Valerie Heffernan is Professor of Literary and Cultural Studies at the National University of Ireland Maynooth. Her research interests encompass 20th and 21st century literature and cultural studies. Her current research focuses on the representation of mothers, motherhood and mothering in contemporary culture.

Gay Wilgus is Associate Professor in the Graduate Program in Early Childhood Education at the City College of New York, The City University of New York. Her recent research has focused on motherhood, carework, and early childhood teacher preparation in Spain, France, Belgium and Ireland.

Introduction: Imagining Motherhood in the Twenty-First Century - Images, Representations, Constructions

Valerie Heffernan and Gay Wilgus

1. Situating Single Mothers through Values-Based Cartooning

Penelope Mendonça

2. Lesbian, Bisexual and Queer Motherhood: Crafting Radical Narratives and Representing Social Change through Cultural Representations

Elizabeth Reed

3. Mothering across Languages and Cultures in Ying Chen's Letters to Her Children

Egl¿ Käkut¿

4. On the Margins of Motherhood: Choosing to Be Child-Free in Lucie Joubert's L'Envers du landau (2010)

Julie Rodgers

5. Post-Feminist Fatherhood and the Marginalization of the Mother in Cormac McCarthy's The Road

Berit Åström

6. Rethinking Constructs of Maternity in the Novels of Elena Ferrante and Alice Sebold

Katrin Wehling-Giorgi

7. Mending the Torn Fragments of a Relationship: An Interview with Sarah Strong

Valerie Heffernan