'It Came, Over and Over, Down to This: What Made Someone a Mother?': A Reproductive Justice Analysis of Little Fires Everywhere

• Published in: Feminist formations 2023-06, Vol.35 (2), p.129-153
• Main Authors: McKee, Kimberly D, Gibney, Shannon
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adoption; American literature; Asian American literature; Bodily integrity; Children; Families & family life; Heteronormativity; Interpersonal relations; Justice; Kinship; Legibility; Middle class; Minority & ethnic groups; Mothers; Ng, Celeste; Novels; Race; Reproductive rights; Socioeconomic factors; Violence; White supremacy; Women; Writing
• ISSN: 2151-7363; 2151-7371; 2151-7371
• DOI: 10.1353/ff.2023.a907924

Ideologies of motherhood reflect the complexities and contradictions of what it means to be seen as a worthy parent—someone who deserves to care for children—in contrast to those deemed unworthy or undesirable. The family is a site of contestation when accounting for the ways maternalism and white supremacy affect racialized family systems in the lives of people of color in white American suburbia. In a critical engagement with the 2017 novel Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng and the 2020 Hulu -released series by the same name, this essay reveals the contours of non-normative kinship formations, including surrogacy and adoption. These kinship ties demonstrate the tensions of motherhood as a gendered, raced, and classed phenomena. A reproductive justice framework reveals the way Little Fires Everywhere —the novel and the series—demonstrate the legibility and legitimacy of some families over others in exploring the contingencies of kinship.