I Do Not Want to be a Weekend Papa

The Demographic 'Crisis,' Active Fatherhood, and Emergent Caring Masculinities in Berlin

Bibliographic Data

ID2348422
AuthorsMeghana Joshi (0000-0003-0042-4041, University at Buffalo, The State University of New York, Buffalo, NY, USA, corresponding author)
Year2021
Volume42
Issue5
Pages883-907
Publication date2021-05-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Family Issues (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0192-513X • E-ISSN: 1552-5481
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0192513x21994154
OpenAlexW3135053767
LanguageEN
Citations received11
References cited29

In this article, I explore German men's relation to the emerging ideal of the father figure in general, and their conceptualizations and practices of this ideal as exemplified in the notion of aktive Vaterschaft (active fatherhood) in particular. I draw upon ethnographic data collected in Berlin (2010-2013) among three groups of West German men who converge in how they conceptualize and seek presence-sensual, emotional, and in absentia-in the lives of their children. Here, paternal labor includes striving for regular contact with one's child through routine care, emotional labor, and/or legal routes. This article, thus, furthers scholarship on forms of paternal labor, arguing that aktive Vaterschaft potentially re-signifies gender roles and destabilizes persistent negative representations of fathers. The contemporary demographic 'crisis,' corresponding policy reforms that encourage male caregiving, shifts in discourses around fathers' roles, and men's social presence as caregivers facilitate and produce these particular forms of caring masculinities

Developmental psychology · Ethnography · German · Political science · Scholarship · Sociology · Gender Roles and Identity Studies · Gender Studies · Law · Psychology · Social Policy and Reform Studies · Social Psychology · Work-Family Balance Challenges

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