The Everyday Politics of Parenting: A Case Study of MamaBake

ABSTRACT

The narratives about the decline in political participation are as frequent as they are familiar. The great irony of these narratives, however, is that they occur at a time when citizens have more avenues to voice their opinions than ever before. This article uses a coding framework to analyze political talk occurring on the Facebook page of an Australian community group, MamaBake. It highlights two important but often overlooked trends: political talk can take place in various forums, which do not necessarily have any links to the formal political sphere; and these discussions enrich the everyday politics of the private sphere. However, these new forms of enacting politics usually go unrecognized, reinforcing the dominant narrative of passive, disinterested citizens. Overall, it argues that contemporary research should be sensitive to alternative understanding of politics, to construct a more accurate picture of how politics is enacted in both online and off-line spheres.

KEYWORDS:

• Australia
• everyday politics
• MamaBake
• political talk
• process politics

Notes

1. Indeed Marsh et al. (2007) go so far as to argue that class and gender are themselves political “lived experiences,” rather than variables to be used to explain engagement or nonengagement in arena politics.

2. For a selected list of media appearances, see http://mamabake.com/media/

3. (Distributed) Denial of Service.

4. The movement also has a Web site (www.mamabake.com), but because the discussions take place on the Facebook page, the Web site has not been included in the analysis.

5. For Bennett and Segerberg, collective action is based upon centralized coordination, community organizing, and campaigning in the traditional media. In contrast, connective action relies on shared voluntary self-expression expressed in and developed through the formation of large social networks.

6. Lactation/breastfeeding activist.