The Journal of Marriage and Family recently published a special issue on transformative family scholarship that included an article by Chandra Reyna, instructor in the Department of Sociology at Boise State, titled, “You’re biracial but…: Multiracial socialization discourse among mommy bloggers with Black and non-Black multiracial children.”
“Mommy blogs” have been recognized as a medium through which mothers challenge dominant representations of motherhood, create community with other mothers and seek out advice. Reyna’s study analyzes how mothers to multiracial children construct narratives surrounding race, multiraciality and multiracial socialization online, and how their narratives differ with the racial makeup of the blogger’s family.
Reyna was also awarded an inaugural dissertation grant from the Russel Sage Foundation for her project “More than a Monolith: Later-Generation Latinx Motherwork and Motherhood Ideologies.”
According to Reyna, research on motherhood in the U.S. overwhelmingly focuses on white middle-class mothers, assumes mothers are the primary caretaker of their children and downplays how social identities such as race and ethnicity inform approaches to mothering. Moreover, research on Latinx mothers and families focus primarily on immigrants and their children. As a result, little is known about how the second and later generations approach parenting once their families are established in the U.S. and no longer consider themselves immigrant families. Her study will examine native-born Latinx mothers’ experiences and approaches to motherhood. She will conduct in-depth interviews to better understand how U.S.-based concepts of race complicate and inform how Latinx mothers engage in caregiving.