Mass Observation has been running in Britain for decades, and records daily life and activities for posterity. Everyday people record what they are doing, doing everyday things. The records are then open to historians and researchers, and can be used to gain an insight about what was going on with the 'masses' at any given time.
Yesterday was a Mass Observation day, for recording a journal entry from you, about your every day life. E-mail only, and it goes into a database to be used in the future.
Why should it be important that you were breastfeeding yesterday?
I'm glad you asked. It's important, as you were doing an everyday thing. It's also important if you were doing other everyday things, like baby wearing, bed sharing and cuddling your baby if it was distressed. And it's important because... well, imagine it's the year 2111. Researchers are trying to gain an idea about parenting techniques in Britain one hundred years ago. So they look at old television programmes, adverts, newspaper article and movies from 2011, to see how it was done then.
And what do they find?
They find Gina Ford, Jo Frost and advice on how to Cry It Out. They find that mothers adored the new follow-on milk, and it was advertised heavily. They read that mothers were told how to train and control their children and how to ignore their baby tyrants from day one.
That's the impression you'd get from us, from the major media sources around us today. Is that how you parent?
Let's make sure the future knows how we are parenting, today. Write a journal for yesterday, and post it to Mass Observation. Email only.
Speak now, on how you do things, and let history record it. Mamas in the future may need the support! :-)
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