The Professionalization of Parenthood: Between Common Sense and Expert Knowledge

Abstract

This article considers the professionalization of parenthood as one of the key tendencies in contemporary Russian parenting culture. Parenting culture is a set of care practices that are embedded within the certain meanings and ideological contexts of both a particular social group and society in general. Professionalization can be conceptualised as a process whereby expert knowledge (medical, psychological, pedagogical) penetrates into the everyday practice of child care. The professionalization of parenting involves a variety of actors: the mass media, social policy, public and independent experts of childhood. In this article we examine self-help literature for parents as one of the agents in the parenthood professionalization process. Handbooks published for parents represent one part of an expert knowledge system that has been adapted for mass readers and contains criticism of everyday and conventional ideas about childcare. On the basis of methodology used to assess the popularity of books, such as the number of published copies, readership levels on parent Internet-forums and the evaluation of sealed copies by vendors, a sample of fifteen Russian books was formed. Employing the use of discourse analysis, the meaning behind the responsibility zones of experts and parents is reconstructed in these popular books. The authors found and conceptualized three types of parent professionalization in these books. Firstly, there is professionalization based on individual experience, which prioritize individual, often biologically defined, care practices as the basis of knowledge about the child. This corresponds to the institutionalized, standard expert view of a ‘normal child’. Secondly, we found professionalization based on expert knowledge. This type of professionalization is found in books where the experts are prior agents in signifying parenting practices. Parent’s specific knowledge and everyday understandings are ignored or presented as harmful and dangerous for child. The knowledge and practices of childcare are medicalized and related to treatment and hygiene. Thirdly, there is professionalization based on ‘common sense’. This type of professionalization is based on critical reflection that parents should undertake, both in relation to the expert’s advice and everyday notions about good childcare. In conclusion, we consider why these three types of professionalization are popular in a Russian context. It can be argued that the current neo-liberal trend in social policy strengthens the demand for parents handbooks.