Bonnie Fox, When Couples Become Parents: The Creation of Gender in the Transition to Parenthood. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2009, 334 pp. $35.00 paper (978-0-8020-9184-0), $75.00 hardcover (978-0-8020-9183-3)
Gillian Ranson, Against the Grain: Couples, Gender, and the Reframing of Parenting. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2010, 214 pp. $28.95 paper (978-1-4426-0358-5)
Babies create dramatic life changes for adults, arguably the most striking of the life course, and for sociologists, they create a theoretically rich arena in which to examine gender. The birth of a baby impels women and men to negotiate and renegotiate how to earn and care for the next generation, and as they do this, gender relations and inequalities come into sharp focus. Two recent books, When Couples Become Parents: The Creation of Gender in the Transition to Parenthood, by Bonnie Fox, and Against the Grain: Couples, Gender, and the Reframing of Parenting, by Gillian Ranson, take up important sociological questions intimately embedded in how rearing children affects adults’ lives in a gendered society. Read more
CJS Blog publishes news about the Canadian Journal of Sociology, including abstracts of forthcoming articles, and links to advance versions of book reviews.
