Temporally inexpensive, affectively expensive: Digitally-mediated maternal interpersonal ties in the perinatal months

Abstract

This article presents findings on the Internet and maternal interpersonal connections in the critical "perinatal" period before and immediately after childbirth. Drawing on qualitative interviews and online data from a range of digital sites, I advance the central argument that digitally-mediated interpersonal connections are critical components of contemporary motherhood, but that these ties have complex positive and less than positive nuances in the perinatal period. Unpacking this argument in three steps, I first discuss how the moral weight of motherhood in neoliberal societies, rendered particularly visible in the perinatal period, complicates a central boundary in the study of online interpersonal relationships between information and communication. Second, I note the relative significance, in emotional terms, of temporally-contained social ties in digitally-mediated perinatal connections. Third, I consider how the material and emotional roles of traditionally held-to-be-important offline maternal support networks are re-negotiated, re-positioned and even bypassed through online ties.