Naturalist Mothering in Turkey: Neoliberal Governance and New Ideals of Child-raising

• In Event: 2266 - Family Section Roundtables (1 hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: 12. Gender, Mothering, and Family Ideologies and Practices

Abstract

This paper focuses on “naturalist” mothering practices that have become predominant especially among urban, well-educated, middle and upper-middle class women in Turkey in the last decade. It asks how and why the concept of “natural” gradually took hold as the hegemonic discourse in mothering in Turkey and it delves into the ways this shift might intersect with the current cultural/political transformation of the country which is gradually drifting further into authoritarianism. Based on my fieldwork in Istanbul, Turkey, I use the data from in-depth interviews with naturalist mothers to explore how “natural” comes to be envisioned in a context of neoliberal governance in which policies and regulations regarding families are increasingly conservative. Consequently, I suggest that “naturalist mothering” as a historically contingent set of practices draws exclusionary borders similar to conventional models of gendered parenting, despite being presented in opposition to them. With excessive focus on ensuring a “natural” upbringing of children and demanding standards of procuring this "naturalness" these mothers take on primary care-taker responsibilities at home. In addition, the limited accessibility of such practices economically is made invisible by their narratives of an “achieved awareness” against the commonly presumed risks posed by deregulated health and food industries. While they may present their politics of mothering as an act of opposition or resistance, in so far as it lacks a critical understanding of gender and class as social structures, their approach points to a paradoxical strategy in which they remain as an unchallenging accomplice of the conservative neoliberal order that reproduces and reinforces the existing stratifications.

Author

• Canan Tanir, Binghamton University