CEEL Projects

The Meaning of Fatherhood: A Community-Based Ethnography of New Parents in St. Louis

-- Todd Goodsell, Predoctoral Candidate at the Center for the Ethnography of Everyday Life

St. Louis arch The central question of this research is, "What is a good father?" Todd tried to answer that question by gathering stories about fatherhood from men and women in the St. Louis area who were just becoming parents for the first time.

The reason for studying new, first-time parents was due to the focus on fatherhood rather than fathering. We wanted individuals who have little to no experience actually being parents, so all they could speak from were the expectations they had built up over several years about what fatherhood (and parenthood) would be like. Most research participants learned about the research and volunteered to participate through the assistance of a major medical center in the St. Louis metropolitan area that cooperated with the study.

A St.Louis neighborhood The interview method was designed in this study especially for use in this project. It focused on the narratives that research participants felt went into constructing their current conceptions of good fatherhood. Prior to each interview, Todd and the research participant talked about what the research participant wanted to include in the interview, and together they constructed an interview guide, in which the narratives were organized, often within a life-course framework.

A St. Louis street Todd made ethnographic observations about life in St. Louis, and about parenting activities. He attended prenatal education classes, religious services, and public events, and generally participated in the everyday life of the St. Louis area. He also gave some particular attention to the history and culture of the St. Louis region, and is using that as an additional framework in which to understand the stories that research participants told.