Skip to main content

Search from vocabulary

Content language

Concept information

Preferred term

matroreform  

Definition

  • Matroreform is a term coined by Canadian feminist psychologist and maternal theorist Gina Wong-Wylie in her article, “Images and Echoes in Matroreform: A Cultural Feminist Perspective,” published in a 2006 issue of Journal of the Association for Research on Mothering.She evolved the concept from matrophobia, first introduced by poet Lynn Sukenick. Adrienne Rich, a renowned feminist maternal theorist, in her 1986 work Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution, described matrophobia as occurring when women split themselves in a desire to purge themselves of their mothers' bondage, to become individuals free from the expectation of perfecting a full-time domestic housewife role.Rich goes on to explain that matrophobia is the fear of becoming one's mother, as daughters witness their mothers compromise and struggle to free themselves of the restrictions and degradations of a female existence. [Source: Encyclopedia of Motherhood; Matroreform]

Broader concept

Belongs to group

URI

https://concepts.sagepub.com/social-science/concept/matroreform

Download this concept: