Motherhood in the Digital Age
This presentation explores how local working- and middle-class mothers respond to increasing economic and social insecurity through everyday engagements with online media, such as social media platforms like Facebook and Pinterest, couponing and health sites, and parenting blogs. Feeling responsible for bringing both security and happiness to family life in what are deeply uncertain times, mothers turn to online media for information and community, as well as for opportunities to augment the family’s income. At the same time, though, these engagements with online media often bring fear, competition, and anxiety into mothers’ lives, heightening their experiences of insecurity.
Julie Wilson, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Communication Arts and Community and Justice Studies at Allegheny College, where she teaches courses in media and cultural studies. She is the author, with Dr. Emily Chivers Yochim, of Mothering through Precarity: Women’s Work and Digital Media, which explores how mothers in Northwestern Pennsylvania navigate economic insecurity through everyday engagements with digital media. Dr. Wilson is also the author of Neoliberalism, a textbook that offers a rich and multilayered introduction to what is arguably the most pressing issue of our times. Before becoming an academic, Julie was a neighborhood organizer and small-business owner, running a fiercely independent, community-oriented video store, in St. Paul, Minnesota. Since joining the faculty at Allegheny College in 2010, she has been involved in a number of local initiatives. She is currently a founding board member of the Northwest Pennsylvania Investment Cooperative and the president of Common Roots, a community-based organization that is working to expand sustainable affordable housing in Meadville. She earned her Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota.
