MLA 2026-Laboring Mothers, Motherlands, and the Nation: Literary Constructions of Maternal Identity, Work, and Belonging
The maternal figure has long been central to literary imaginings of the nation-state, shaping narratives of belonging, exile, and inheritance. As both metaphor and material reality, motherhood is entwined with national reproduction, kinship structures, and the regulation of bodies, often reinforcing but sometimes resisting dominant ideologies. At the same time, motherhood is a site of labor—both reproductive and economic—raising questions about care work, migration, and the feminization of labor within and across borders. Maternal grief, loss, and displacement further complicate the imagined continuity between mother and motherland, exposing fractures in nationalist and colonial narratives.