Revolutionizing Motherhood examines one of the most astonishing human rights movements of recent years. During the Argentine junta's Dirty War against subversives, as tens of thousands were abducted, tortured, and disappeared, a group of women forged the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo and changed Argentine politics forever. The Mothers began in the 1970s as an informal group of working-class housewives making the rounds of prisons and military barracks in search of their disappeared children. As they realized that both state and church officials were conspiring to withhold information, they started to protest, claiming the administrative center of Argentina the Plaza de Mayo for their center stage. In this volume, Marguerite G. Bouvard traces the history of the Mothers and examines how they have transformed maternity from a passive, domestic role to one of public strength. Bouvard also gives a detailed history of contemporary Argentina, including the military's debacle in the Falklands, the fall of the junta, and the efforts of subsequent governments to reach an accord with the Mothers. Finally, she examines their current agenda and their continuing struggle to bring the murderers of their children to justice.

Offers essays on Bosnia, the genocide in Rwanda, sweatshops and globalization, and the political obligations of the mothers of Argentina's Disappeared. In this book, readers may be fascinated by the ways in which essays on conflict, conscience, memory, illness (essay on AIDS), and God overlap and resonate with one another.

If you’re one of the more than 15 million stepmothers in the country, you know the particular trials—and joys—of stepfamily dynamics today. You wonder if you’re doing the right thing and, as a stepmother, many of your specific questions are unique. In this second edition of Stepmotherhood: How to Survive Without Feeling Frustrated, Left Out, or Wicked, journalist and stepmother Cherie Burns brings together countless insights and sound advice, based on the latest research and interviews with experts in the field (including dozens of other stepmoms), to answer questions such as: • How do you manage discipline when parents and stepparents disagree? • How can you help stepsiblings get along? • How do you handle birthdays, holidays, and weddings? • What’s the best way to get along with your stepchild’s mother? • When should you seek a therapist’s help? Burns’s wise and empathetic suggestions go beyond struggle, stigma, and compromise, showing how sensitive, informed stepmothers can take charge—and pride—in their role, becoming more effective and fulfilled.

Women have, through choice and circumstance, changed what it means to be a mother today. No longer is there one clear and correct prescribed definition. As economic, social, cultural and political conditions evolve, women are revolutionizing concepts of mothering in a way unrecognizable short decades ago. In this unique collection, twenty-three women, teaching at colleges and universities throughout Canada, explore how traditional views of motherhood have been influenced by changing social and cultural conditions. Their essays unravel patriarchal constructions of motherhood and re-present new definitions drawn from women's lived experiences.

Traditional histories of war have typically explored masculine narratives of military and political action, leaving private, domestic life relatively unstudied. This volume expands our understanding by looking at the relationships between mothers and children, and the varied roles both have assumed during periods of armed conflict.

When the Spanish arrived in Peru in 1532, men of the Inca Umpire worshipped the Sun as Father and their dead kings as ancestor heroes, while women venerated the Moon and her daughters, the Inca queens, as founders of female dynasties. In the pre-Inca period such notions of parallel descent were expressions of complementarity between men and women. Examining the interplay between gender ideologies and political hierarchy, Irene Silverblatt shows how Inca rulers used their Sun and Moon traditions as methods of controlling women and the Andean peoples the Incas conquered. She then explores the process by which the Spaniards employed European male and female imageries to establish their own rule in Peru and to make new inroads on the power of native women, particularly poor peasant women. Harassed economically and abused sexually, Andean women fought back, earning in the process the Spaniards' condemnation as "witches." Fresh from the European witch hunts that damned women for susceptibility to heresy and diabolic influence, Spanish clerics were predisposed to charge politically disruptive poor women with witchcraft. Silverblatt shows that these very accusations provided women with an ideology of rebellion and a method for defending their culture.

The bestselling author of The Kind Diet offers practical solutions for a healthier, more vibrant approach to new motherhood When did making babies get to be so hard? Infertility is on the rise globally, affecting as many as one in six couples. But instead of looking at diet and lifestyle as key factors, doctors are racing to pump their patients full of expensive and invasive fertility treatments. Once pregnant, women just accept that carrying a baby will be the gassy, swollen, irritable, sleepless nightmare that has become the new normal. Once their babies are born, they assume it will be just as challenging—from breastfeeding woes to screaming fits and constant trips to the doctor. It doesn’t have to be that way. In The Kind Mama, Alicia Silverstone shows that if we kick nasty foods that fight our bodies and replace them with nutrient-rocking “clean” foods that heal and nourish, we can create a more positive baby-making experience, from conception through the third trimester (and beyond). By encouraging basic diet and lifestyle modifications and drawing on wisdom from medical experts, friends, and her own experience, Silverstone has created a one-stop guide that empowers women to take charge of their fertility and pregnancy, and helps them to embark on a healthier, more vibrant path to parenthood.