When Words Fail Us: Mother Time, Relational Attention, and the Rhetorics of Focus and Balance

Standpoints of Maternity Leave: Discourses of Temporality and Ability

“…Much like Gilbert and von Wallmenich's (2014) research participants, who found conventional language describing the different employment-relational rhythms of their lives to be inadequate, our participants found the corporate language of disability to be out of sync with their lived experience of mothering and even perplexing because they did not perceive themselves as disabled. Simultaneously, however, they appreciated how the language could be used for their benefit.…”

“…Their agency to do otherwise was constrained by financial realities (e.g., pink-collar workers' lower pay in comparison to white-and blue-collar workers; see Women's International Network, 2003) but also seemed to have been linked to U.S. societal beliefs that paid (i.e., linear or clock) time has more value than other kinds of time, particularly time for caring activities (i.e., time for physical healing, relational work, and so on, that indicate life-cycle and life-event time orientations; see Ancona, 2001;Gallos, 1989;Gilbert & von Wallmenich, 2014;Wood, 1994) in contrast to other countries that have extensive leaves. Indeed, all participants said that they would like to have had maternity leave extensions.…”

“…With President Barack Obama's call to revisit and revise family leave to assist U.S. families in managing work and family needs (see Council on Women and Girls, 2014; Eilperin & Zezima, 2014), perhaps language can be crafted to lessen the (dis)ability tensions and to achieve understandings that disability and ability as well as work and family are necessary contrasts that enrich each other rather than act as antithetical terms, that they intersect differently based on context and perpetuate gendered workplaces (Scott, 1998). Even so, as Gilbert and von Wallmenich (2014) note, the problems are rooted deeply in language itself and the value judgments about women's relational experiences. Even in the language of disability the temporal order of contemporary life emerged: time spent in the activities of caregiving and mothering is valued so little in comparison to employment that one would need to be "disabled" to even consider not engaging in paid work, thus forfeiting ideal worker status.…”

“…For example, Sandy reported that while her supervisors and coworkers were "very nice" and supportive throughout her pregnancy, leave, and return to paid work, she perceived their attitude about her return as being "you had your baby, now it's time to get back to work." Now that their leaves were over, they should refocus on work (see Gilbert & von Wallmenich, 2014). Now that they had their babies-apparently considered a singular event with temporary workplace repercussions rather than a whole life change and new set of role obligations and long-term consequences-they should reorient or "get back" to their work, where time is a proxy for performance and their presence or face time signaled their commitment to their work role (Bailyn, 1993;.…”

“…They may now be mothers, but their time primarily has been and will be spent in the labor force. The disruptive "off" in time off paid work meant that they were off the clock (on break in chronological time), off the temporal and linear rhythm of career and labor patterns (Buzzanell & Goldzwig, 1991;Buzzanell & Lucas, 2006; see also Gilbert & von Wallmenich, 2014), and off of the most important aspect of their lives-the aspect that regulates their time throughout their life course, namely, paid work. Their language and conceptualization of time implied devaluation of time for caregiving and for activities not associated with money.…”