"Pronatalism: Discourses and Counter Discourses," by Sarah Benesch

Why and how are women pressured to have children? Sarah Benesch's brilliant book, "Pronatalism: Discourses and Counter Discourses," explores this important and timely topic. What are the forces in society that push women to become mothers, whether they want to or not, and what are the ways we talk about (in our "discourses and counter discourses") the choices women make in this regard? The author approaches the topic from various angles, including historical, social, cultural, and ideological aspects of pronatalism. Benesch, a well-known scholar of Applied Linguistics, accomplishes the difficult balance of writing a well-researched and revelatory scholarly book that is also very readable and accessible for a more general audience. Each chapter focuses on a different aspect of pronatalism, and I learned from each one. One of my favorite chapters (regular readers of this blog will not be surprised to hear!) is the one on great women authors from the past and present, such as Virginia Woolf, Simone de Beauvoir, Rebecca Solnit, and Ann Patchett, all of whom chose to be childfree. Another favorite, since I am an academic myself, is the chapter on the struggles of academic women when choosing whether to have children. I also appreciate very much Benesch's generosity, in one of the last chapters, in being willing to make herself vulnerable by sharing her own experiences and feelings while she was making the choice about whether to have children. I highly recommend this thoughtful, beautifully written book.