• Mums, Dummies and Dirty ‘Dids’: the dummy as a symbolic representation of mothering?

      Whitmarsh, Judy (Wiley InterScience., 2008)
      The bio medical expert literature, although contested, associates the use of dummies, soothers or pacifiers, with illness, dental malformation, impaired speech and language, and working-class mothering. This article suggests this negative perspective has filtered, via experts and the media, into public narratives of ‘good’ mothering. Interviews with 20 disadvantaged mothers demonstrate the complex negotiations undertaken to integrate dummy use into their personal ‘good-mothering’ narratives. Representing their hitherto ignored voices in the dummy debate allows a consideration of the context of, and influences on, dummy use. The article argues that rather than a symbol of inadequate working-class mothering, dummy use is a complex, highly negotiated, situated mothering practice.
    • The Good, the Bad and the Pacifier: unsettling accounts of early years practice.

      Whitmarsh, Judy (London: Sage Publications Ltd., 2008)
      In this article, interviews with eight managers and questionnaires from 75 practitioners are analysed to explore their perceptions of the role of pacifiers (or dummies) within the nursery. Managers and practitioners source their knowledge from the media, family/friends, and short professional speech and language courses; however, their perceptions of pacifiers derive from mainly contested research that has filtered into the public domain. This creates tensions between perceived parental rights to offer a child a pacifier, current UK guidelines and participants' own, often ambivalent, views. The article engages with Foucauldian concepts to explore how authoritative knowledge filters into everyday practice and to deconstruct relations of power within the early years setting.