This paper explores how single mothers both incorporate others into family life (e.g., when they ask others to care for their children) and simultaneously “do families” in a manner that holds out a vision of a “traditional” family structure. Drawing on research with White, rural single mothers, the author explores the manner in which these women both endorse their children’s attachment to other caregivers and maintain boundaries around issues of discipline and attachment vis‐à‐vis these others. The author demonstrates that single mothers are willing to share this protected realm of family life with a new man (a fiancé or cohabiting boyfriend) as they pursue the goal of what has been called the “Standard North American Family.”

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Scholarship on fictive kinship has relied on many different terminologies. I argue for a new precision. I review existing discussions and draw on those to suggest a new, experimental typology. I suggest that the typology illuminates a variety of issues, including the aspects of family that are accomplished through fictive kin. I also discuss issues surrounding fictive kinship for which no information exists but about which the typology might help make predictions.

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