Laughing at the Good Mum: Representing and Challenging Dominant Motherhood Discourses Through Humour on Instagram

Abstract

The intensive motherhood discourse establishes norms around what is socially considered a ‘good mum’. Social media platforms like Instagram contribute to the widespread reach and reproduction of these norms, although pockets of resistance have been found. Building on humour's capacity to both reinforce and subvert social norms, and its wide circulation on Instagram, this study explores how mum humour contributes to the representation, reproduction and contestation of contemporary motherhood discourses. Furthermore, we sought to understand what mothers take from mum humour and how this shapes their positioning toward these discourses. We identified ten mum humour influencers and selected their five most liked videos for analysis. We also ran a focus group with mum humour followers. Our paper considers three themes that illustrate how mum humour navigates contemporary motherhood: gentle vs. traditional mums; real vs. ideal mums; and overloaded mums vs. good dads. Regarding mum humour's functions, we identified three themes: craving realness, solidarity, and private resistance. Overall, we found that mum humour (seemingly) challenges the good mum ideology and cleverly exposes the asymmetric gendered expectations that sustain it. However, it was discouraging that, at least among our participants, resistance to these unrealistic demands remains largely confined to their private sphere.