Nancy Chodorow, a professor emerita of sociology at the University of California, Berkeley, died on October 14 at the age of 81.
Chodorow joined UC Berkeley’s Sociology Department in 1986. She completed her undergraduate studies at Radcliffe College in 1966 and earned her Ph.D. in sociology from Brandeis University in 1975. While at Brandeis, she studied under Philip Slater, whose research on mother-son relationships led her to explore the lack of scholarship on mother-daughter relationships. This work became the basis for her dissertation and later her 1978 book, “The Reproduction of Mothering,” which is recognized as a significant contribution to feminist theory and gender studies.
Gabriel Chodorow-Reich, her son, said, “Major intellectual achievements require dissatisfaction with the status quo. The Reproduction of Mothering began with my mother’s dissatisfaction with the imbalance between the study of mothers and sons and the study of mothers and daughters.” He also noted that this concern influenced her role in establishing the Gender and Women’s Studies Department at UC Berkeley, alongside Elizabeth Abel, Janet Adelman, and former Chancellor Carol Christ.
Chodorow’s work connected sociology and psychoanalysis, examining how mothering influences psychological development and social roles. Berkeley Social Sciences Dean Raka Ray said, “Nancy Chodorow was one of the founding figures of second wave feminist theory. She revolutionized feminist theorizing by bringing together the psychoanalytic and the sociological, emphasizing the role of the structure of the nuclear family in creating the early psychic formation of men and women. I was fortunate to experience her brilliance and clarity when I arrived at Berkeley as a young feminist sociologist, and will always be grateful for her mentorship.”
Chodorow authored several books after “The Reproduction of Mothering,” including “Femininities, Masculinities, Sexualities: Freud and Beyond,” “The Psychoanalytic Ear and the Sociological Eye: Toward an American Independent Tradition,” and “The Power of Feelings: Personal Meaning in Psychoanalysis, Gender, and Culture.” She published more than 60 articles and book chapters.
Jeffrey Prager, a UCLA sociology professor and psychoanalyst, said, “Throughout her career, Nancy crafted pioneering essays and books that bridged the worlds of individual and society, psyche and structure. She reconceptualized our understanding of gender, family, sexualities and individuality. Nancy was a rare, bracing voice that will be sorely missed.”
Ann Swidler, Berkeley Sociology Professor Emerita, added, “Nancy Chodorow was a bold, courageous innovator. She used psychoanalytic ideas not to explain individual behavior but to develop a distinctive account of broad (indeed, universal) patterns in human societies: persistent differences in identity formation and psychic tendencies between women and men, and even the constitution of gender itself. Her work has been widely influential in fields from American Studies to literature and throughout social sciences.”
Kristin Luker, Berkeley Sociology and Law Professor Emerita, said, “Nancy Chodorow was a genuinely innovative thinker. She brought together two bodies of literature: psychoanalysis, which saw the self primarily as an internal process, and sociology, which saw the self as primarily external, created in interaction with others. Perhaps her contribution is clearest in her book The Psychoanalytic Ear and the Sociological Eye, which taught sociologists to listen to people as well as observe them.”
During her tenure at Berkeley, Chodorow also practiced as a psychoanalyst and was on the faculty at the San Francisco Psychoanalytic Institute, graduating from there in 1993. After retiring, she moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts, where she joined the faculty of the Boston Psychoanalytic Society and Institute and lectured at Harvard Medical School.
Gabriel Chodorow-Reich said, “The Reproduction of Mothering grappled with the role of the mother (and, therefore, also the father) at a time when society was in transition from one where most women did not have full careers outside the home to one where most did. My mother had two: her career as a sociologist at Berkeley, and her psychoanalytic practice. Somehow this did not keep her from developing extraordinary friendships; from her enjoyment of the arts, including museums, symphonies and opera; from her love of cooking; from caring for her parents as they aged; from her large extended family; and, most important to me, from mothering my sister and me and grandmothering our children with tenderness, love, devotion, patience and guidance.”
Chodorow is survived by her children Rachel and Gabriel Chodorow-Reich and their spouses, her husband Carl Salzman, his two children, and seven grandchildren.
A funeral service will take place at Temple Israel in Boston on October 17 at 11 a.m. ET, followed by burial at Mount Auburn Cemetery at 1 p.m. ET and a reception. The service will also be livestreamed. A memorial is being planned for the coming months, with a session at the American Sociological Association conference scheduled for August.
