Reading Guide: Motherhood

My Body, Our Body?

“A Matter of Choice” by Ophelia Alcantara-Dimalanta

  1. What is the author’s position on motherhood? What is her tone? What type of language does she use to discuss motherhood? 
  2. The author writes, “What is sad, dear life-that-never-is is you will never have known the unreasoning logic of this gift: this one of never having to be born, this one regret that must be nipped too soon before it grows into a monster of a lifetime loathing.” Traditional motherhood values the child’s life over the mother’s. How does Alcantara-Dimalanta’s poem re-represent, or rather, put into question, this notion? How can one’s own maternal instincts persuade them not to have a child? Can one be a mother without a child? What does it mean to be maternal?
  3. How can we understand the gift of life, or rather, the gift of death in her work? (Reference the following quote: “What is sad, dear life-that-never-is is you will never have known the unreasoning logic of this gift: this one of never having to be born, this one regret that must be nipped too soon before it grows into a monster of a lifetime loathing. There you are, nubbin of a sorry love quashed dead in your tracks before life’s dawning threshold, stopping short of all there is to non-living: the smell of poverty, rotting in a swill of endless need, a reek that sticks on like gadflies around their prey, the random spill of illness, filth, the slop…”)
  4. How does the author view abortion? How does she treat motherhood as an agentive choice? 

“Tribeswoman” by Marra Pl. Lanot

  1. How does Lanot view motherhood currently and historically? Is she speaking to the past or the present?
  2. Why do you think the author titled the piece “Tribeswoman”?
  3. How is the “fruit of the womb” motif used as an extended metaphor for child rearing? How are women’s bodies seen as part of the general premise of Mother Nature? (Refer to the section Mother Earth and the Nature of Womanhood) 
  4. What language does Lanot utilize to voice her desire for bodily autonomy?

Grief of Mothering

“Daughter” by Conchitina R. Cruz

  1. What is the author’s tone? Who is the audience? 
  2. How does Cruz express grief in the poem? What role does nature play in managing this grief? For whom is she grieving?
  3. How does the narrator view her body in retrospect? What does her body mean to her?

Maternal Instinct or Obligation?

“Magnificence” by Estrella Alfon

  1. Who is the audience of the short story? How does the tone change?
  2. What message does Alfon try to send through this story? 
  3. This story openly reveals the serious issue of child molestation and sexual assault in Philippine society. What advice does Alfon give in combating this issue? In her opinion, what is the role of a mother? 
  4. What significance does the title “Magnificence” lend to the story?

“The Birth” by Reine Arache Melvin

  1. In Melvin’s short story, we are presented with a mother, Patricia, who is still coming to terms with the birth of her infant daughter. How does the author present the inner conflicts of motherhood and mothering? (Refer to “Mothering and Motherhood: Experience, Ideology, and Agency”)
  2. Re-read the quote: “Patricia stroked its cheek, curious to see if some instinct stirred in her. Nothing. No pride, no tenderness, no warmth. Only the certainty that she could not be a mother to Santiago’s child, and shame that it did not know how little she could give it.” How does Melvin approach themes of bodily autonomy and societal obligation? How does she critique the intimate ties between “obligation” and “instinct” in motherhood, and more broadly, Philippine culture? 
  3. Review the first section of the course that discusses female archetypes. What archetypes can you see in the story? 
  4. What criticisms does Melvin make about motherhood?
  5. What other themes are present in the story? How do they interact with motherhood?

Mother the Martyr

“Mother’s Break” by Merlinda C Bobis

  1. What language does Bobis use to describe women and mothers? 
  2. How does Bobis criticize and praise elements of motherhood while empowering women? What effect does the quote “She rips off apron and womb to strike a regal pose under the infinity of strings of wash. Drenched in midday glow, her colors show beyond her husband’s myth – wife, woman, whore at times – but she is real now!” have on you, the readers? 
  3. How does Bobis seek to separate womanhood from motherhood? How is femininity tied to motherhood? How do you interpret the phrase “aproned with her womb again”?
  4. How is motherhood a performance? (Skip to the section “The Performance of Gender” in reference to the quote: “She rushes back to them, to all of them auditioning for love.”)
Thematic Questions:
1) How do all of the pieces put womanhood in conversation with motherhood? Do you think any one story is more effective in sparking this dialogue than others? 
2) How do these stories interpret the archetypes of the wife, the mother, and perhaps the mistress?