Do Men Mother? Fatherhood, Care, and Domestic Responsibility; Andrea Doucet

As increasing numbers of mothers with young children participate in the work force, increasing numbers of fathers are performing as primary caregivers. Granted, those latter numbers remain quite small. While mothers still outnumber fathers as primary caregivers, more men have taken on caregiving. Whether resulting from employment disruption, or mothers out-earning fathers, Canada has seen an increase of stay-at-home fathers and a decrease in stay-at-home mothers. In a culture dominated by ideologies of motherhood, feminist scholars have exposed the various “myths of motherhood.” Many of these same scholars have explored men’s roles in the home, arguing that men are equally capable of providing the nurturing and care historically deemed “natural” for women. In Do Men Mother?: Fatherhood, Care, and Domestic Responsibility, Andrea Doucet explores the world of fathering by asking, when men care for their children, are they actually “mothering?”

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