More Work for Mother: Part 2

Welcome to the second installment in our 4-part blog series on Ruth Schwartz Cowan’s seminal book More Work For Mother: The Ironies of Household Technology from the Open Hearth to the Microwave.  Today we will discuss how modern utilities and automotive transportation helped keep “women’s work” in the home.

As discussed in Part 1, the industrial revolution moved traditionally men’s work into the commercial and industrial sectors while leaving women’s work in the private sphere.  According to Cowan, modern utility access supported this break.  According to her research, access to water, gas, and electric service removed men’s role in collecting and hauling water and fuel, and made it possible for cleaning and cooking tasks to remain inside the home (rather than be outsourced).  For example, with a water hookup and electricity, women could clean their laundry at home rather than sending it to a commercial laundry.

The development of automotive transportation also influenced the work done by married women.  Before the car came into widespread use, goods and services came to your door.  The local grocery's delivery boys would deliver your order.  Doctors made house calls.  Peddlers would make their rounds.  As the car took over and the depression put pressure on businesses, delivery services vanished and women started driving to do their shopping, take the kids to school or the doctor, etc.   Transportation service became a large part of a women’s daily route.

Cowan’s book was written in the early 1980s, so recent developments in internet shopping piqued my interest.  Has the internet made things easier for women or harder?  At first, I thought it’s probably helping.  With the rise of online shopping and reliable delivery, women don’t have to drive all over town for many items.  On the other hand, most day-to-day items like groceries still aren’t available for delivery at a price most people are willing to pay.  In addition, internet access has placed the burden of research on the consumer.  Whereas once you paid a travel agent to book your flights, now you spend several hours researching and comparing prices.  The variety of products available also means you spend a lot more time researching the perfect backpack for your child or the best rice cooker.  All this research time seems like an added burden on working mothers that we take for granted.

More Work for Mother: Part 1

As a PhD student interested in technology and its role in society, professors are always suggesting interesting reading material.  Of course, I never read most of it, but this blog gave me a good excuse to finally read Ruth Schwartz Cowan’s seminal book More Work For Mother: The Ironies of Household Technology from the Open Hearth to the Microwave.

The book covers a lot of ground, so I’m going to get four posts out of it.  This “Part 1” will discuss Cowan’s basic thesis: industrialization eliminated “housework” for men and children but preserved “women’s work” and in some ways made it worse.

For most of human history, basic survival required a lot of work from every person in the household.  Men made leather goods, whittled tools, ground grain into meal (or hauled it to the mill), chopped and stacked wood, tended animals, and worked the fields.  Women cooked, tended children, made soap and candles, sewed, and wove.  Even children worked, tending smaller children, mending, stirring pots, and cleaning vegetables.  If the family needed help during the harvest/slaughtering season, or if someone was ill, they would hire help or foster a young family member.  In this dynamic, everyone had work to do and each person developed specialized skills to complete this work.

Then the industrial revolution changed the balance.  Children went to school and men’s work became industrialized: flour was milled commercially, tools and leather goods were made in factories, coal and gas replaced wood.  However, traditionally women’s work remained in the home and new technologies often created more work for married women.

• The production of industrial clothing reduced women’s sewing and weaving tasks, but now the family has more clothing that is expected to be washed more frequently.
• Coal and gas stoves meant that women didn’t tend the fire anymore, but they are expected to provide more diverse and more time consuming meals.
• Vacuum cleaners simplified carpet cleaning, but now women are expected to clean the carpets weekly rather than yearly.

In addition, with the boom in factory jobs, domestic workers could find better pay for less work outside the home, so married women are expected to do all of this by themselves.

This got me thinking.  Aren’t  there “labor-saving” devices today that only make more work for women?  Here are some examples I thought up and I’d love to hear others: 

• We now have McMansions where each kid has his/her own room with a bathroom and Dad has his man-cave, but now Mom needs to clean more rooms.
• How many kitchen devices promise to grill a stuffed pepper, infuse a steak, or puree something exotic?  Guess who usually makes all these specialized meals and then cleans the contraptions.
• How many laundry steaming and sanitizing machines are on the market, raising the sanitation standard yet again?