Abstract
A reified and patriarchal form of Christianity that emphasizes “family values” – that is, adherence to the formula of a male-headed, heterosexual, capitalist, nuclear family, characterized by distinct, complementary, and hierarchical gender roles as essential to the well-being of individuals, one’s nation, and the ecumenical Church - over “community values” has become a happy bedfellow of the market system and neocolonialism, extending its reach worldwide through globalization. The result is that single mothers constitute the most economically oppressed demographic internationally across all race and ethnic categories. Using Constructivist Grounded Theory and a postcolonial feminist theological lens to collect, retell, and evaluate the stories of single mothers in cross-cultural fieldwork in both the United States and South Africa, this project will analyze the factors, theologies, and practices embodied and created by Christian single mothers that either empower social activism and collective identity or undermine the motivation and means to organize for liberating social action for single mothers.
Degree Date
Winter 12-21-2019
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Ph.D.
Department
Religious Studies
Advisor
Joerg Rieger
Second Advisor
Jill DeTemple
Third Advisor
Crista DeLuzio
Fourth Advisor
Gerald O. West
Subject Area
Religion
Number of Pages
450
Format
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 License
Recommended Citation
Feuerbacher, Haley, "The Unmarried (M)Other: A Study of Christianity, Capitalism, and Counternarratives Concerning Motherhood and Marriage in the United States and South Africa" (2019). Religious Studies Theses and Dissertations. 19.
https://scholar.smu.edu/religious_studies_etds/19
Included in
Africana Studies Commons, Christian Denominations and Sects Commons, Christianity Commons, Ethics in Religion Commons, Missions and World Christianity Commons, Other Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons, Practical Theology Commons, Religious Thought, Theology and Philosophy of Religion Commons, Women's Studies Commons
