The ideological construction of mother identity in the discourse of four women of the lower socio-economic group from Santiago,Chile

Abstract

This article examines the different ways in which a group of Chilean women of the lower socio-economic group dynamically construct their identity as mothers. The data collected through qualitative interviews were analyzed bringing together insights from the Appraisal Framework and Critical Discourse Studies. The findings show that these mothers instantiate three evaluative patterns to represent themselves: the mother-instructor, the attached mother and the striving mother. The linguistic resources deployed in the construction of these roles include the repeated use of modulation of obligations directed both at themselves and at their children in order for the latter to become socially valued through access to education. In addition, they construct their identities through the voice and affective behavior of their children, positioning themselves as the most important figure in their lives. The patterns of self-representation displayed suggest that these women’s only source of validation is their maternal function and their children’s love, in a context of poverty and invisibilization.

Keywords

Appraisal framework Critical Discourse Studies maternity mother identity

Introduction

This article is concerned with the tensions and multiple identifications involved in the ideological construction of mother identity in the discourse of a group of women of the lower socio-economic group from Santiago, Chile. Following postmodernist views on the self (Beck, 1992; Giddens, 1991), identity is conceived in this article as fragmented, reflexive and in constant conflict, as a consequence of societal changes produced by globalization. The exposure to multiple cultural models produced by emergent social dynamics has resulted in the fragmentation of the self (Gergen, 1991) whereby the individual starts experiencing a variety of identities, giving rise to conflict and uncertainty.

Maternity, which is a historically evolving and cultural construct, holds different representations and meanings according to different situational and temporal contexts in which it is inserted. It is a concept closely tied to the representation of femininity and upbringing, having a great impact on the identity construction of women and their position, in society (Duarte and Gonçalves, 2007; Fuller, 2004; Molina, 2006). Research on mother identity has shown that the traditional model of motherhood that considered maternity to be the core of feminine identity – intensive mothering (Hays, 1996) – has changed to the extent that nowadays women have found external sources of identification, such as their occupation and individual projects; thus maternity is no longer perceived exclusively as a biological function, but rather as a choice (MacKinlay and MacVittie, 2011; Podnieks and O’Reilly, 2010; Schwarz, 2007).

In Chile, investigations on the representation of motherhood conducted from a number of disciplines (e.g. anthropology, psychology, sociology, nursing, among others) state that the social changes brought about from the process of democratization has improved Chileans, life conditions in general, and women’s in particular, giving way to modified representations of family and motherhood, thus leaving behind patriarchal representations of maternity, in which women were reduced to their reproductive function (Ansoleaga and Godoy, 2013). Some legislative initiatives aimed at defending women’s rights have allowed for political and cultural legitimation of gender equality as well having a higher valuation of women in Chilean society (Álvarez Vicente, 2012; Salinas and Lagos, 2014; Sharim, 2005). As a result of these political and cultural changes, women nowadays have an increased participation in the workforce, where they have achieved better and more equal conditions, according to El Programa de las Naciones Unidas para el Desarrollo (hereafter, Programa de las Naciones Unidas para el Desarrollo (PNUD), 2014). These studies have stated that women’s active participation as workers has resulted not only in an income source, but also – and more importantly – in a feeling of empowerment and in the capacity to undertake individual projects.

These cultural changes, however, do not occur homogeneously across all social groups, since historical, social and cultural factors constrain the way in which mothers construct their identities. In contexts of vulnerability and poverty, the focus of this study, several factors such as adolescent pregnancy and school dropout constrain the way in which women construct their mother identity, which ultimately hinder their experience as mothers.

This article, in consequence, aims to analyze the ideological construction of mother identity as expressed in the discourse of four mothers from the lower socio-economic group of Santiago, Chile.

The participants’ social stratification was carried out by adapting the model used by the Chilean Market Research Association, which assigns a specific score to Chilean homes according to the following variables: (1) profession or occupation, (2) level of education, (3) family per capita income and (4) place of residence (Asociación de Investigadores de Mercado (AIM), 2009; Rasse et al., 2009). Based on the scores obtained, the Chilean population is divided into five socio-economic groups. For this particular study, however, we condensed these groups into only three, that is, upper, middle and lower socio-economic groups, in order to be able to compare our results with those of other studies using the same parameters. As a sampling criterion, only those mothers with the lowest scores, that is, prototypical cases of the lower socio-economic group, were considered in this study.

By means of bringing together the insights of the Appraisal Framework (Martin, 2000; Martin and White, 2005) and Critical Discourse Studies (Fairclough, 2010; Van Leeuwen, 2008; Wodak and Benke, 2003), we attempt to explore the appraisals and the voices included in these mothers’ discourses from an integrated perspective, tackling the micro(linguistic) resources and the macro(social and cultural) contexts involved in the construction and (de)legitimation of mother identity.

Theoretical framework

Identity and maternity

Research on mother identity has been conducted in a plethora of disciplines such as discursive psychology (Edwards, 2009; Johnston and Swanson, 2004, 2007; Swanson and Johnston, 2003), anthropology (Montecino, 1991), cultural studies (Lagarde, 1990; Sanhueza, 2005) and sociology (Ehrenberg, 2000; Larrain, 2000), among others. These investigations address the discursive and socially constructed identity of mothers from a postmodern approach that assigns discourse an essential role in identity formation. As a consequence of numerous societal changes brought about by globalization and neo-liberal economies – a period referred to as postmodernity (Beck, 1992; Giddens, 1991) – the exposure to multiple models and to complex social dynamics has resulted in the fragmentation of the self (Gergen, 1991), giving rise to multiple and heterogeneous identities that cause conflict and uncertainty.

This fluid and conflictive view on identity takes account of the different social and cultural contexts that constrain mother identity construction, assuming that there is not just a single way to be a mother, but multiple modes in different historical periods (Darré, 2013). In this article we adopt this relational and fluid approach to maternity that cannot be separated from the social and cultural contexts in which it takes place. In the following subsections, we provide a brief background of the ideologies surrounding the concept of maternity and the way in which these beliefs influence maternal practices. In addition, we shortly refer to the meanings and representations of maternity in the Chilean context and finally, we present some factors that constrain mother identity in the poorest sectors of the country.

Maternity − meanings and representations

The meanings and representations of maternity vary depending on the temporal and situational contexts. Because maternity is a social construct closely related to the representation of femininity, it has a great impact on the construction of women’s identity and their place in society. Motherhood ideologies,¹ traditions and relational dynamics are all aspects that both influence and constrain women regarding their identity construction and their experience as mothers since they involve interpretations about the ideal of womanhood and upbringing practices that ultimately constitute a source for female identification (Duarte and Gonçalves, 2007; Fuller, 2004; Johnston and Swanson, 2007; Molina, 2006). These ideologies are important for an in-depth understanding of mother identity since ideological discourses create subject positions that are (de)legitimized, which additionally generate expectations related to the performance of different practices (Hall, 2003).

Psychoanalysis and attachment theory (Fonagy, 2001) have had an influence on the legitimation of women through their maternal function: that of raising morally and emotionally stable future citizens, thus contributing to a harmonious society (Fuller, 2004; Molina, 2006). Maternity seen from these theories was perceived as a source of realization, an ideal and, as such, has been considered to constitute the nucleus of female identity and valuation for centuries in patriarchal societies (Fuller, 2004; Montecino, 2005). This is the ‘intensive mothering’ ideology (Hays, 1996) that assigns mothers complete responsibility for children’s upbringing.

Maternity in the Chilean context

As in most Latin-American societies, in Chile the representation of the mother in mestizo (mixed race) culture (Montecino, 2005), and from the Catholic Church (Larrain, 2000; Montecino, 2005; Pacheco and Caballero Vallejo, 2014), has had a great impact on the way Chilean mothers construct both their femininity and their maternity. This image depicts the indigenous and sacred mother who establishes a strong bond with her children, a link that symbolizes the greatest expression of sacrifice – an intensive mothering ideology. From this perspective, women are considered to be the carriers of the virtues of purity, dedication and abnegation, functioning as a source of identification for Chilean women (Montecino, 2005).

Since the recovery of democracy in 1990, after 17 years of dictatorship (1973–1990), many authors concur that the social and cultural changes brought about by postmodernity have resulted in a new context for Chilean women, and accordingly for mother identity construction. In current President Michelle Bachelet’s government (2014–2018), a number of reforms (e.g. maternity leave, anti-discrimination, divorce and domestic violence laws, among others) that tackle gender inequalities in politics, health and social security have been introduced with the aim of, on the one hand, providing women with better life conditions and, on the other, overcoming contexts of historical subjection (Álvarez Vicente, 2012; Salinas and Lagos, 2014). These social programs targeted at different female groups have allowed for political and cultural legitimation of gender equality as well as a higher valuation of women in Chilean society, beyond their maternal role (Salinas and Lagos, 2014; Sharim, 2005). Consequently, there has been a rise of ‘postmodern’ discourses about maternity that consider it as a planned event in women’s lives, or even not part of their plans at all (Sanhueza, 2005; Schwarz, 2007; Sharim, 2005). While these researchers indicate that this is the case for middle-class Chilean women, there are some others who state that rather than a real transformation, there has been a symbolic change in the representation of maternity, without a concrete realization in social and maternal practices (Álvarez Vicente, 2012; Castilla, 2009; Pacheco and Caballero Vallejo, 2014; Suárez-Villegas, 2014; Tobío, 2012), as mothers continue to report being in charge of home work, being inherently responsible for their children and, depending on the negotiations with their partners, accessing the workforce (PNUD, 2014). In consequence, even if there has been an evident improvement in women’s social and political conditions, unequal distribution of workload is still the most likely scenario in the private sphere. Moreover, these cultural changes do not occur equally across socio-economic groups (Baeza, 2015; Castilla, 2009) since mother identity varies depending on historical, social and individual contexts. Our question here is how do mothers in lower socio-economic groups build their mother identity in contexts of vulnerability and poverty?

Maternity and poverty in Chile

As opposed to those from the middle or upper classes, impoverished mothers have less access to education, childcare, formal employment and opportunities for promotion, facts that negatively interfere with the way they experience their motherhood and how their identities are constructed. There is a causal relationship between adolescent pregnancy, education access and poverty, which has led to the ‘feminization of poverty’ (Kliksberg, 2014) in Chile as well as in other Latin American countries.

Adolescent mothers usually achieve a lower level of schooling, which limits the possibilities of accessing a well-paid job or formal work (González et al., 2013). For this reason, mothers from lower socio-economic groups are predominantly employed in the occupations of housekeeping or cleaning which, besides lacking social recognition, often lack social security (Álvarez Vicente, 2012). Because for these mothers work is a necessity – not a matter of choice, as is the case for middle- or upper-class mothers – and since they often lack access to childcare, mothers of lower socio-economic status tend to opt for flexible work, usually without a contract or social security (Ansoleaga and Godoy, 2013) in order to be able to reconcile both productive and reproductive work, causing a vicious circle that hinders social mobility.

Mothers from the lower socio-economic group, therefore, are at a disadvantage in respect of experiencing cultural changes in maternal practices, as is the case in upper socio-economic groups. The aim of this article is thus to analyze the ideological construction of mother identity expressed in the discourse of a group of four mothers in the lower socio-economic group of Santiago de Chile. We attempt to analyze the voices included in their discourses as well as the appraisals involved in their identity construction. In addition, the investigation aims at finding out the types of identities that are (de)legitimized by this group of mothers, at an interpretative level. With this investigation, our aim is to contribute with the identification and functioning of the evaluative linguistic resources involved in identity construction and their instantiation in discourse, in an area of scarce exploration.

Analytical and methodological framework

The research described in this article is part of a larger research project that is concerned with the identity construction of a group of 12 working mothers from three socio-economic groups – upper, middle and lower – in Santiago, Chile. By means of an intentional sampling (Flores, 2009), four mothers from each socio-economic group were selected to take part in the original study. This particular article explores the ideological construction of mother identity in the discourse of four mothers – prototypical cases – from the lower socio-economic group in Santiago, Chile. The analysis of the data was carried out by employing the Appraisal Framework (Martin, 2000; Martin and White, 2005) and Critical Discourse Studies (Fairclough, 2010; Van Leeuwen, 2008; Wodak and Benke, 2003). These approaches are complementary, given their socio-semiotic orientation to language, as a system of options to create meanings. In addition, due to the fact that the speaker’s or writer’s opinion reflects the value system not only of that person but of their community, the appraisal system is a useful analytical tool that collaborates to analyze how ideologies that lie behind every text are codified in discourse. If we understand ideologies as value systems of a community or of a subgroup of a community, evaluation is a key linguistic concept of the Critical Discourse Studies perspective. As Hunston and Thompson (2000) remark, ‘ideologies do not exist in silence, but neither are they usually expressed overtly. They are built up and transmitted through texts, and it is in texts that their nature is revealed’ (p. 6).

The Appraisal Framework, underpinned by Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL hereafter), which developed from J.R. Martin and colleagues’ early work in genre in primary schools (Martin, 2014), originated in an attempt to explore the rhetorical effects associated with different choices made in the lexicogrammar stratum; specifically, how the contextual variable of tenor (Martin, 1992) – the constitution of social roles, power and ideological solidarity – is a key factor for interpersonal variation in the social context. The Appraisal Framework seeks to map the codification of social reality from the (inter)subjective meanings in three systems: ATTITUDE, ENGAGEMENT and GRADUATION.

ATTITUDE comprises semantic options for evaluating people’s behavior and people’s emotions, as well as entities, things and events (Martin and White, 2005), through the three semantic regions of AFFECT, JUDGMENT and APPRECIATION. The subsystem of AFFECT relates to affective and emotional evaluation, positive or negative, regarding (un)happiness, (in)security, (dis)inclination and (in)satisfaction. JUDGMENT, on the contrary, provides linguistic options for expressing appraisals of behavior, positive or negative, in terms of Social Esteem (normality, capacity, tenacity) and Social Sanction (veracity and propriety). Finally, the APPRECIATION subsystem offers resources for evaluating Reaction (impact and quality), Composition (balance and complexity) and Valuation of products, processes and entities, in terms of positive or negative values (Martin and White, 2005). Attitudes can be explicitly realized in discourse (inscribed), or they can be implicitly expressed (invoked) through appraisal tokens (Martin and White, 2005) given by contextual or co-text cues.

ENGAGEMENT provides the options for managing and incorporating different voices into discourse, as well as the potential for aligning or disaligning with the positions brought about. Lexico-grammatical resources of modalization (probability/habituality), modulation (obligation/disposition), polarity (positive and negative) and concession (counter-expectancy), among others, are organized into two systemic options: heteroglossia or discourse that acknowledges other stances, which allows for contracting (via disclaiming or proclaiming) and expanding (through entertaining or attributing) alternative positions to that of the authorial voice, and monoglossia, which admits no other positioning (Martin and White, 2005).

Attitudes and interpersonal values are gradable, thus semantic options for grading attitudes can be organized in the third subsystem: GRADUATION. Attitudinal meanings, consequently, can be intensified and quantified in FORCE, and sharpened or softened in FOCUS. These systems are involved in the expression of implicit evaluation by means of attitude tokens (Macken-Horarik and Isaac, 2014; Martin and White, 2005), such as, for example, lexical metaphors or intensifiers, that provoke or invite an evaluative response from the reader/hearer, depending on how much inference work they have to carry out. Evaluative language is not expressed in discrete elements, but rather the accumulative effect of interpersonal meanings is prosodic in nature. Appraisal, since it is based on the expression of interpersonal meanings, is realized prosodically (Martin and White, 2005) so that the resources are accumulated in discourse, creating an evaluative prosody (Martin and White, 2005; Oteíza and Pinuer, 2012).

Corpus/research participants

The corpus of this study consists of the lifestories (Bertaux, 1989, 2005; Ferrarotti, 1988, 2007) of four mothers belonging to the lower socio-economic group of Santiago, Chile. These participants were contacted through the ‘snowball’ technique (Bertaux, 2005) and had to meet the following requirements: (1) they had to be part of the lower socio-economic group of Santiago, Chile, according to the sampling criteria mentioned in the Introduction section – for this, they completed a socio-economic survey, and only those who met the ratings that positioned them in the lower social stratum were considered suitable for the study; (2) in order to control age variables, the mothers’ age had to fall within the range of 20 to 40 years; (3) they had to be full-time workers; (4); and their children had to preferably be school-aged (3–18 years of age), because this is the period during which they depend more on their mothers.

The actual mothers in this study, whose ages range from 23 to 40 years, work full time as cleaners (Eva² and Ana) and housekeepers (Ofelia and Fran). Only two of them completed high school (Fran and Ana), whereas the remaining two (Ofelia and Eva) dropped out in middle school since they had to work to help with the family income. As these women became mothers while adolescents, they had to begin working at a very young age, thus resorting to their own mothers for childcare.

Data collection method

We chose life stories (as part of the biographical method) for the data collection method because besides allowing for focusing on the individual’s identity, it also permits reflection on family issues, the individual’s social practices and the place they occupy in society (Bertaux, 2005). To achieve this, it is advisable to conduct at least two interviews per participant, and research informants should not be fewer than four for each social context (Cornejo et al., 2008). For that reason, the four life stories that took part in this investigation were collected in two semi-structured, co-constructed interviews (45-minute long interviews) per participant that were recorded and later transcribed. While the first interview aimed at exploring the mothers’ experiences in terms of their childhood, social networks and communities of practice, the second interview’s focus was on the thematic dimensions of maternity, mothering practices, work, childcare and family. Even though there was this thematic axis that guided the interview, participants had enough freedom to talk about any aspect related to maternity. In fact, the excerpts included in this article were not elicited, but rather freely emerged during the interviews.

Data analysis

The analysis of these mothers’ discourses is carried out in three phases, namely, a descriptive, an interpretative and a triangulation phase, congruent with the principles of Critical Discourse Studies. After the interviews were fully transcribed, we sought the excerpts dealing with the aforementioned thematic axis, that is, any extracts containing the dimensions of self-representation as mothers, maternity, mothering practices, childcare and family. Once we had extracted all these excerpts from the interviews, we first used the Appraisal Framework to identify the social actors involved, how they were evaluated (ATTITUDE and GRADUATION systems), and the sources of evaluation (ENGAGEMENT system). In order to have a comprehensive theory dealing with the micro(linguistic analysis) and macro(social reality) levels involved in these mothers’ identity constructions, we turned to the principles and methodologies proposed by Critical Discourse Studies for the second phase of analysis, where the evaluative discourse strategies of reference, predication and legitimation (Van Leeuwen, 2008; Wodak and Benke, 2003) – which construct discourse semantics resources – were analyzed with the lexico-grammatical resources. The final phase of analysis is one of integration that considers the evaluative discourse strategies in relation to the context of production and consumption of the analyzed discourses, as well as their social practices.

Analysis and results

In this article, we explore the ways in which these four women of the lower-socio-economic group discursively represent themselves as mothers. After analyzing all the excerpts from the interviews, we found that the women in the sample tend to construct their mother identity in relation to various aspects, mainly concerning the maternal instruction they provide their children with, the maternal bonding that exists between them and their children and the sacrifices they make as mothers, which constitute the three dimensions that we present below. Given that identity construction may take many forms and, as such, it is difficult to grasp on the whole, we decided to group these mothers’ patterns of self-representation into three dimensions for analytical purposes. These dimensions, which emerged from data analysis, depict to a great extent the mother identity these women affiliate with. These are as follows: (1) the mother-instructor, (2) the attached mother and (3) the striving mother.

Mother-instructor

The women in this study construct a positive identity as a mother who is responsible for educating her children – and who is proud of it – mainly through positive appraisals that are not explicitly targeted at them, but rather at their children’s behavior, and to the way they have been brought up. By means of positive Judgments directed to their offspring’s Propriety (‘I myself have him well-bred’, ‘He behaves well’), these women simultaneously position themselves as mothers with the capacity to raise well-behaved children. Some of the most representative examples of these realizations are presented below:³

Example 1

Until this moment I⁴ myself have him⁵ quite upright, thank God, quite upstanding. Yes, he behaves himself well, thank God, my son […]. I’ve also had trouble raising my son but thank God I already have him well-bred and upright, because my son, I already have him raised he’s big now. (Eva)

Hasta este momento me lo tengo bien derechito gracias a dios bien paradito/sí, no si se porta bien gracias a dios mi hijo […] igual me ha costado criar a mi hijo pero gracias a dios lo tengo bien criado y bien paradito/porque a mi hijo ya lo tengo criado, ya está grande . (Eva)

In this first example, the mother (pseudonym ‘Eva’) expresses positive judgments toward her son’s moral integrity by appraising how he grew into an ‘upright’ and ‘upstanding’ adolescent, someone who, in addition, ‘behaves well’. While building her son’s character, she is simultaneously constructing herself as a competent enough mother who, despite having ‘trouble’, was capable of raising a child with such virtuous qualities. The target of the evaluation expressed, thus, is twofold: at the same time that she positively appraises the child’s behavior, the mother is explicitly alluding to her maternal capacity of bringing up a principled young person.

At the same time that judgments are actualized in discourse, these inscriptions also realize Affects of Satisfaction. Thus, ATTITUDE realizations are likewise dual: the mothers position themselves as capable mothers in the difficult task of raising virtuous children and, at the same time, feel proud of the outcome. This is further reinforced when viewed at the lexico-grammar stratum. In the example, the inscription of Judgments of Capacity (‘I myself have him quite upright’/‘me lo tengo bien derechito’) is realized in Spanish grammar by the possessive clitic particle ‘me’ and the dative clitic ‘lo’, construction labeled as ‘dative of interest’ (Maldonado, 1994), whose function is mainly affective and commonly used in colloquial and family contexts by the Chilean working classes. The sense of pride is further emphasized by the Spanish verbal construction ‘lo tengo criado’ (‘I have him raised’), which gives a sense of completeness. This is similar to the English causative form ‘have something done’, yet in Spanish it is the mother as the agent who carries out the action. These two lexico-grammatical realizations – datives of interest and causative constructions – together with some other elements discussed later color these mothers’ life stories, at discourse-semantic level, with meanings of pride for their duties as mothers, which ultimately endow them with self-worth.

Continuing with example 1, Eva frames her mother-instructor identity not only through positive appraisals toward herself, but also by means of negative appreciations aimed at the complexity involved in her child’s upbringing (‘I’ve also had trouble raising my son’). Yet this negative contrast serves to emphasize her role as a capable instructor mother. The counter-expectancy resource that follows (‘but thank God I already have him well-bred’), realized through the adversative conjunction ‘but’, brings the negative appreciation down and gives way to the aforementioned causative construction, underscoring her mother-instructor role with the positive Judgment of Propriety ‘well-bred’. The meaning of exceptionality brought about by counter-expectancy further positions this mother as someone who is exceptionally capable of raising her child ‘well’, especially considering her social, cultural and economic difficulties.⁶ GRADUATION plays a key role in amplifying attitudes related to the mother-instructor role. Intensification, given by Force, is often realized in these mothers’ discourses by the repetition of lexical items. In the case of example 1, the repetition of ‘bien’, which in English functions as an adverb of manner such as ‘well’ (‘he behaves himself well/se porta bien’), or of quantity such as ‘quite’ (‘quite upright/bien derechito’, ‘quite upstanding/bien paradito’), infuses her discourse with positive appraisals.

Mother-instructor – expectations of their children

A sub-dimension underlying the construction of a mother-instructor identity is related to the expected outcome this role may have on their children’s development. Maternal guidance, besides reinforcing the son’s moral values, is directed toward the development of the children’s capacities acquired through formal education in order to obtain social valuation and recognition.

The following excerpt, also taken from Eva, expresses this mother’s expectations of her son:

Example 2

I try to instill in him many things that are good in life/above all that he studies and that he finishes something off⁷ tomorrow/I say to him: ‘I work, I work as a cleaner ’, I say ‘but if you make an effort, you’ll achieve it, if not, you won’t, and everything works with effort’/and for him to be somebody in life/I say to him: ‘or you’ll end up like your Dad, your Dad looks after cars’⁸ I say ‘on the street, those aren’t good things’ I say to him, ‘and you have to make an effort, for yourself’/‘Yes, Mom, I’m going to be somebody in life’ He says to me. (Eva)

Trato de inculcarle hartas cosas que son buenas en la vida/lo que más que estudie y que saque algo el día de mañana que/yo le digo: ‘yo trabajo, yo trabajo haciendo aseo ’ le digo ‘pero si te esforzai, lo vai a lograr, si no no, y todo es con esfuerzo’/y pa que sea alguien en la vida yo le digo: ‘o vai a estar como tu papá que tu papá cuida autos ’ le digo ‘en la vía pública’, no son cosas buenas, le digo yo ‘y tú tenís que esforzarte por ti’/‘Sí, mamá, voy a ser alguien en la vida’, me dice. (Eva)

In general, what these mothers expect is related to their children’s potential access to ‘be somebody in life’. This is realized at discourse semantic-level through the inscriptions of positive judgments alluding to the children’s capacities, which are in turn realized at lexico-grammatical level by means of the idiomatic expression ‘to be somebody’ and by processes whose aspect implies completeness (‘finishes something off’, ‘achieve’, ‘get his study off the ground’).

The value of effort is also strengthened throughout these mothers’ discourses, in their mother-instructor role, as a quality they expect their children to acquire. Thus, the mothers inscribe positive Judgments of Tenacity through material processes (‘make an effort’) and also through the use of nominalizations (‘effort’).

While mothers express these positive judgments toward the behavior they are instructing their children to develop, they are simultaneously evoking negative judgments of their own capacity – not regarding their maternal ability, but related to their worth as socially accepted and valued women. The use of the idiomatic expression ‘to be somebody’, which expresses future desire, implies that their daughters/sons may not be worthy of such a statement, and neither are the mothers – especially considering that Eva explicitly refers to her occupation (cleaning), expression that invokes a negative Judgment of Capacity. The evocation is drawn from counter-expectancy, in the form of the adversative conjunction ‘but’ (‘I say to him: “I work, I work as a cleaner,” I say “but if you make an effort, you’ll achieve it, if not, you won’t”’). What this heteroglossic resource does is to downplay her occupation (‘cleaner’), implying that that is one of the main factors for her not to be considered as ‘somebody’. The way to avoid this status is through ‘effort’ and through finishing high school. Negative polarity (‘not’, ‘won’t’) also plays a role in emphasizing the consequences in the event of the child failing his mother’s expectations; that is, he would remain being ‘nobody’.

Mother instructor – duties of both mother and children

The affiliation with a mother-instructor identity is further realized in these mother’s discourses by means of a constant dialogue with their children, exchange that takes the form of a series of deontic mandates in an attempt to modulate their children’s behavior. These mothers’ discourses accumulate meanings of obligation, which are realized in the lexico-grammar stratum by the modal verb ‘have to’. The modulations act as a heteroglossic resource, which in terms of ENGAGEMENT contract dialogistic alternatives, since one position is rather imposed on them. Thus, these directives are what the mothers consider to be what is morally correct – tenacity and capacity – and also the means that will eventually allow their children to be ‘somebody in life’.

This sense of duty is also applied to themselves in the form of maternal obligations that will later contribute to the achievement of their children’s objectives in life. These obligations are related to what they sense correspond to their responsibilities as a mother, in terms of nurturing and also in terms of devoting time to their children’s studies. The following are excerpts taken from Eva and Fran:

Example 3

To know that I have to raise my son well/I have to work because there’s my son, one has to get him his things. That was the drive. (Eva)

O sea, de saber que tengo que criar bien a mi hijo/no, yo tengo que trabajar porque está mi hijo, a él hay que darle sus cosas, así que no, ése fue como el empuje. (Eva)

Example 4

I’m not going to continue with my studies because one has to dedicate time to Alejandra’s⁹ studies. Because I arrive back home to study with her until 9 at night. (Fran)

No voy a estudiar porque ehm hay que dedicarle tiempo a la Alejandra en los estudios de ella, porque yo llego de aquí a estudiar con ella hasta las 9 de la noche. (Fran)

In example 3, Eva realizes three instances of her obligations as a mother. In the first case, she makes use of the modal verb ‘have to’ projected in a mental clause to express that her obligation as a mother is to raise her son ‘well’ (‘to know that I have to raise my son well’). The remaining modulations are in a relation of cause and effect, that is, in order for her son to get ‘his things’, she has ‘to work’. It is interesting to note that Eva uses the Spanish modal verb ‘hay que’ (‘one has to’), which is the most impersonal form of modals expressing obligation, rendering the imposition as something external to the individual, exerted upon by society. Providing their children with their basics is thus for Eva a natural or inherent obligation of mothers.

In the case of Fran (example 4), she states that she could not study gastronomy after finishing high school because of her daughter’s need to succeed in primary school studies (‘I’m not going to continue with my studies because one has to dedicate time to Alejandra’s studies’). As with the previous example, this mother conveys obligation in an impersonal manner (‘one has to’), considering it naturalized imposition that a mother should study with her daughter, while the opposite is not true regarding her own studies.

These obligations directed to the mothers are usually linked to work and providing for their children, and are associated with negative appreciations relating to the ideational meanings ‘lack’ and ‘need’. The following example illustrates this:

Example 5

I lack this, I lack that, or he needs I don’t know, a sweatshirt, but I have to do it, I’m not alone, I’ve got my son and I have to give him things to eat […], I have to work. (Eva)

me falta esto, me falta esto otro, o necesita no sé po un polerón, pero es que yo lo tengo que hacerlo, no soy sola, tengo a mi hijo y yo a mi hijo tengo que dejarle cosas pa comer […] yo tengo que trabajar. (Eva)

The attached mother

The next dimension these mothers affiliate with is the attached mother, which is constructed through the voice of their children. The role of ENGAGEMENT is pivotal since most evaluations, mainly affective, come from the insertion of their children’s comments through either a resource of extravocalization¹⁰ or by attributes describing their behavior that depicts these children’s affective bond with their mothers:

Example 6

The girls are loving to me, kind, so is Joe […] when I get back from work he hugs me, kisses me, and he goes kissing me, sometimes he goes pinching me, he goes pinching my butt back there, he grabs my leg, he grabs me there, and I say: ‘Hey, stop it!’ and he says to me: ‘I love you’. And Christian is also a mommy’s boy , he’s my baby . (Ofelia)

Las chiquillas son cariñosas conmigo, atentas/el Joe también […] cuando llego del trabajo me abraza , me da besos /y anda dándome besos , de repente me anda peñiscando /me anda peñiscando el pompis atrás, me agarra la pierna, me agarra pal otro lado/y yo le digo: ‘ya pos córtala’ y me dice: ‘te quiero’/y el Cristian igual es regalón po, ese es mi conchito . (Ofelia)

As the example shows, Ofelia’s discourse is imbued with appraisals that irradiate an affective prosody. Ofelia positions herself as an attached mother by narrating how her children treat her, what they do when she comes back home and what they say to her. The attributes by which she describes her daughters and her youngest son inscribe positive Affects of Happiness (‘they’re loving to me’, ‘ kind ’). The oldest boys, on the contrary, are described in terms of their affective behavior toward their mother, through the use of material processes with an affective nature (‘he hugs me’, ‘he kisses me’, ‘kissing me’, ‘pinching me’, ‘grabbing me’), which evoke positive Affects of Happiness. In addition, Ofelia directly quotes the words of one of her sons through a resource of extravocalization, insertion (‘He says to me: “I love you”’), demonstrating with verbal evidence that her children love her. These inscriptions and evocations saturate these mothers’ discourses with an affective load that depicts a very intimate and loving relationship between mother and children, constructing themselves as attached mothers and as the mosts important figure in their children’s lives.

The striving mother

The last dimension relating to the construction of mother identity we want to explore here is the striving mother. The notion of sacrifice in these mothers’ discourses is related to the actions they perform in their children’s upbringing as well as to those aimed at providing for them which prevent their children from experiencing a lack of any kind:

Example 7

I work everything for my kids, I don’t have any limits for them. If they need anything, I make the effort and I buy it. Sometimes I need to buy something for myself, but I leave it behind , I leave it behind for them, for example for their snacks, for their school materials, or sometimes they want to buy a pair of pants. I work only for them. All of what I make is for them not to lack anything, so I don’t want them to go through any need. (Ana)

Yo trabajo todo pa mis hijos po, yo no tengo límites pa ellos po/si ellos necesitan algo yo me lo esfuerzo y se lo compro po/a veces yo necesito comprarme algo, pero lo dejo de lado, dejo de lado las cosas pa ellos, po, por ejemplo pa la colación, pa cosas del colegio, que sus materiales, que de repente quieren comprarse un pantalón, pucha yo trabajo pa ellos no más po/todo lo que yo me gano o hago por ahí es pa que a ellos no les falte nada po/entonces yo no quiero que ellos pasen ninguna necesidad. (Ana)

This example shows the extent to which a mother makes sacrifices for her children. The role of the striving mother is realized through the inscriptions of positive Judgments of Social Esteem, showing how tenacious these mothers are when it comes to providing for their children (‘I work everything for my kids’, ‘I make the effort’, ‘All of what I make is for them’). The drive for this sacrifice is the desire that their children will never lack anything, with emotion expressed by the inscription of a negative affect (‘I don’t want them to go through any need’). At the same time, the lack of goods is expressed through inscribed negative appreciations (‘If they need anything, I make the effort’, ‘All of what I make is for them not to lack anything’, ‘I don’t want them to go through any need’), further emphasized by negation. Ana also evokes positive Judgments of Social Esteem regarding her tenacity by stating that she places her children’s desires above her needs. She thus inscribes a negative appreciation, stating that even when she ‘needs’ something, she prefers satisfying her children’s needs (‘Sometimes I need to buy something for myself, but I leave it behind, I leave it behind for them’). The invokation of the positive judgment is carried out through both counter-expectation (‘but’) and by the repetition of her actions (‘I leave it behind, I leave it behind’). Counter-expectation allows for replacing a dialogistic alternative (‘Sometimes I need something for myself’), with an exceptional action that opposes expectations (‘but I leave it behind, I leave it behind for them’). This further reinforces her striving mother role.

Discussion and conclusion

This article aimed to address the ideological construction of mother identity expressed in the discourse of four mothers from the lower socio-economic group of Santiago, Chile. The results show that the evaluative patterns of these discourses create three general mother identity constructions, all of which realize distinct evaluative strategies: (1) the mother-instructor, (2) the attached mother, and (3) the striving mother.

The mother-instructor role is constructed by a combination of two systems, namely, Judgment of Propriety/Capacity, and Affects of Satisfaction. The evaluative strategy they use is to explicitly praise the character of their children in terms of their propriety, which at the same time allows them to implicitly position themselves as mothers who have had the capacity to raise their sons according to the socially expected moral values, and who feel proud of their role. Their identity as a capable mother who provides their offspring with moral values is thus legitimized, and their feeling of pride derives from having overcome continued difficulties in the upbringing of their children. The virtuous way in which their children have been raised becomes a source of pride in their own capacity as mothers. This predicational strategy (Wodak and Benke, 2003) is realized at lexico-grammatical level through a construction called ‘dative of interest’ (Maldonado, 1994), very common in Chilean working-class women.

Their mother-instructor identity is further realized by the expectations these mothers have of their children that are related to the achievement of becoming ‘somebody in life’, particularly through the access to education and the value of effort. This expression is associated with the discourse of success driven by consumption in Latin American societies (Duarte Quapper, 2009), which naturalizes the link between identity construction and the possession of material goods (Bauman, 2000), achieved through formal education and hard work. Education thus plays a key role for social mobility and social valuation, so much so that their discourses are infused with modulations directed to regulate their children’s behavior in the hope that they will complete their secondary studies, and so achieve the opportunities these mothers were denied.

The sense of duty is also directed to them in their mother-instructor role, especially when related to the ideational meanings – with negative evaluative load – of ‘lack of’ and ‘necessity’. This modulates their behavior toward working and providing for their children, activities perceived as inherent maternal obligations. The use of impersonal modulations of obligation expresses the extent to which these mothers have naturalized the responsibility of their children’s future. Work for them is not a matter of choice as it is for mothers in upper socio-economic groups (Salinas and Lagos, 2014; Schwarz, 2007), but rather it is an obligation to provide at least the very basics for their children, for lack of work means lack of food and other essentials for their children.

The second evaluative strategy these mothers deploy is that of the attached mother, a role that is constructed through the voice and affective behavior of their children. By means of an affective prosody realized through explicit and implicit Affects, these mothers position themselves as the most important figure in their children’s lives and emphasize their inextricable mother–child bond. The love of their children, together with maternity as a whole, provides these women with a sense of fulfillment and self-worth, constituting the main – if not the only – source of validation.

The last evaluative strategy used by these mothers is the construction of a striving mother identity through the inscriptions or evocations of positive Judgments of Tenacity. The values of sacrifice are mostly invoked in their discourses through lexical metaphors and graduated meanings via the repetition of actions that consistently place the desires of their children above these mothers’ own needs. The explicit realizations, realized by the lexicalization of the noun ‘everything’, relate to doing whatever it takes for their children, especially to prevent them from experiencing any lack as these women did in their childhood. The main intensification strategies (Wodak and Benke, 2003) they use to emphasize their role as striving mothers include negative appraisals toward the difficulties experienced in upbringing and counter-expectation meanings. These negative appreciations all stem from having raised their children by themselves, with no support from the children’s fathers, and in extreme conditions of poverty and vulnerability. However, these difficulties trigger a series of selfless actions they carry out for their children, which come across as exceptional activities by means of the use of counter-expectancy resources.

The evaluative strategies used in the construction of different mother identities by the women in the sample are inevitably constrained by their cultural and social backgrounds, which constitute similar scenarios across the poorest socio-economic groups (Muñoz et al., 2013). These conditions comprise many of the factors that contribute to poverty as a vicious cycle that ultimate leads to the feminization of poverty (Kliksberg, 2014). Adolescent pregnancy in the mothers of the sample had a considerable influence on either school dropout or on only completing secondary studies, in an attempt to provide for their children through informal work, or disprivileged occupations such as housekeeping or cleaning (Álvarez Vicente, 2012). In addition, three of the four mothers in the sample were left alone in the upbringing of their children since the children’s adolescent fathers exhibited a ‘behavior of escape’ (Kliksberg, 2014), which is very common in Chile’s poorest socio-economic groups. Thus, these mothers formed single-parent families, in which the entire responsibility for the children’s moral and emotional development, as well as for the basic survival needs, falls upon themselves. Considering these mothers’ backgrounds, therefore, it comes as no surprise that maternity becomes for these mothers a source of realization and validation. In a context in which not only their capacities but also their identities are invisibilized, these mothers become salient through their maternal function: that of raising upright children who, through the values of effort and access to education, may reverse their mothers’ invisibilization by achieving social recognition and valuation.

This article argues that cultural transformations in the concept of maternity brought about by postmodernity in global terms, and by the implementation of gender equality programs in a local sense, do not seem to occur equally across socio-economic strata.¹¹ In the lower socio-economic groups, at least in the sample that took part in this investigation, traditional representations of motherhood – and the mother identity constructions derived from them – are still prevalent and adopted by mothers who naturalize the innate (material and moral) responsibility toward their children, not only because of their ideological constraints, but rather because the only figure on whom those duties can fall is themselves.

Footnotes

Declaration of conflicting interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.

Notes

Author biographies

Consuelo Gajardo is currently a 4-year PhD candidate in the Linguistics Program at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile and has an MA in Applied Linguistics. She works as Adjunct Professor at the same university, and her research interests concern Discourse Studies, Critical Discourse Studies, Systemic Functional Linguistics and Educational Linguistics.

Teresa Oteíza is an Associate Professor at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. Her research has focused on the valorative prosody in the discourse of history and on the pedagogical discourse of history. She is the author of El discurso pedagógico de la historia: un análisis lingüístico sobre la construcción ideológica de la historia de Chile (1970–2001) (Frasis, 2006) and En (re) construcción: Discurso, Identdad y nación en los manuales escolares de historia y ciencias sociales (with Derrin Pinto; Cuarto Propio, 2011).

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