Focus on 'the family'?: how South African family policy could fail us
- Morison, Tracy, Lynch, Ingrid, Macleod, Catriona I
- Authors: Morison, Tracy , Lynch, Ingrid , Macleod, Catriona I
- Date: 2016
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/446244 , vital:74484 , xlink:href="https://hsrc.ac.za/uploads/pageContent/7505/HSRC%20POLICY%20BRIEF%2011%20-%20MORISON%20Family%20policy_PRESS%20(2).pdf"
- Description: In the past decade South African policymakers have increasingly focused on families as sites of state intervention. To date, several family policies have been developed to support societal well-being and cohesion. The most recent policy document is the White Paper on Families in South Africa (DSD 2012), which aims to facilitate the mainstreaming of a family perspective into all government policy-making. Family policies are intended to provide support, enhance family members’ wellbeing, strengthen family relationships, and help families address social challenges, such as economic instability. Their ultimate aim is to ensure a safe and socially cohesive society (Robila 2014). A core concern, therefore, is with promoting ‘stable, healthy families’. This concern is valid in South Africa since many families experienced a profound lack of stability under apartheid and today instability is brought about by various socio-economic changes, especially the HIV and AIDS epidemic.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Morison, Tracy , Lynch, Ingrid , Macleod, Catriona I
- Date: 2016
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/446244 , vital:74484 , xlink:href="https://hsrc.ac.za/uploads/pageContent/7505/HSRC%20POLICY%20BRIEF%2011%20-%20MORISON%20Family%20policy_PRESS%20(2).pdf"
- Description: In the past decade South African policymakers have increasingly focused on families as sites of state intervention. To date, several family policies have been developed to support societal well-being and cohesion. The most recent policy document is the White Paper on Families in South Africa (DSD 2012), which aims to facilitate the mainstreaming of a family perspective into all government policy-making. Family policies are intended to provide support, enhance family members’ wellbeing, strengthen family relationships, and help families address social challenges, such as economic instability. Their ultimate aim is to ensure a safe and socially cohesive society (Robila 2014). A core concern, therefore, is with promoting ‘stable, healthy families’. This concern is valid in South Africa since many families experienced a profound lack of stability under apartheid and today instability is brought about by various socio-economic changes, especially the HIV and AIDS epidemic.
- Full Text:
Stigma resistance in online childfree communities: The limitations of choice rhetoric
- Morison, Tracy, Macleod, Catriona I, Lynch, Ingrid, Shivakumar, Seemanthini T
- Authors: Morison, Tracy , Macleod, Catriona I , Lynch, Ingrid , Shivakumar, Seemanthini T
- Date: 2016
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/446299 , vital:74488 , xlink:href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0361684315603657"
- Description: People who are voluntarily childless, or ‘‘childfree,’’ face considerable stigma. Researchers have begun to explore how these individuals respond to stigma, usually focusing on interpersonal stigma management strategies. We explored participants’ responses to stigma in a way that is cognisant of broader social norms and gender power relations. Using a feminist discursive psychology framework, we analysed women’s and men’s computer-assisted communication about their childfree status. Our analysis draws attention to ‘‘identity work’’ in the context of stigma. We show how the strategic use of ‘‘choice’’ rhetoric allowed participants to avoid stigmatised identities and was used in two contradictory ways. On the one hand, participants drew on a ‘‘childfree-by-choice script,’’ which enabled them to hold a positive identity of themselves as autonomous, rational, and responsible decision makers. On the other hand, they mobilised a ‘‘disavowal of choice script’’ that allowed a person who is unable to choose childlessness (for various reasons) to hold a blameless identity regarding deviation from the norm of parenthood. We demonstrate how choice rhetoric allowed participants to resist stigma and challenge pronatalism to some extent; we discuss the political potential of these scripts for reproductive freedom.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Morison, Tracy , Macleod, Catriona I , Lynch, Ingrid , Shivakumar, Seemanthini T
- Date: 2016
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/446299 , vital:74488 , xlink:href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0361684315603657"
- Description: People who are voluntarily childless, or ‘‘childfree,’’ face considerable stigma. Researchers have begun to explore how these individuals respond to stigma, usually focusing on interpersonal stigma management strategies. We explored participants’ responses to stigma in a way that is cognisant of broader social norms and gender power relations. Using a feminist discursive psychology framework, we analysed women’s and men’s computer-assisted communication about their childfree status. Our analysis draws attention to ‘‘identity work’’ in the context of stigma. We show how the strategic use of ‘‘choice’’ rhetoric allowed participants to avoid stigmatised identities and was used in two contradictory ways. On the one hand, participants drew on a ‘‘childfree-by-choice script,’’ which enabled them to hold a positive identity of themselves as autonomous, rational, and responsible decision makers. On the other hand, they mobilised a ‘‘disavowal of choice script’’ that allowed a person who is unable to choose childlessness (for various reasons) to hold a blameless identity regarding deviation from the norm of parenthood. We demonstrate how choice rhetoric allowed participants to resist stigma and challenge pronatalism to some extent; we discuss the political potential of these scripts for reproductive freedom.
- Full Text:
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