Still a Mother : : Noncustodial Mothers, Gendered Institutions, and Social Change / / Jackie Krasas.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Cornell University Press Complete eBook-Package 2021
• VerfasserIn: Krasas, Jackie,
• Place / Publishing House: Ithaca, NY : : Cornell University Press, , [2021]; ©2021
• Year of Publication: 2021
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (228 p.)
• Other title: Frontmatter --; Contents --; Acknowledgments --; 1. A Contradiction in Terms --; 2. The Mothers --; 3. She Must Have Done Something --; 4. Still a Mother --; 5. Father of the Year --; 6. Manufacturing Bad Mothers --; 7. Still in an Abusive Relationship --; 8. Lessons Learned --; Notes --; Bibliography --; Index
• Format: Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web.
• ISBN: 9781501754319; 9783110739084; 9783110754001; 9783110753776; 9783110754186; 9783110753967
• DOI: 10.1515/9781501754319?locatt=mode:legacy
• Access: restricted access
• Hierarchical level: Monograph
• Statement of Responsibility: Jackie Krasas.

Jackie Krasas traces the trajectories of non-custodial mothers who have lost or ceded custody to an ex-partner. She argues that non-custodial mothers' experiences should be understood within a greater web of gendered social institutions such as employment, education, health care, and legal sytems that shape the meanings of contemporary motherhood in the United States. If motherhood means "being there" then non-custodial mothers, through their absence, are seen as non-mothers. They are anti-mothers to be reviled. At the very least, these mothers serve as cautionary tales.Still a Mother questions the existence of an objective method for determining custody for children and challenges the "best interests" standard through a feminist reproductive justice lens. The stories of non-custodial mothers Krasas relates shed light on marriage and divorce, caregiving, gender violence, and family court. Unfortunately, much of the contemporary discussion of child custody determination is dominated either by gender neutral discussions, or at the opposite end of the spectrum by the idea that fathers are severely disadvantaged in custody disputes. As a result, the idea that mothers always have custody has taken on the status of common sense. If this were true, as Krasas affirms, there would be no book to write.