Sitcom Mom: The Evolution of a Classic Television Character

Sitcom Mom: The Evolution of a Classic Television Character is Judy Kutulas’s lively, ambitious discussion of the history of television’s sitcom mothers. In a discussion of moms ranging from the prototypical June Cleaver, the fantastical My Mother the Car, and the iconic Claire Huxtable, Kutulas situates her discussion in sophisticated sociological theories of the changing American family. She demonstrates how the early and extremely influential television sitcoms gave way to the more modern and nuanced mom images of Roseanne’s Roseanne Connor, Arrested Development’s Lucille Bluth, and Modern Family’s Claire Dunphy, as the configuration of the modern American family changed dramatically in the wake of the feminist movement, changing labor force, and changing norms about childcare, gender roles in the nuclear family, and what constitutes “good-enough” mothering. This exhaustive work is the definitive study of motherhood in television comedy.

-- Andrea L. Press, University of Virginia

Judy Kutulas is professor emerita of history, film and media studies, and gender and sexuality studies at St. Olaf College.