Young mothers: Discursive constructions of their lives and identities

The notion that early motherhood is a significant problem for society is widely documented in the academic literature, and there is a complicated history surrounding young pregnant and parenting women in social and educational policy contexts. Less is known about young mothers themselves and how they experience the social and material effects of early motherhood. The purpose of this study was to examine how young mothers, who attended a young parent program in Lake City in Victoria Australia, experienced early motherhood and how they contested the social discourses that framed their lives. Using a poststructural lens and drawing on the work of Michel Foucault, this thesis used narrative inquiry and discourse analysis to examine the complex nature of seven young mothers’ lives. Analysis of the narrative data showed that despite the complexities, early motherhood was a significant turning point as the young mothers drew on resources of resistance and responsibility to transform their lives. An analysis of the social welfare policy practices identified surveillance and regulation measures as responses to alleviate long-term welfare dependency but did not account for the structural and economic barriers that young mothers encountered in their lives. In educational contexts, the young mothers in this study had experienced disrupted education trajectories before moving to an alternative setting. The findings highlight that they were ‘invisible’ in mainstream educational contexts and while ‘learning from the margins’ in the young parent program. This study found that the voice of the young mother was missing in the social and educational policy discourses, and the complexities of early motherhood were not accounted for within the policies. This thesis argues that young mothers’ voices need to be included in strategic policy responses to address issues of inequity and reduce the structural and economic barriers faced by young mothers.Doctor of Philosoph