Deirdre Flynn

Susan Liddy

The Routledge Handbook of Motherhood on Screen offers a comprehensive global analysis of the representation of Mothers and Motherhood in contemporary screen industries and online spaces. Over five distinct sections, this handbook examines how the complexities and realities of contemporary motherhood are translated to the screen. Offering a full scholarly overview of the field, this handbook provides a ground-breaking and important contribution to our understanding of motherhood on screen. The geographical and genre reach of the handbook presents new ways of theorising and reframing current scholarly debate, and gives a wide-ranging and comprehensive contribution to knowledge of on-screen representations. An international team of established scholars and emerging voices provide analysis of representations from around the world, spanning a breadth of genres. The chapters situate transnational screen representations of motherhood in the 21st Century and assess the implications of contemporary representation of motherhood. Thoroughly challenging and expanding understandings of motherhood and mothers, this handbook will be an essential multi-faceted publication for researchers and students of film, TV, animation, motherhood, gender studies, feminism, ageing studies, anthropology and sociology.

The Routledge Handbook of Motherhood on Screen

This book explores the challenges facing women from their mid-forties as they attempt to build/maintain careers in the screen industries. Essays are concerned with the intersection of gender and age on screen and behind the camera and how that can create a ‘double jeopardy’. Existing research in this area has been primarily directed to onscreen representation. Female actors, with notable exceptions, struggle to get screen time and expansive roles as they age. Behind the camera, women 45+ also face challenges and roadblocks; to date, less attention has been directed to this group. The cross-cultural research in this collection offers an analysis of representation, on and off screen, touching on film, television, streaming services and film festivals. It includes an exploration of gendered ageism, age bias and stereotyping. It also highlights the achievements of mature female practitioners who, in their work and working lives, embody a resistance to restrictive cultural discourses about ageing women.

Falling off a Cliff?

Women, Ageing and the Screen Industries

Women in Irish Film: Stories and storytellers is an interdisciplinary collection that critically explores the contribution of women to the Irish film industry as creators of culture - screenwriters, directors, producers, cinematographers, editors, animators, film festival programmers and educators. This book will explore the experiences and reflections of Irish women practitioners and, across a range of chapters, will situate them within a very specific historical, social and cultural context and further position them within a male dominated film industry. In an accessible style, it rigorously teases out the myriad of ways that gender impacts on who has the power to speak and be heard in the film industry. The absence of women has implications for the kinds of stories being told, the diversity of characters on our screens and for employment and creative opportunities. This collection teases out the impact of women's presence and absence. It also contextualizes that contribution by interrogating why women are so underrepresented in the film industry. What factors lie behind their absence and marginalization and what steps can be taken, and are being taken, to reconfigure the landscape? An exclusive focus on women in the Irish film industry has been notably absent from publications to date. This book is long overdue and builds a nuanced picture of the underrepresentation of women in the Irish film industry. Importantly, it is anticipated that this collection will put a solid research foundation in place and forge a pathway for future scholarship.

Stories and Storytellers

Women in the Irish Film Industry

Anne O'Brien

This interdisciplinary and international volume offers an innovative and critical exploration of the impact of motherhood on the engagement of women in media and creative industries across the globe. Diverse contributions critically engage with the intersections and overlap between the social categories of worker and mother, and the work of media production and maternal caregiving. Conflicting ideas about, and expectations of, mothers are untangled in the context of the working world of radio, film, television and creative media industries. The book teases out commonalities between experiences that are evident across a number of countries, from Hollywood to Bollywood, as well as examining the differences between class, religion, maternal status and cultural frameworks that surround working mothers in various nation states. It also offers some possibilities for ways forward that can improve the lives of women workers who are also mothers. A timely and valuable contribution to international debates on equality, mothers and motherhood in audiovisual industries, this book will be of interest to scholars and students of media, communication, cultural studies and gender, programmes engaged with work inequalities and motherhood studies, and activists, funders, policymakers and practitioners.

Negotiating the International Audio-Visual Industry

Media Work, Mothers and Motherhood

The chapter Experiencing Male Dominance in Swedish Film Production” is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

Susan Liddy

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