1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910824494303321

Autore

Edin Kathryn <1962->

Titolo

Promises I can keep [[electronic resource] ] : why poor women put motherhood before marriage : with a new preface / / Kathryn Edin + Maria Kefalas

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Berkeley : , : University of California, , 2011

ISBN

1-283-27974-6

9786613279743

0-520-95068-2

Edizione

[Third edition.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource

Disciplina

306.8560974811

Soggetti

Unmarried mothers - Pennsylvania - Philadelphia

Low-income single mothers - Pennsylvania - Philadelphia

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Description based upon print version of record.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Frontmatter -- CONTENTS -- PREFACE TO THE 2011 EDITION -- INTRODUCTION -- ONE. " BEFORE WE HAD A BABY .. " -- TWO. " WHEN I GOT PREGNANT .. " -- THREE. HOW DOES THE DREAM DIE? -- FOUR. WHAT MARRIAGE MEANS -- FIVE. LABOR OF LOVE -- SIX. HOW MOTHERHOOD CHANGED MY LIFE -- CONCLUSION. MAKING SENSE OF SINGLE MOTHERHOOD -- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS -- APPENDIX A. CITY, NEIGHBORHOOD, AND FAMILY CHARACTERISTICS AND RESEARCH METHODS -- APPENDIX B. INTERVIEW GUIDE -- NOTES -- REFERENCES -- INDEX

Sommario/riassunto

Millie Acevedo bore her first child before the age of 16 and dropped out of high school to care for her newborn. Now 27, she is the unmarried mother of three and is raising her kids in one of Philadelphia's poorest neighborhoods. Would she and her children be better off if she had waited to have them and had married their father first? Why do so many poor American youth like Millie continue to have children before they can afford to take care of them? Over a span of five years, sociologists Kathryn Edin and Maria Kefalas talked in-depth with 162 low-income single moms like Millie to learn how they think about marriage and family. Promises I Can Keep offers an intimate look



at what marriage and motherhood mean to these women and provides the most extensive on-the-ground study to date of why they put children before marriage despite the daunting challenges they know lie ahead.