Pregnant with Meaning: Teen Mothers and the Politics of Inclusive Schooling

How and why have teen mothers become scapegoats for social anxieties? How do schools respond to these stigmatized students in their midst? And, in those rare schools attempting to form more inclusive settings for teen mothers, what helps or hinders success? These issues are explored in Pregnant with Meaning, which links an ethnographic study of two schools to the wider North American political and economic context. Mindful of myriad, shifting power relations within the research setting, Deirdre M. Kelly scrutinizes her own practices as a participant observer and contributes new knowledge in the areas of sexuality education, detracking curriculum, and the politics of representation. Against the prevailing neoliberal/moral conservative consensus, she develops a critical feminist argument for integrating teen mothers and rethinking school and classroom practices.