Adrienne Pine was in a jam. The assistant anthropology professor at American University was about to begin teaching “Sex, Gender & Culture,” but her baby daughter woke up in the morning with a fever. The single mother worried that she had no good child-care options.
So Pine brought her sick baby to class. The baby, in a blue onesie, crawled on the floor of the lecture hall during part of the 75-minute class two weeks ago, according to the professor’s account. The mother extracted a paper clip from the girl’s mouth at one point and shooed her away from an electrical outlet. A teaching assistant held the baby and rocked her at times, volunteering to help even though Pine stressed that she didn’t have to. When the baby grew restless, Pine breast-fed her while continuing her lecture in front of 40 students.
Now Pine finds herself at the center of a debate over whether she did the right thing that day and what the ground rules are for working parents who face such child-care dilemmas.
MORE.
[+]
The professor's essay/response is pretty fantastic: http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/09/05/exposeing-my-breasts-on-the-internet/
ReplyDelete"I disagree thoroughly with your concept of what should be news (the righteous claim that “we owe them an explanation” about breastfeeding- would you “owe them an explanation” if I menstruated in class as well?"
She's an anthropology professor who teaches "Sex, Gender, and Culture" and she brings her baby and breastfeeds in the middle of the first class. I call that genius, even if she might not have intended it. Too bad the students can't appreciate the lesson they're learning.
ReplyDeleteMy first thought was it was a genius move, as well; possibly even scripted in the manner of most "reality" shows. Those making a big deal out of this need to look up "irony."
DeleteGiven the class she was teaching I'd say it was a great way to spark a discussion!!!! I hope she has tenure though.
ReplyDeleteAnd why am I not surprised it's the local Fox affiliate that is pumping this story....
This whole thing pisses me off so bad. If she'd been a man who brought his sick baby in and bottle-fed it, the students would have been all "Ohhhh, isn't that cute! What a great dude!"
ReplyDeleteDoesn't she have ANY local network at all? She didn't exactly sound enthused about bringing her baby to class, and what would have her reaction been had a student done the same thing?
ReplyDeleteCharles Ives was once asked by a pianist, "Mr. Ives, this chord has 14 notes! How do I play it?"
"Don't you have any friends?"
Reading further, I find that a "friend" charged her $140 to look after the child for a day. Some friend.
DeleteI suppose I should insert the disclaimer here, that breastfeeding is, indeed, banal. But bringing your baby to class is not professional, emergency or no.
DeleteAs I asked, doesn't she have any local network at all? A colleague who would look after the baby while she was in class? Anything other than someone who charges $140 a day?
Given the standard US maternity leave-time of "six weeks to get over the C-section and then get your ass back in class, or lose your job, you lazy fucking slacker", I am not surprised that she had to bring the baby to class. And given the complete mess that is child care facilities anywhere, I am not surprised her arrangements fell through. We've had faculty leave TT jobs here because they put in a full year trying and couldn't find child care anywhere in the vicinity.
DeleteIf she doesn't have a 'local network' - I don't; my entire family is somewhere else - that is surely a cause for sympathy, not a reason to revile her further.
I suspect that the friend she found was a child care professional, or someone who was willing to forgo some other hourly labor. That's why it cost real money: people's time is worth something, even if they're not academics.
DeleteI'm not sure that having a local network should be a requirement of holding down a job, especially not in academia, which values/requires extreme mobility.
ReplyDeleteI would, however, be in favor of a much better child-care network (including emergency care for sick children, perhaps even provided by the employer?) being available to all. Trying to care for a sick child (in whatever way is needed) while also trying to teach a class is not an ideal scenario for succeeding at either activity. There's also the question of whether, if the U.S. had paid maternity leaves (as many countries do), she would have been in the classroom at all. One can debate the merits of that one,too (at the very least, it should be paid parental leave), but at least she'd have had more choices.
I may be about to step in it with both feet here, but I'm sincerely asking.
DeleteHow long a period of time are you talking about for paid maternity leave? If the baby was crawling around on the floor, got too close to an electrical outlet, and put a paperclip in its mouth it is beyond "infant stage" approaching toddler level. My recollection of my own kids put that at about 6 months or so. That's obviously far beyond the typical 6 weeks of maternity leave allotted.
A school I used to work at only provided 2 weeks maternity leave for both professors and graduate students. Professors were expected to give up their sabbatical for it (which, I suppose, makes sense--but is ultimately pretty crappy since neither new dads nor new moms are usually using their time with their baby to also write a book, so this policy hurt the tenure chances of parents of both genders who wanted to stay home with a new baby).
DeleteCivilized countries give parents one year, split between the two of them.
DeleteAs one who often encounters scheduling demands of parents in my department with babies, I would love for the maternity leave to be a year, split between parents, and a year, if one is a single parent.
DeleteA year does, indeed, seem to be the period many countries have settled on, and with good reason, I think. It coincides with the recommended period for breastfeeding in the U.S. (though both recommendations and personal choices about that vary widely, and emphasizing breastfeeding tends to assume maternal leave, which may or may not be the best choice for any particular family).
DeleteAt the very least, I'd argue that leave should extend until the baby, and hence the parents, are sleeping through the night most nights. That, too, varies a lot, but 6 weeks is not enough.
Six weeks is nowhere near enough. 1 year split between 2 parents works. If Mom takes the first 6 months (which makes sense since she's the one whose body needs to recover) she can still breastfeed after she goes back to work, if she wants, because the baby is on solid food by then, and you can make do with morning & evening x 2 feedings.
DeleteYet the world continues to spin.
ReplyDeleteFirst it can very difficult to get child care for a sick child- most centers won't take them because they can expose the other children. Also, she may have a fine network of friends, but perhaps most/all of them are working professionals also.
ReplyDeleteAll true, Charlotte and Cassandra. I would strongly support (and vote for) a European-style maternity and child-sick-leave policy that would obviate the need for this situation. But we don't have it yet. And if the child is sick, meaning that she can't be left at day care because of the hazard to others, perhaps it's also inappropriate to bring her in to work. (Prof. Pine caught the girl's cold, after all. And then went in to work as usual.)
ReplyDeleteI understand Prof. Pine's dilemma. Academia has really, really screwed-up values; in many places, taking a sick day is something faculty just don't do unless they are, themselves, in the hospital. A bit of contingency planning should therefore be done if one is a single parent, and I hope she's learned that important lesson in the midst of this stupid kerfuffle over public wet-nursing. What if, God forbid, she were struck by a car in the parking lot and ended up in the hospital? Who would mind the baby then?
The Army kicks you out if you don't have a plan on file for taking care of your minor children in your absence. The point is that the child is more important.
When I first read this article I thought she was trying to make a point--I mean, given the course she teaches that would have made sense.
ReplyDeleteShe has other options, though maybe she's not a creative enough individual to make use of them. If this were me (I have dogs, not kids, but it's completely possible for one to be sick and for me to not be able to find a sitter at the last minute) I would have gotten into the classroom early with the baby, left the syllabi, and given the students a series of tasks to do via a sign, the blackboard, etc.
After having them read the syllabus, students could disperse into groups on campus using their cell phone cameras to take pictures of gendered language, sex in the media, clothes, whatever and then post these as those groups to Blackboard in order to start a class discussion. Better still, if the syllabus featured readings/topics the class is going to cover, students could have tried to find examples of those things, document them, and then start discussion online of class topics that way.
If the instructor didn't want to completely leave campus, she could have been in her office or somewhere on campus hidden in plain view for them to find as an example of course material with her baby. She could have cheered them on.
The students would probably have enjoyed it and thought it was the best class period ever, even if they did witness her breastfeeding. Or maybe they would have thought it was stupid, but at least it wouldn't have made the news.
In short--there are options. If she wasn't comfortable in her situation and didn't want to cancel class there are OTHER ways of holding class.
Brava!
DeleteI'm betting this prof did not have tenure, though, so was afraid to risk not showing up.
DeleteI'm not recommending she not show up, I'm recommending she use an "interactive student centered" activity on the first night of class. Oh, that uses technology. Showing up ahead of time and setting up an activity/scavenger hunt thing is STiLL showing up.
DeleteShe had a TA, so I wonder why she didn't ask the TA to supervise an activity and step out to feed the baby. This makes me think she wanted to teach a lesson by breast feeding in public, knowing full well that the issue is one that would raise eyes and consciousness to the plight of mothers (and hungry babies) in professional roles.
ReplyDeleteWhile letting a baby crawl on a classroom floor while you are supposed to do your job may sound like the optimal solution, perhaps she could try these options:
ReplyDeleteTake a sick day.
Have a colleague or TA teach the class.
Get a TA to lead your class so that they accomplish at least some minimum amount of learning for the day.
Cancel the class and provide materials for students to get caught up for the next class session.
Find somebody to take care of your kid. This requires much planning but guess what? This won't be the last day your kid is sick. Having a personal network is not a job requirement for faculty but doing your job in a way that doesn't invite the local media to scrutinize your performance is.
This is dumb. Plenty of companies and countries offer backup childcare, drop-off care, work-from-home days, etc. It should not be up to individual women to patch together some half-assed solution. If it is, of course they are going to make mistakes from time to time. Her choices were not professionally wise, but they reflect the poverty of easy, plug-and-play solutions in academe.
ReplyDeleteWell, yeah. But in the era of "planned parenthood" the planning needs to extend to contingencies after the little tyke has emerged from the warm but crowded swimming pool. I can't imagine a department that wouldn't be willing and able to cover for this situation -- at least to the extent of watching the kid during class, or covering the lecture -- but I know I'm pretty lucky in my position and my colleagues.
DeleteA further thought: academics are expected to be smarter than the average bear. That means that they shouldn't require a plug-and-play solution to get things done. As BB noted, you're expected to be able to handle things that come up in a professional manner.
DeleteIntrovert: you're right! It's not like the TA wasn't there insisting to help...
DeleteMy recollection of coping with my first baby was that it was very much a learning experience. It takes awhile to figure out what the hell to do as different emergencies crop up. Eventually you do have a plan for all of them and the second child has a much easier ride. But faced with an emergency she did the right thing in putting her child first. Someone downstream commented on the child crawling on a dirty floor - well, yes, but I have always considered that "immune system boosting". It's good for them. :)
DeleteI am with Merely. There is nothing about getting a Ph.D. or being an intellectual brainiac that prepares you for the soul-sucking sleep deprivation and bodily disintegration that is having a baby and breastfeeding it. The potential for fucking up is extreme. I was amazed that I didn't die in a car accident during my kid's first six months. I was so, so, so incredibly lucky to have a winter baby, a full quarter's leave and spring on "reduced duties" (office hours only, plus the usual with grad students), a summer, and then a year-long fellowship I could take at home. I went back to work full-time when my kid was 20 months old having never been denied a paycheck during that time. By then, yes, I had my network and my childcare and backup childcare solutions, but plug-and-play is exactly what women who must return too soon after giving birth need.
DeleteAnd MEN had plug and play solutions for decades: they were called wives. The successful men in my department still have them.
And also? I cannot imagine my department covering for me, ever, in such a situation. I have a lovely department, but women with serious caretaking duties are on their own.
For me, the breastfeeding isn't the issue... *yawn* Who cares?
ReplyDeleteThe potential danger faced by an ill child crawling on a dirty, public floor without proper supervision is.
My immediate thought was: Why didn't she just take a sick day? Don't we often say this about our students when they are ill and in class, sneezing their nasty little snot-wads all over the place? I mean, it wasn't a test day or anything.
When I was in college, my Women's Studies professor breastfed her 4 year old son while lecturing us. But only after he climbed on her, grabbed her breast and shouted, "Mommy I'm hungry!" about fifty times.
DeleteIt was the first day of class. I'm pretty sure most of us know what would happen if the first day was cancelled--some jerk students would never take the class seriously after that. Some would skip and probably use it as a reason. Cancelling then makes her look less serious than their other teachers. It's stupid because it really is just another day and when that day consists of "here's the syllabus and now tell me your names" we could all miss it, but.... still.....
DeleteHow many fucking times to I have to tell you?
ReplyDeleteNO EATING OR DRINKING IN THE CLASSROOM!
Are you a bunch of selfish little babies?
I draw the line at nursing the little snowflakes.
DeleteThe imagery just made me shudder. I may have nightmares tonight.
Delete