| Summary: | For this dissertation, the following novels have been chosen as examples of the many issues that are involved in mothering in United States society: Chapter 1: Dorothy Allisons Bastard Out of Carolina and Toni Morrisons Beloved, Chapter 2: Toni Morrisons Song of Solomon and Dorothy Wests The Wedding, Chapter 3: Amy Tans The Kitchen Gods Wife and Christina Garcías Dreaming in Cuban, and Chapter 4: Betty Smiths A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and Paule Marshalls Brown Girl, Brownstones. For this study, the term mothering is specifically related to the rearing of children by the female parent. Rearing is defined as the bringing up of a child to maturity and at least to the legal age of eighteen. In Mothers at Work: Representations of Maternal Practice in Literature, Elizabeth Bourque Johnson examines the following definition of mothering: Mothering is a job, a kind of work. The word mother may also indicate a relationship or a title or a way of caring, but primarily a mother is a worker, a person who takes responsibility for the care and development of a child (22). In this dissertation, I argue that oppressive circumstances in the examples in these novels create similar coping strategies for the mother characters, especially when mothering daughters. In addition and contrary to what some might believe, those coping strategies are not confined exclusively to particular cultural groups. The chapters of this study show how different mothers who rear children under different negative circumstances may benefit from similar coping strategies, and they examine these coping strategies from the least to the greatest examples of their success.
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