The uninvited guest: mother/daughter conflict in feminist gerontology

dIn this paper, I argue that the tensions between generations of women-particularly mothers and daughters-can be used to initiate change and growth for both generations. I introduce the subject of developmental conflict between women through fictional images from a Scottish film called The Winter Guest and then show how these conflicts have occurred in my own ethnographic research on older women. I argue that feminist gerontologists need to be working-always on the personal and professional levels-to recognize, explore, understand, critique, and theorize generational differences among women. Otherwise, we are at risk of promoting the very sexist and ageist attitudes that we are ostensibly working against. My aim is to alert readers to the generational conflicts that can occur in empirical research, as well as in the politics and theorizing of academic feminism, when women act unconsciously from generational positions or "age identities" that precondition them to challenge and resist each other. I conclude that mothers and daughters need alternative models for relating to one another outside the "family plot" and suggest that life story groups might help us develop these collaboratively. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved.