When Mamaw Becomes Mom Social Capital and Kinship Family Formation amid the Rural Opioid Crisis

Amid the opioid crisis, the number of kinship families—or children living with relatives—has risen dramatically, particularly in rural communities. Using in-depth interviews with relative caregivers and local legal actors in Appalachian Kentucky, I consider how rural kinship families are formed. I d...

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Published inRSF : Russell Sage Foundation journal of the social sciences Vol. 8; no. 3; pp. 78 - 98
Main Author BRANT, KRISTINA
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published New York Russell Sage Foundation 01.05.2022
Subjects
Caregivers
child welfare
Children & youth
Criminalization
Crises
Drug use
Families & family life
Households
Inequality
Kinship
Kinship care
Narcotics
opioid crisis
Opioids
Parents & parenting
PART I: Rural Families: Coping Under the Strain
Relatives
Rural areas
Rural communities
Social capital
Surveillance
United States > US
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Summary:Amid the opioid crisis, the number of kinship families—or children living with relatives—has risen dramatically, particularly in rural communities. Using in-depth interviews with relative caregivers and local legal actors in Appalachian Kentucky, I consider how rural kinship families are formed. I demonstrate how relatives’ experiences depend on the social capital they hold with local legal actors who regulate kinship care. Whether a relative possesses positive, negative, or no social capital with these actors affects their ability to secure their ideal legal arrangement and the level of surveillance they must endure. These findings illuminate how seemingly rigid legal processes can reproduce inequalities in rural jurisdictions. In this case, the unequal distribution of legal-specific social capital precipitates different levels of stability and support afforded to rural kinship families.
ISSN:2377-8253
2377-8261
DOI:10.7758/RSF.2022.8.3.03