Brain, Child

Wealthy, Highly Educated Readership

While Brain, Child welcomes a diversity of opinion and parenting style, its readers are relatively homogenous. A readership survey undertaken in 2004 found that 90 percent of Brain, Child subscribers own their own home, and the median household income of readers was $125,000. In addition, Brain, Child readers are extremely well educated, with 96 percent holding undergraduate degrees and two-thirds of all readers having undertaken or completed graduate studies. Finally, the vast majority (95 percent) of mothers who subscribe to Brain, Child are either married or partnered. Given the uniformity of readers, it is therefore not surprising that while Brain, Child presents a heterogeneity of topics, within that range topics are generally those relevant to a middle-class, educated reader.

In terms of publishing philosophy, Brain, Child encourages respect and community within its pages, definitively rejecting the call toward intensive mothering. The foregrounding of personal narrative privileges a “life politic” approach that minimizes societal inequality and focuses on personal experience and resistance. This philosophy seeks to reach mothers who may find their personal privilege eroded as they parent. In terms of tone, the magazine is stylistically similar to The New Yorker and Salon, but, in its focus on mothers, stakes new territory for analysis.

The magazine's byline has generated some controversy, in terms of both the potential elitism of “thinking mothers” as well as the perceived exclusion of fathers. It should be noted that fathers are both regular contributors as well as readers of the magazine. Despite concern and debate, the magazine is flourishing as it enters its tenth year of publication.

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