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| Subjects: Sociology, Women's Studies, Religion |
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| Mothers who homeschool their children constantly face judgmental questions about their choices, and yet the homeschooling movement continues to grow with an estimated 1.5 million American children now schooled at home. These children are largely taught by stay-at-home mothers who find that they must tightly manage their daily schedules to avoid burnout and maximize their relationships with their children, and that they must sustain a desire to sacrifice their independent selves for many years in order to savor the experience of motherhood. Home Is Where the School Is is the first comprehensive look into the lives of homeschooling mothers. Drawing on rich data collected through eight years of fieldwork and dozens of in-depth interviews, Jennifer Lois examines the intense effects of the emotional and temporal demands that homeschooling places on mothers’ lives, raising profound questions about the expectations of modern motherhood and the limits of parenting. |
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| | “Jennifer Lois’s compelling and informative ethnography about parents who decide to homeschool their children comes at a propitious time in American education. A fascinating read into these parents’ motivations, rationales, choices, time allocation, and philosophies.” | | -Peter Adler, co-author of The Tender Cut |
| | “Lois’s patient ethnography at once sensitively reveals the complicated emotional and time-bound processes that forge the maternal self and motherhood as gendered social institution par excellence. This is an honest story of self-sacrifice and entitlement that not
only tells the complicated truth of homeschooling, but more broadly
highlights what’s at stake for mothers everywhere.” | | -Chris Bobel, author of The Paradox of Natural Mothering |
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