'New' fatherhood is one of the most hotly contested topics in the family changes debates. It is also the topic which most explicitly divides theorists into those who claim new phenomenon of involved father and those who ground their arguments in empirical research, claiming that no significant changes in the field of fatherhood and their involvement in the family have occurred. How to explain this conundrum? Taking into account the latest historical findings on modern family, the authoress attempts to answer the question by challenging the concept of 'paternal presence/absence in the family', whose cultural meanings vary through time to a great extent. The analysis of topology of 'new' fatherhood implies the phenomenon to be anything but a clearly defined social phenomenon. Just the opposite, in its social diversity,identity trouble and ideological duality, the 'new' fatherhood appears to be far from social model of active parenting.
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