Monday, September 28, 2009
Halving it All
Fancine Duetsch interviewed dual-earner couples who had children ranging in age from babies to teenagers. Then stratifying the group into parents that equally shared their parenting responsibilities, groups that did not share parenting responsibilities, and lastly a group who alternated their responsibility. Her study was to see not only how people split their task but why? In chapter five she focuses on how the alternating shift couples divide parenting and their logic behind it.
Who are the alternative shift couples?
The alternate shift is predominately held by working class families. Alternative shift fathers' occupational positions were in fields such as; health care, fire fighters, delivery men. While their partners worked as nurses, secretaries, retail clerks and other service based jobs.
How Do Couples Alternate Shifts?
Usually one parent takes on an early work-shift while the other parents stays home and maintains the home, watch and feed the kids, and do all of the daily errand. Then when the afternoon working shift hits, they switch positions. The other partner cooks dinner, baths the kids, and put them to bed. The whole day the children are accounted for by at least one parent.
Though both parents are working inside and outside the home, it is rarely a completely egalitarian system. The fathers tend to work more hours outside the home while the mother spends more time in the house. In some cases, working class fathers only agree to care for the children and leave the house maintenance and cooking to the wife. The middle class family has a more 50 -50 relationship when it comes to raising the children, but because alternate shifters are with their children more than middle-class families, working-class fathers spend twice as much time with their children than middle class fathers.
Why do they do it?
Money is always a reason for why families are do the alternate shift. 80 percent of the couples mentioned money as playing a role for how they parent their kids. The alternate shifters had the lowest income out of the other group interviewed. Though they talked about money being an issue, their reasoning differed. Some people thought childcare was too costly. Since they did not have a lot of money, paying for childcare seemed impractical. Others parents felt it was their responsibility to raise their kids, not strangers. They heard so many stories about incidences occurring in day-cares that they do not want to risk their children lives.
The bad day-care experiences could be attributed to the fact that many of the day-care they can afford are low quality, which could lead to bad service. Also the better childcare institutions hold the values of the middle-class, which are not always in tune with that of the working class. Alternative shifter would rather dedicate their time providing for their child and raising them with their morals instead of someone else giving them a different set of values. Though this style of parenting hindered the actual time the parents had with each other, shifters felt it was necessary.
Maintaining an identity
Despite the actual dual inside and outside the home work from both sexes, men and women still hold their titles as breadwinners and caregivers. Fathers still feel it is their responsibility to work. Though they appreciated the new gifts of having meaningful relationships with their children, men in the study admitted to feeling more responsibility to work harder and provide for their family after have children. Men who did not work, felt useless even though they were raising their children. Women re-enforced the breadwinner theory by making it known that the father's job was the most important job in the household. The husband would usually work the more hours despite if they wife was paid at a higher rate.
Women in shifter relationships are still regarded to the primary parent, no matter how much the father does. They are still expected to do all house duties, men are still seen as additional help. These responsibilities in the home leaves the women in a tough position as a mother and a worker. Women like the idea of being their for their family but also really enjoyed working outside the home. One participant felt that having a job made her feel like whole person. Although their husbands wished they did not work, most women ideally preferred a part-time job.
Traditional Ideologies with Non-traditional Lives
To conclude, the alternative shifter is the most egalitarian type parenting presented in the study, but they still follow the ideology of domesticity. In order to keep their traditional views they link on to aspects of ideal positions in their ideology. Men hold on to their outside work, making it their most important activity, while mothers consider themselves the primary caregiver. Though they are not trying to end gender, they are opening gender barriers to respond to the realities of today's society.
Questions
Are the divorce rates higher for these shifters? The lack of time parents spend with each other must effect their relationship. Also, how much interaction does the child has with their parents together? I can not image a child learning how to have a healthy intimate relationship from their parents if he does not see them.
Who are the alternative shift couples?
The alternate shift is predominately held by working class families. Alternative shift fathers' occupational positions were in fields such as; health care, fire fighters, delivery men. While their partners worked as nurses, secretaries, retail clerks and other service based jobs.
How Do Couples Alternate Shifts?
Usually one parent takes on an early work-shift while the other parents stays home and maintains the home, watch and feed the kids, and do all of the daily errand. Then when the afternoon working shift hits, they switch positions. The other partner cooks dinner, baths the kids, and put them to bed. The whole day the children are accounted for by at least one parent.
Though both parents are working inside and outside the home, it is rarely a completely egalitarian system. The fathers tend to work more hours outside the home while the mother spends more time in the house. In some cases, working class fathers only agree to care for the children and leave the house maintenance and cooking to the wife. The middle class family has a more 50 -50 relationship when it comes to raising the children, but because alternate shifters are with their children more than middle-class families, working-class fathers spend twice as much time with their children than middle class fathers.
Why do they do it?
Money is always a reason for why families are do the alternate shift. 80 percent of the couples mentioned money as playing a role for how they parent their kids. The alternate shifters had the lowest income out of the other group interviewed. Though they talked about money being an issue, their reasoning differed. Some people thought childcare was too costly. Since they did not have a lot of money, paying for childcare seemed impractical. Others parents felt it was their responsibility to raise their kids, not strangers. They heard so many stories about incidences occurring in day-cares that they do not want to risk their children lives.
The bad day-care experiences could be attributed to the fact that many of the day-care they can afford are low quality, which could lead to bad service. Also the better childcare institutions hold the values of the middle-class, which are not always in tune with that of the working class. Alternative shifter would rather dedicate their time providing for their child and raising them with their morals instead of someone else giving them a different set of values. Though this style of parenting hindered the actual time the parents had with each other, shifters felt it was necessary.
Maintaining an identity
Despite the actual dual inside and outside the home work from both sexes, men and women still hold their titles as breadwinners and caregivers. Fathers still feel it is their responsibility to work. Though they appreciated the new gifts of having meaningful relationships with their children, men in the study admitted to feeling more responsibility to work harder and provide for their family after have children. Men who did not work, felt useless even though they were raising their children. Women re-enforced the breadwinner theory by making it known that the father's job was the most important job in the household. The husband would usually work the more hours despite if they wife was paid at a higher rate.
Women in shifter relationships are still regarded to the primary parent, no matter how much the father does. They are still expected to do all house duties, men are still seen as additional help. These responsibilities in the home leaves the women in a tough position as a mother and a worker. Women like the idea of being their for their family but also really enjoyed working outside the home. One participant felt that having a job made her feel like whole person. Although their husbands wished they did not work, most women ideally preferred a part-time job.
Traditional Ideologies with Non-traditional Lives
To conclude, the alternative shifter is the most egalitarian type parenting presented in the study, but they still follow the ideology of domesticity. In order to keep their traditional views they link on to aspects of ideal positions in their ideology. Men hold on to their outside work, making it their most important activity, while mothers consider themselves the primary caregiver. Though they are not trying to end gender, they are opening gender barriers to respond to the realities of today's society.
Questions
Are the divorce rates higher for these shifters? The lack of time parents spend with each other must effect their relationship. Also, how much interaction does the child has with their parents together? I can not image a child learning how to have a healthy intimate relationship from their parents if he does not see them.
The Myth of Masculinity
The decline of Male breadwinner has prompted confusion, leaving manhood and masculinity at a critical point of change. If men no longer hold their position as the dominant financial provider for his wife and child, what is his purpose in the home? What is a man? This unique shift has shaken the foundation of the patriarchal society we live and has left us with the opportunity to redefine masculinity.
Though men never had to worry about having both a family and a job, they did have to decide between being "free and having to share, between independence or interdependence, between privileged and equality (260)." Men had to make these choices but they did have some restraints. Work place opportunities, women relationships all played important roles in creating a more diverse male experience.
Men live very diverse lifestyles counter to the stereotypical breadwinner mold they are lumped into, even within an individual's own life time. Since men now move in and out of different family environments, they have the opportunity to change their roles from relationship to relationship. In today's society, men can divorce and remarry several times, having multiple families. Also, depending on a persons job, he could have more time to tend to his children or not. These circumstances and many other circumstance could make the man go against the breadwinner theory and explore other ways of living.
Many people try to say men are born with a masculine personality that is bestowed upon them by their father and in childhood. Gerson explains that this notion of the man personality is set as a child is completely false. Men evaluate, respond to and resolve problems they established in their childhood on the experiences they have in their adulthood. There are no shared complex psychological traits that predict the life choices of men.
Gerson also pointed out Masculine Culture and male dominance could account for the diversity of experiences
Though men never had to worry about having both a family and a job, they did have to decide between being "free and having to share, between independence or interdependence, between privileged and equality (260)." Men had to make these choices but they did have some restraints. Work place opportunities, women relationships all played important roles in creating a more diverse male experience.
Men live very diverse lifestyles counter to the stereotypical breadwinner mold they are lumped into, even within an individual's own life time. Since men now move in and out of different family environments, they have the opportunity to change their roles from relationship to relationship. In today's society, men can divorce and remarry several times, having multiple families. Also, depending on a persons job, he could have more time to tend to his children or not. These circumstances and many other circumstance could make the man go against the breadwinner theory and explore other ways of living.
Many people try to say men are born with a masculine personality that is bestowed upon them by their father and in childhood. Gerson explains that this notion of the man personality is set as a child is completely false. Men evaluate, respond to and resolve problems they established in their childhood on the experiences they have in their adulthood. There are no shared complex psychological traits that predict the life choices of men.
Gerson also pointed out Masculine Culture and male dominance could account for the diversity of experiences
The Absent Black Father
This chapter discusses the critical role that absent Black fathers play in the promotion of marital fatherhood as the panacea for children's need. Author, Dorthy Roberts clearly states that the chapter is not meant to answer whether fatherlessness causes poverty or effect children upbringing, but to address the fact not cause by family form but by racism and inequality.
In our culture fatherlessness is seen as a Black problem. Absent Black Fathers represent the "dangers of fathering uncivilized by marriage (146)." Black are used as a tool to explain what ever the general population needs to address at the moment. Absent fatherhood being placed on Black men functions to racially associate as not only a depraved state but also a way to distance itself from the problem of fatherlessness and blame it on Black people.
A female headed house-hold has been the dominant family arrangement for Black families but the trend is now starting to occur more in the white community. The idea of the nuclear family today is now starting to become a myth. Today there are more white single mothers than there are Black mother; however the stigma of single still remains with Black single mothers and Black absent fathers. Roberts argues that the stigma is still placed on Black people because female headed homes are still viewed as a Black cultural trait that is plaguing the structure of White families. Whites that fall into illegitimate families are judged only on an individual basis, no matter how frequent it occurs in the White community.
As a result of Fatherlessness being racialized, the Black single mothers were blamed for not having husbands and not helped. The non-nuclear family was the escape-goat to explain why Black people were not achieving success in America, rather than looking at institutional racism. Black women were seen as rebels for not following the patriarchal family structure and the reason for their poverty. What sociologist and other people at the time did not take in consideration was the high unemployment and incarceration rates that prevented Black women from marrying their children's fathers. In 1988 there were more Black women in the workforce than men and many men could not financially provide for their household. In 1994, there were eight Black men in jail for every White man that was imprisoned. These type of systemic problems are what restrain Black men from being active as they want in their family.
One reason Black men leave their positions in the household is because they can not live up to the breadwinning theory that White America idealizes. The breadwinning theory polarizes men and women work; men work in the public area while women care for the private sphere of the home. In a Black community, where mothers were working full time jobs and men could not find jobs, Black men were emasculated.
Labeling a child fatherless also gives a skew perception of the family arrangement. Fatherless is referred to a unmarried mother. Society does not quantify what the man contributes to their child emotionally, it only cares if the man is a husband, which means the problems linked with Fatherlessness are to be fixed simply by men marrying their child's mother. Welfare re-enforces this belief that marriage is the solution to poverty by making programs that praise the widow who was married by giving them more financial support than the mothers who never married. State welfare programs even created reform bills that would encourage these mothers to get married.
The problem with the overall forcing of marriage and also the laws created to receive the child support they neglect is racism and inequality. Black men are unemployed and poor. Their financial contributions does little to help with overall financial problems. Black women are likely to impoverish with or without a Black husband. Child support only helps 10 percent of the recipients rise above the poverty level because child support can not take something that someone does not have!
Some states even created a bridefare where they actually gave up monetary rewards for marrying. It allowed families to earn 150 percent more money over the poverty line. The purpose was to make lower-class women assimilate into a more middle-class lifestyle; however it over looked the important of a father as more than a money machine.
The welfare of single low-income women will remain to be a problem as long as Black women are seen as the sole beneficiaries of it and Black "anti-culture" of single family homes is perceived as the problem.
My question is have this stuff change in the more recent years with TANF?
In our culture fatherlessness is seen as a Black problem. Absent Black Fathers represent the "dangers of fathering uncivilized by marriage (146)." Black are used as a tool to explain what ever the general population needs to address at the moment. Absent fatherhood being placed on Black men functions to racially associate as not only a depraved state but also a way to distance itself from the problem of fatherlessness and blame it on Black people.
A female headed house-hold has been the dominant family arrangement for Black families but the trend is now starting to occur more in the white community. The idea of the nuclear family today is now starting to become a myth. Today there are more white single mothers than there are Black mother; however the stigma of single still remains with Black single mothers and Black absent fathers. Roberts argues that the stigma is still placed on Black people because female headed homes are still viewed as a Black cultural trait that is plaguing the structure of White families. Whites that fall into illegitimate families are judged only on an individual basis, no matter how frequent it occurs in the White community.
As a result of Fatherlessness being racialized, the Black single mothers were blamed for not having husbands and not helped. The non-nuclear family was the escape-goat to explain why Black people were not achieving success in America, rather than looking at institutional racism. Black women were seen as rebels for not following the patriarchal family structure and the reason for their poverty. What sociologist and other people at the time did not take in consideration was the high unemployment and incarceration rates that prevented Black women from marrying their children's fathers. In 1988 there were more Black women in the workforce than men and many men could not financially provide for their household. In 1994, there were eight Black men in jail for every White man that was imprisoned. These type of systemic problems are what restrain Black men from being active as they want in their family.
One reason Black men leave their positions in the household is because they can not live up to the breadwinning theory that White America idealizes. The breadwinning theory polarizes men and women work; men work in the public area while women care for the private sphere of the home. In a Black community, where mothers were working full time jobs and men could not find jobs, Black men were emasculated.
Labeling a child fatherless also gives a skew perception of the family arrangement. Fatherless is referred to a unmarried mother. Society does not quantify what the man contributes to their child emotionally, it only cares if the man is a husband, which means the problems linked with Fatherlessness are to be fixed simply by men marrying their child's mother. Welfare re-enforces this belief that marriage is the solution to poverty by making programs that praise the widow who was married by giving them more financial support than the mothers who never married. State welfare programs even created reform bills that would encourage these mothers to get married.
The problem with the overall forcing of marriage and also the laws created to receive the child support they neglect is racism and inequality. Black men are unemployed and poor. Their financial contributions does little to help with overall financial problems. Black women are likely to impoverish with or without a Black husband. Child support only helps 10 percent of the recipients rise above the poverty level because child support can not take something that someone does not have!
Some states even created a bridefare where they actually gave up monetary rewards for marrying. It allowed families to earn 150 percent more money over the poverty line. The purpose was to make lower-class women assimilate into a more middle-class lifestyle; however it over looked the important of a father as more than a money machine.
The welfare of single low-income women will remain to be a problem as long as Black women are seen as the sole beneficiaries of it and Black "anti-culture" of single family homes is perceived as the problem.
My question is have this stuff change in the more recent years with TANF?
Monday, September 21, 2009
American Fathering in Historical Perspective
In American Fathering in Historical Perspective, author Joseph Pleck shows the historical phases of the role of the father in American society. The chapter begins by exploring the Father's role in the 1700s and the 1800s. As mentioned in the previous blog, women in this era took on the responsibility of rearing their children; however after they were seven or eight they became the responsibility of the father. In year of the enlightened thinkers, men were seen as moral and rational, while women weren't. It was the man's duty to not only to train their sons in a trade but also make them rational and moral adults.
This father-children relationship started to shift with the raise of capitalism and industrialization. By the late 19th century, many men started to leave their home for work and be paid a wage for their labor. Wage labor meant the more hours you spent outside the home the more money you made for your family. As a bi-product of working outside the home for a wage, men involvement in their children lives became less and less direct, which resulted in the role shift from a emotional provider to a financial provider. Mother then took on the sole responsibility of the caregiver.
After huge portion of fathers not making it home from WW2, many people encourage fathers to become more than just a provider for their children. Husbands started to assist in raising the children from birth, and even maintaining the household. The range of responsibility grew even wider than pre-industrialization but it was not as big of a priority. The breadwinner mentality was still the dominant practice in American family households.
I think it is amazing how fast a society social norms can change. The very fact that father's roles has changed three times in America show that we have the power to change our current society. I wonder how President Barrack Obama's public relationship with his daughter going to change Americas perception of fatherhood now a days? Will it make being an active father more a norm?
This father-children relationship started to shift with the raise of capitalism and industrialization. By the late 19th century, many men started to leave their home for work and be paid a wage for their labor. Wage labor meant the more hours you spent outside the home the more money you made for your family. As a bi-product of working outside the home for a wage, men involvement in their children lives became less and less direct, which resulted in the role shift from a emotional provider to a financial provider. Mother then took on the sole responsibility of the caregiver.
After huge portion of fathers not making it home from WW2, many people encourage fathers to become more than just a provider for their children. Husbands started to assist in raising the children from birth, and even maintaining the household. The range of responsibility grew even wider than pre-industrialization but it was not as big of a priority. The breadwinner mentality was still the dominant practice in American family households.
I think it is amazing how fast a society social norms can change. The very fact that father's roles has changed three times in America show that we have the power to change our current society. I wonder how President Barrack Obama's public relationship with his daughter going to change Americas perception of fatherhood now a days? Will it make being an active father more a norm?
Dead Domesticity Cont.
One argument people use to dismiss domesticity is that women have the opportunity to do whatever job they want, they just choose less-skilled work. In Chapter One, of Unbending Gender: Why Family and Work Conflicts and What to do about it, author, Joan Williams gives evidence that domesticity in America is still a live and kicking through practiced laws in the workforce. In the EEOC v Sears, Ruebuck Co., Sears was accused of discriminating against women when it came to high-paying commission work. EEOC argued that statistically men dominated the high payed position in Sears. Sears countered EEOC argument by stating women just were not interested in these high paid positions. In the end, the courts agreed with Sears and said EEOC needed to prove that women were actually interested. This case study shows that the judicial system believes women are not taking on high paid positions solely because of their preference rather than an effect of inequality in our country.
People who hold the belief that women are not taking higher-paid positions because of preference rarely look at the whole gender picture. Women responsibility in the home is an tremendous factor that keeps them out of higher paid jobs. Since they spend most, if not all, the time maintain the home and raising the children, two-thirds of the wage gap is based on women duties to the home and family. The very same domesticity that puts the responsibility of the home on women is the thing that is preventing them from excelling in the workforce.
Also, a huge portion of the gender-wage gap is out of the control of the actual women who "have the choice". The perception of an ideal-worker being a man prevents women of the opportunities for promotions or being hired, for that matter. In addition to the ideal worker belief, men are the people choosing who is being accepted in the workforce. Since men are suppose to be the breadwinner, they are more prone to give another man the positions over woman.
These two factors of home responsibilities and discrimination practices are what comprise our domesticity in America. We need to recognize the problem of gender and help solve it. One solution is to start putting responsibility of raising a family back on the men and women. If the norm that men were outside the home and women was in or around home was eliminated. We could actually balance out much of the duties that prohibits women from choosing to higher paid jobs by having the father more active in their children rearing and upbringing. What do you think?
People who hold the belief that women are not taking higher-paid positions because of preference rarely look at the whole gender picture. Women responsibility in the home is an tremendous factor that keeps them out of higher paid jobs. Since they spend most, if not all, the time maintain the home and raising the children, two-thirds of the wage gap is based on women duties to the home and family. The very same domesticity that puts the responsibility of the home on women is the thing that is preventing them from excelling in the workforce.
Also, a huge portion of the gender-wage gap is out of the control of the actual women who "have the choice". The perception of an ideal-worker being a man prevents women of the opportunities for promotions or being hired, for that matter. In addition to the ideal worker belief, men are the people choosing who is being accepted in the workforce. Since men are suppose to be the breadwinner, they are more prone to give another man the positions over woman.
These two factors of home responsibilities and discrimination practices are what comprise our domesticity in America. We need to recognize the problem of gender and help solve it. One solution is to start putting responsibility of raising a family back on the men and women. If the norm that men were outside the home and women was in or around home was eliminated. We could actually balance out much of the duties that prohibits women from choosing to higher paid jobs by having the father more active in their children rearing and upbringing. What do you think?
The Cultural Contradictions of Mothering
In "From Rods to Reason" author Sharon Hayes uses the history of childcare to show phases of women responsibility to the home. In the earlier centuries the perspectives on children changed significantly. Earlier societies child rearing was equated only with protecting children until they were able to survive on their own. By the age of seven they shared the burden of providing for their kin as much as their mother did. Once societies began to see children as mentally and emotionally underdeveloped kids rather than small adults, the mother role of nurturing became much more crucial. The mothers presence became more dominant while men started to work outside the home. While women developed as child-rearers, men took on a larger role outside the house. By the mid-1800s men gravitated towards working outside of the home. Men now became the major contributors of the financial stability of the home. This polarized system of men as the providers is known as the breadwinner system. The breadwinner system force men to financially support their family or to be seen as less of an man. This responsibility of the provider became tied with male masculinity just as child-rearing was to femininity and both of responsibilities were mutually exclusive to the gender group. Hays argues the effects of the breadwinner system still has its reminiscence in the today's society.
In my personal opinion, the breadwinner society is still very prevalent in our society. As an American male, I feel like I have to hold the burden of providing for my family in the future. Though, I expect that my wife will also be working (and probably making more money than i will), at the end of the day if we are struggling financially it is seen as my fault. On the other side of the spectrum, women are still viewed as being the nurturer. Such phrases like the "soccer mom" speak to the responsibility women have in the home; however, their burden is even greater now. Since an average family can not survive on one income, women now have to take on their motherly duties and work full time. Even though men should contribute in the home, it is still not a cultural or societal responsibility, leaving women with an uneven amount of work.
In my personal opinion, the breadwinner society is still very prevalent in our society. As an American male, I feel like I have to hold the burden of providing for my family in the future. Though, I expect that my wife will also be working (and probably making more money than i will), at the end of the day if we are struggling financially it is seen as my fault. On the other side of the spectrum, women are still viewed as being the nurturer. Such phrases like the "soccer mom" speak to the responsibility women have in the home; however, their burden is even greater now. Since an average family can not survive on one income, women now have to take on their motherly duties and work full time. Even though men should contribute in the home, it is still not a cultural or societal responsibility, leaving women with an uneven amount of work.
Is Domesiticty Dead?
The common perception is that Domesticity in the United States is over. Domesticity is a gender system comprising of organization of market work and family work and the gender norms that maintain and reproduce this organization. The American version of domesticity in 19th century was men worked outside the home, while women stayed at home to bear children and maintain the house.
Though in the 21st century, we have more women stepping outside the home and venturing into the work place, the belief of domesticity is still instilled in the American norm. In the work force, our ideal worker is someone who works full time, can take a lot of overtime hours and has little or no-time off for childbearing or rearing. Since most women rear children some time in their working lives, they are inherently excluded from becoming an ideal worker and as a result they have little success in gaining high professional positions.
The result of not being considered an ideal worker is drastic especially for single and divorced mothers. Since mothers are not seen as archetypal workers, they end up getting payed lower wages than men. Women were making forty percent less then men in wages for the same job. This has a devastating affect on mothers trying to lead their household. They simply can not afford it. Domesticity causes divorced and single mothers to live under the poverty lines and almost guarantees their children will have downward mobility in relations to their father's socio-economic status.
Another bi-product of domesticity is that it takes away the responsibility of the fathers to help child-rear. Due to their responsibility to the workforce, they are always out of the house and are not interacting with their children. Mothers spend three times as much time in face to face interaction with their children than men do. This lack of fathering is depriving children of male influences in their life.
The domesticity is huge problem in America; especially since we need two sources of income to raise a family. Since both parents are outside the home, many children are not being raised sufficiently by either parent and babysitters and other people are becoming the main influences in children lives. I feel parents are losing their connection with their children and losing their authority in their lives.
Though in the 21st century, we have more women stepping outside the home and venturing into the work place, the belief of domesticity is still instilled in the American norm. In the work force, our ideal worker is someone who works full time, can take a lot of overtime hours and has little or no-time off for childbearing or rearing. Since most women rear children some time in their working lives, they are inherently excluded from becoming an ideal worker and as a result they have little success in gaining high professional positions.
The result of not being considered an ideal worker is drastic especially for single and divorced mothers. Since mothers are not seen as archetypal workers, they end up getting payed lower wages than men. Women were making forty percent less then men in wages for the same job. This has a devastating affect on mothers trying to lead their household. They simply can not afford it. Domesticity causes divorced and single mothers to live under the poverty lines and almost guarantees their children will have downward mobility in relations to their father's socio-economic status.
Another bi-product of domesticity is that it takes away the responsibility of the fathers to help child-rear. Due to their responsibility to the workforce, they are always out of the house and are not interacting with their children. Mothers spend three times as much time in face to face interaction with their children than men do. This lack of fathering is depriving children of male influences in their life.
The domesticity is huge problem in America; especially since we need two sources of income to raise a family. Since both parents are outside the home, many children are not being raised sufficiently by either parent and babysitters and other people are becoming the main influences in children lives. I feel parents are losing their connection with their children and losing their authority in their lives.
Sunday, September 13, 2009
The Theory the Sex-Role Revolution
It is fascinating to see how fast gender roles have changes in the over 100 years. In the 1890 only 2% of married women worked outside the home and recently in 2006 there were 100% of married women in the workforce. Kingsley Davis believes their were many factors that played into this migration into the workforce.
One reason Davis claimed had an effect on women in the workforce was rise and fall of the Breadwinner system. In the breadwinning system, husbands provided income for the family while the wife tended to the home and children. This type of system made very distinct roles for women and men, not only figuratively but physically. Men actually spent their time working long hours away from home in cities to provide for their families, while women did everything in the home to make sure the family was functional. In the late 1900s, the median age of giving birth was 40 years old while the life expectancy was only 57 years old, which meant, wives actually spent their whole life rearing and raising children. This duty of rearing children made it virtually impossible for women to work outside the home for a long period of time (especially if their husbands were not raising their children).
By the 1940s, the breadwinner system started to crumble. The industrialization made a high demand for workers and women were now starting to have their last child in their late 20s. This newly freed time and demand made work more appealing. Also the new fear of divorce played push factor for women to start provide financial support for themselves.
My question is if this trend of migrating to the workforce and having a more egalitarian system occurred at a faster rate in the African American community than in the White community that this data is seem to refer? I know Black women needed to work to make a living wage for their family and also they were forced to work in earlier centuries because of slavery. Did this accelerate their sex-role revolution?
One reason Davis claimed had an effect on women in the workforce was rise and fall of the Breadwinner system. In the breadwinning system, husbands provided income for the family while the wife tended to the home and children. This type of system made very distinct roles for women and men, not only figuratively but physically. Men actually spent their time working long hours away from home in cities to provide for their families, while women did everything in the home to make sure the family was functional. In the late 1900s, the median age of giving birth was 40 years old while the life expectancy was only 57 years old, which meant, wives actually spent their whole life rearing and raising children. This duty of rearing children made it virtually impossible for women to work outside the home for a long period of time (especially if their husbands were not raising their children).
By the 1940s, the breadwinner system started to crumble. The industrialization made a high demand for workers and women were now starting to have their last child in their late 20s. This newly freed time and demand made work more appealing. Also the new fear of divorce played push factor for women to start provide financial support for themselves.
My question is if this trend of migrating to the workforce and having a more egalitarian system occurred at a faster rate in the African American community than in the White community that this data is seem to refer? I know Black women needed to work to make a living wage for their family and also they were forced to work in earlier centuries because of slavery. Did this accelerate their sex-role revolution?
Chapters 2, 3 from: From Marriage to the Market: The Transformation of Women’s Lives and Work.
Chapter 2 and 3 discussed the actual transition of women in the home to the workforce. They debunked the myth that industrialization, in this period of 1920s, actually made the work load for women lighter. Through these chapters, I learned that unemployed women in the 1960s actually spent an additional four on household chores than women in the 1920s. Though women were no longer doing strenuous chores such as collecting water from wells, or knitting and maintaining clothes in the 1960s, the emphasis was more on maintaining a clean home and nurturing, cultivating their children.
I think we can all agree that raising children in a safe and cultivating environment is important for a family and a society, but why did we take away the financial support for married women whom perform these acts? Divorce Law stripped ex-wife's of financial support from their ex-husband and added no-fault divorces, which made divorces more accessible and accepted. Do you think wives should receive compensation for the work they dedicate in the home?
I think we can all agree that raising children in a safe and cultivating environment is important for a family and a society, but why did we take away the financial support for married women whom perform these acts? Divorce Law stripped ex-wife's of financial support from their ex-husband and added no-fault divorces, which made divorces more accessible and accepted. Do you think wives should receive compensation for the work they dedicate in the home?
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