<i>Supernanny</i>, parenting and a pedagogical state

Abstract

This paper explores the messages and assumptions relating to parenting that are promoted through Supernanny and how this connects with the policy expectation or hope of New Labour – that parents should take responsibility for being skilled educators and developers of their children. In exploring these state and non-state governance discourses and what these suggest about contemporary ideals and expectations relating to parenting, I make use of Raymond Williams' structure of feeling approach and draw on this to develop the definition and reach the idea of a pedagogical state. I argue that a pedagogical state can be seen as a state of mind or way of being that is produced through and producing of a particular sort of mood and set of sensibilities, in this case relating to contemporary understandings and experiences of parenting. In considering various viewer responses to Supernanny, some resistance to and scepticism of these discourses can, however, be detected. In this context, I further explore the idea of a pedagogical state as a disposition and mood relating to parenting which is disrupted – but also deepened – through people's evaluative reflexivity and (healthy) scepticism.