page_title: Union of Australian Women
section_title: Maternalism
hierarchical_section_title: Union of Australian Women / History / Maternalism
caption_attribution_description: English: Flyer from Newmarket, no date, promoting the UAW as welcoming of all women. U6.55, FVF440, Fryer Library, University of Queensland.
context_page_description: The Union of Australian Women is a left-wing women's organisation concerned with local and international issues regarding women's rights, international peace and equality.
  The UAW was established in Sydney on 31 July 1950 in New South Wales. Branches in Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania soon followed. In 1956 a national UAW was set up, with an executive committee based in Sydney and representatives from each state organisation.
  The UAW's self-published magazine, Our Women, mixed mainstream content such as recipes with news from the trade union movement, tracts on women's equality and articles on Aboriginal rights. Although the UAW was never officially affiliated with any political party many of its founding members were in close contact with Communist Party of Australia. The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation kept the organisation under surveillance during the 1950s and '60s.
  The UAW campaigned for women's rights to work, with equal pay and conditions, affordable childcare, Indigenous rights and the environment, and strongly protested against Australia's involvement in the Vietnam War.
context_section_description: The UAW's name, as opposed to the NHA's, reflected their aim to attract "all women", recognising that those who stayed in the post-war workforce were no longer necessarily housewives and would want to identify otherwise.
  Nevertheless, the domestic focus persevered, especially through the 1950s, shaping what has come to be called UAW's "maternalist" approach. The working-class mothers and housewives who comprised the bulk of earlier UAW membership did challenge traditional maternalism by recognising the necessity for women to work, and in Victoria overcame traditional maternalist policies by advocating local and subsidised childcare for all working women. Nevertheless, they subscribed to the underlying notion that children were a woman's responsibility, which informed their stance on issues from living costs to environmental damage, and especially war. The UAW's significant peace activism stemmed from the perceived universal concern of mothers over the mental and physical well-being of children.
  Maternalism provided the ideological backdrop for domestic activities, such as apron-making and millinery demonstrations, to comfortably coexist alongside equally important discussions on serious political issues in local group meetings. Similarly, the UAW's self-published magazine, Our Women, juxtaposed mainstream content such as recipes, light-hearted chat and fashion tips against the latest workers' union news, tracts on women's equality and articles on Aboriginal rights.
  The UAW's discourse on the universality of motherhood followed a long tradition of uniting women across race, class, and even national divisions, providing an impetus for local women to agitate for change "from within, rather than from the fringes of, mainstream society".
caption: Undated UAW flyer inviting women from various backgrounds to join
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