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Shopping with Mother

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16/04/2014

BBC Radio 4 - Shopping with Mother

Mothers and daughters shopping together, from cradle to grave. A light-hearted feature.

Mothers and daughters shopping together, from cradle to grave: a fantasy of togetherness but, in reality, a battleground, as this light-hearted feature reveals.

Go to any changing room across the country on a Saturday afternoon and you'll see them - the mother/daughter couples. 'What about this one?' 'No it's horrible!' Tetchy, or outright furious, they fight over the clothing racks. And yet, shopping is the number one fantasy of mother/daughter togetherness, a girly dream which can never be realised. So strong is the dream that some pregnant women even say it's why they want their baby to be a girl - 'It will be lovely to have someone to go shopping with'!

This programme gathers reports from tills and changing rooms across the country, to explore the relationship between the generations, between dreams and reality. It follows the mothers and daughters across a whole lifetime: from young girls fighting to wear clothes which are far too adult, through young women choosing their wedding dresses, to older women taking their elderly mothers shopping.

The programme is larky, fun, full of stories - but with a moving undertow.

It explores the depth of the mother/daughter relationship, and the way they influence each other, constructing a personality for each other - 'Even now that she's died, I hear her voice in my head, saying 'I always said you look good in red, give us a twirl - oh you look lovely!'

This programme is a collaboration with Woman's Hour; we asked listeners to invite us to go with them on significant shopping trips across the country.

Presented by Jane Garvey 
Produced by Kim Normanton and Elizabeth Burke.
A Loftus production for BBC Radio 4.

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