Amanda Read Sheik – Unconventional

There was a pause in this column venture, initially due to the birth of my third child, and furthermore due to the work involved in selling a city townhome and purchasing a five acre homestead. I spend a lot of time scribbling notes on which to elaborate, and still more time cleaning floors, mucking a pasture, and carrying a baby on my hip (or as critics who had a knee-jerk reaction to Harrison Butker’s commencement speech might say, hanging around home “doing nothing”).

Among the upcoming subject matter I plan to share is a series of “reality check” pieces on things I learned about home education and big family homestead life firsthand, reviews of some books worth reading, and the story of a certain “Crusading Chemist” whose encounter with bureaucracy in America could offer valuable insight for the incoming Trump administration’s plan to Make America Healthy Again.

For those interested in a more specifically educational and academic focus, I welcome you to subscribe to my Substack, Republican Motherhood. As a Madison Fellow educator, I still enjoy developing educational materials that teach U.S. history and government in unique ways. But putting myself in the shoes of a teacher or parent (especially a busy mother) in this highly cluttered and fast paced day and age, I think, what resources are out there to help equip me to instill this knowledge and relevant principles in my children? Or for that matter, in myself during a chaotic presidential election year when I feel like completely zoning out?

Maybe not many people care anyway. But I’m willing to risk some time and effort on the assumption that there are a few of us who would like to improve citizenship in our own little communities as best we can. We want to maintain self-governing households without getting disillusioned and overwhelmed by all the doomsdays talk.

Republican Motherhood is a digital multimedia publication dedicated to honoring and equipping the discipline of cultivating a self-governing citizenry. It is inspired by the American founding era concept that women, especially through motherhood, are uniquely positioned to safeguard the republic beginning with early childhood.

(Yes, I know “republican motherhood” was an academic term invented much later. Yes, I know the concept had some flaws in practice. Here’s to improving on that!)

I intend to feature academic research particularly on women, educators, and artists who have influenced the development of generations of American citizens and statesmen.

To clarify, the “republican” in Republican Motherhood does not refer to the major political party. Rather, it references what we might call the “little r republican” values of representative democracy. As legend has it, Benjamin Franklin told Mrs. Powel that the Constitutional Convention had produced a republic if she could keep it. If there is one thing we should agree upon across the political spectrum, it’s that a healthy civilization isn’t maintained on autopilot. It must be nurtured and disciplined.

There will be both free subscriber content and paid subscriber-only content towards cultivating this goal. A paid subscription will include access to educational materials otherwise for sale on my TPT store, The Commonplace Classroom.

Thank you for following my productions wherever you prefer!

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