditionally marginalized groups.

Data Sources:
Our data sources include monthly recorded Zoom discussions and individual reflection journals about our ongoing experiences as motherscholars, particularly as women of color working in predominantly white institutions. We also collected relevant emails, WeChat conversations, and pictures. We treat embodied knowledge, emotional labor, informal mentorship, and networks of care as valid and essential data. These lived experiences are read alongside and against a growing body of scholarship that examines mothering as a method of resistance and renewal within the academy (Myles-Baltzly et al. 2021).

Results:
We identify five thematic insights:
Mothering as Methodological Grounding: Skills like observation, emotional attunement, and improvisation enrich research practices.
Mothering and Pedagogy: Empathy and relational teaching styles emerge from parenting practices.
Time, Labor, and Energy: Motherhood cultivates efficient time management and exposes the precarity of “work-life balance.”
Positionality and Intersectionality: Experiences of racialized mothering and intersectional identities as women of color, transnational scholars, and mothers, shape academic navigation and institutional critique.
Academic Sisterhood and Solidarity: Story-sharing among motherscholars builds intellectual community and combats isolation. These findings affirm that mothering produces knowledge and ways of knowing that can disrupt dominant academic norms, value resistance, and reimagine what counts as scholarship.

Scholarly Significance:
This presentation contributes to a growing body of interdisciplinary scholarship that legitimizes alternative epistemologies in academia. By positioning mothering as a method, we offer a critical reframing of academic labor, particularly in relation to gendered and racialized structures. Our work advocates for academic cultures that value care, interdependence, and the intellectual richness of maternal experience.

Authors

• Xiaoxiao Du, University of Manitoba

• Emma Xing Chen, Western Washington Universtiy

• Ying Xiong, Pennsylvania State University