Dictionary

founding mother en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• /ˌfaʊndɪŋ ˈmʌðɚ/ (General-American)
• (General-American) audio
• /ˌfaʊndɪŋ ˈmʌðə/ (Received-Pronunciation)

Etymology

From founding (“who or that founds (establishes, starts) or founded”) + mother, modelled after founding father.

Meanings

1. A woman who founded (established or started) something.
   • She (Audrey Lorde) is a member of the founding collective of Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press and a founding mother of SISA, Sisterhood in Support of Sisters in South Africa. 1986, Johnnetta B. Cole, All American Women: Lines that Divide, Ties that Bind, →ISBN:
   • Finally there is a comprehensive, well-documented life of founding mother Elizabeth Cady Stanton: In Her Own Right, by Elisabeth Griffith. Griffith focuses upon both the life and the social atmosphere which led to the beginnings of the first wave of American feminism. 1984 December 29, Michael Bronski, “Hot Off The Presses”, in Gay Community News, volume 12, number 25, page 10:
   • The initial founding mother, Eve, becomes a paradigmatic figure in later Jewish and Christian exegesis[…] 2020 October 21, Kathleen Gallagher Elkins, Mary, Mother of Martyrs: How Motherhood Became Self-Sacrifice in Early Christianity, Wipf and Stock Publishers, →ISBN:
   • There could even be a case made for treating Jane Harrison as a founding mother of social science (Beard, 2000). 2003 April 21, Sara Delamont, Feminist Sociology, SAGE, →ISBN:

Forms

Relateds

founding member · founding father

Translations (6)

fr mère fondatrice (woman who founded something) · pl założycielka (woman who founded something) · fi perustaja (woman who founded something) · gl nai fundadora (woman who founded something) · mnw ယာဲညးပ္တန်ပဒှ် (woman who founded something) · ka დამფუძნებელი დედა (woman who founded something)