“Le di para adelante”:

maternidades jóvenes en contextos de vulnerabilidad estructural

Abstract

The paper seeks to recognize the meaning of motherhood in the experiences of young women who live in contexts of structural vulnerability. The analysis focuses on the life story of five young womenmothers who live in neighborhoods located in the south-western periphery of Rosario. These young women have in common having been mothers between 14 and 18 years old. The questionnaire comprises two questions: what is the meaning of motherhood for those girls? And how is this sense subjectively configured, taking into account the structural conditioning that frames its experiences? The analysis links the gender and class inequalities that go through their life trajectories together with the voices and meanings of the young people themselves. Thus, it can be said that the meaning of motherhood varies between the fact that they arrive at their pregnancies without their will and they continue reproducing typically patriarchal roles that were naturalized since they were small; and in turn, this sense it’s internalized as the way they structure their lives, giving them a place of belonging and an emotional anchor that drives them to sustain themselves in life.