"A Space Where I Can Be Myself": Exploring Safe Visibility for Graduate Student Mothers in Mom Cafes

Abstract

Graduate student mothers navigate intertwined demands of graduate study and caregiving, yet little is known about how they seek support through online communities. We examine this through Mom Cafes, locally based online parenting communities in South Korea. Drawing on focus group interviews and design workshops with 22 graduate student mothers, we identify a pattern of dual invisibility: caregiving circumstances were difficult to make legible in academic contexts, while academic circumstances were difficult to make legible in parenting contexts. Although Mom Cafes offered useful local information and emotional reassurance, concerns specific to graduate student motherhood were harder to articulate or safely disclose. Participants sought ways to make graduate student motherhood recognizable when relevant, but their designs highlighted tensions around identifiability, judgment, relational burden and accountability. We conceptualize these tensions as safe visibility and discuss infrastructures for selective recognition, low-obligation connection, and accountable pathways to practical care.