Intimate Relationships and Imaginaries of Future Fatherhood : a Sociological Exploration of Reproductive Timings Amongst Men Who Do Not (Yet) Have Children

• Main Author: Law, Caroline
• Format: Dissertation
• Language: English
• Published: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses 01-01-2021
• Subjects: Intimacy; Sociology; Trends; Women

Men and women are having children later in life than was previously the case. Social science research into trends of later parenthood and reproductive timing more generally has predominantly focused on women. While research with men does exist, much of this is quantitative, descriptive and/or atheoretical and there is a paucity of qualitative, sociological, UK based research which utilises a prospective approach with men before they have children, includes unpartnered men, and considers how intimate relationships intersect with reproductive timings. This thesis takes a constructivist ontological and interpretivist epistemological position in reporting findings from a qualitative study of men and reproductive timings. The aim of the study was to explore the meanings, practices and imaginaries relating to reproductive timings amongst men who do not have children but want or expect to have them in the future, in the context of trends of later parenthood. Twenty-five men, ranging in age from 22-47 years and including partnered (n=12) and unpartnered (n=13) men, took part in in-depth, semi-structured, one-to-one interviews. The thesis contributes to an improved understanding of men's meanings, practices and imaginaries in relation to reproductive timing. It draws on the individualisation and connectedness theses to illuminate how men's lives, like women's, are multifaceted and how their trajectories towards parenthood are complicated by multiple barriers, contradictions and complexities. It demonstrates the salience of intimate relationships and imaginaries of fatherhood in relation to reproductive timings. It makes the case for a new conceptual understanding of 'misconnect' to conceptualise relationships, both real and imagined, which are troubled in some way and uses the conceptualisation of reproductive time as multidimensional to demonstrate particular dis-synchronicities within men's reproductive trajectories and ways in which time is (mis)invested in accordance with imaginaries of fatherhood. The thesis demonstrates the value of interrogating future imaginaries in the context of reproduction and suggests there is the need for further development of this approach within studies of reproductive timings as well as the study of reproduction more generally.