Motherhood in SF
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- From the Bible to the popular song,
- There's one theme that we find right along.
- Of all ideals they hail as good,
- The most sublime is Motherhood.
- Tom Lehrer, "Oedipus Rex"
Motherhood is one of the ways by which patriarchal culture defines women. Contrast "fatherhood".
In SF, motherhood may be used in several ways:
- playing out the standard trope that the fiercest fighters are mothers defending their young -- e.g., women turn to violence to protect or avenge their children. See, e.g., Terminator 2; see Aliens (girlchild provides Ripley the opportunity to defend a child); see Buffy's mom - nobody lays a hand on my daughter.
- Motherhood, and pregnancy, as a way for bad women to be redeemed. See, e.g., Darla's pregnancy in Angel (the soulless vampire woman gains a soul through carrying a souled fetus; she kills herself to bear the child ), and Ellen Barkin's character in Switch (the soul of a sinning sexist dead man returns in the body of a woman; the soul is redeemed when the woman dies in childbirth). Note that here, "motherhood" is defined solely by pregnancy/labor/delivery. (This also provides convenient orphan or motherless status to a character.)
- Mother is sainted or awesome or important because she is giving birth or destined to give birth to The One, almost always a male. See, e.g., Dune; the Virgin Mary in Christianity.
- The horror reversal -- In horror, the ideas associated with motherhood -- love, tenderness, protectiveness -- may be transformed or recontextualized to create the sense of horror. Abusive mothers, mothers who eat their young, mothers who love their monstrous young ("That Only a Mother" by Judith Merril; Grendel), etc.; the evil mother who teaches her children to be evil or is willing to use them (e.g., Home (X-Files episode); Deadly Departed (Blood Ties episode 1x05))