ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses each of theideologies as separate ways of thinking; then, most importantly, it turns to the ways they weave together to create a pattern, a fabric, both a curtain and a cage. The ideology of patriarchy is perhaps the easiest to understand of the ideologies that shape motherhood. The term 'patriarchy' technically means 'rule of fathers', but in its current practical usage it more often refers to any system of male superiority and female inferiority. Patriarchal kinship is the core of what is meant by patriarchy: the idea that paternity is the central social relationship. From these ideologies of patriarchy, technology, and capitalism one get the supportive fabric for the strange patterns one see emerging. The most obvious application of the technological ideology to motherhood has occurred in the medicalization of pregnancy and of childbirth.
