An old friend of mine got back from her LDS mission and gave a talk yesterday (erm, sorry about the belated posts... ha ha). Afterwards, family, neighbors and friends co-mingled at her brother's house. One person, after asking me what I was doing, stated, "I didn't know there was such a field as Child Development." Which is understandable... the interdisciplinary approach to social science is relatively new. But another person told me how great a degree in Child Development will be for my kids.
I feel like I come from a culture that believes family should be the primary and, often, only focus for women. Once you have a family, yes, family should be the primary focus. But I'm not remotely close to even finding someone to date, let alone marry, and start making kids with.
The first question someone asked me was, "So, are you dating anyone?"
Nope. I am a loser.
I'm starting to be active again in the Church and I'm having a lot of trouble handling this. Certainly, I hope my possible future family will benefit from all the information I'm gathering and the fact that I will someday (if I ever find someone to love and be loved in return) be a parent does on some level explain why I picked this field. You cannot study developmental psychology without looking at yourself.
But I want to work. I've read a handful of studies that show all the benefits to children, particularly girls, who have working, well-educated mothers. I am incredibly proud of my mom who raised my siblings and I while she worked in law school and as an attorney. Both of my parents taught me that I, with plenty of hard work, could get an advanced degree. But my mom showed me I could.
But, you know, she got a lot of negative feedback. An LDS woman attorney in the 1980s...
Coming back to Utah is strange. So many of my friends are married. A handful of them have children. When I'm in California, I feel normal. 22, single, figuring things out. But in Utah, there must be something wrong with you (and maybe there is something wrong with me?) if you aren't dating. I am open to a relationship, it's just one hasn't happened yet.
This wasn't very scholarly but it hits topics in the vicinity of education. Women in the US in general find themselves in an awful bind between work and family. But when you add in borderline oppressive cultural ideals... well, I think it gets even worse.
-Natalie
1 remarks:
Hey Nat, I just want let you know that the church encourages women to get all the education they can. And though it may sometimes seem that the church and it's members are stuck back in the 1950s it's not; though we feel that overall children benefit from having a parent at home with them, but that not every family is the same and that it won't and can't work out the same for everyone. I don't mean to preach, and I'm sorry if I am. I hope this helps any. I'd love to talk more about this with you.
Janiece
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