Blast Course: "Bad Mothers—in Literature, On Screen, and Across History"

BLAST COURSES IN THE HUMANITIES (from AGHI on Hopkins@Home)

Dates: Mondays/Thursdays from July 13th through August 14th (5 weeks)

Class Type: 2 recorded videos per week (with one live group meeting TBD)

Course Description: What makes a bad mother? Why do so many works of fiction—from classic works of literature to present-day TV and film—center around bad mothers? And how do important factors, especially those rooted in race and class, feature in the decision about who is a “bad” mother? This course takes up these questions in order to consider what counts as mothering. We will ask how it came to be understood as natural, perhaps as the cornerstone of womanhood itself, but also how characters across fiction and outside it have shown the problems with this supposedly instinctive ideal. Across this 5-week Blast Course, we will focus on five topics: 1) “Introducing the ‘Bad Mother,’” across fiction and history; 2) the ideal of the “Angel in the House”; 3) the horror of the “Monster/Mother”; 4) the question of whether “A Mother’s Work” is ever done; and 5) looking at the present and future of “Mothers, Assisted.” Some works considered will include Medea, a variety of fairy tales, Leave It to Beaver, The Babadook, Pride & Prejudice, Schitt’s Creek, and Parasite. Insights from thinkers including bell hooks, Toni Morrison, Dorothy K. Roberts, Adrienne Rich, and Audre Lorde will help us as we re-consider the bad mothers all around us.

Open to the public

_{[image credit: "Great Gatsbys" by Kate Beaton (Hark! A Vagrant) (c) 2010]}