homemaker

Housewife is a term used to describe a married female who is not employed outside of the home.

Multicultural norms

In agriculture studies, the word "housewife" is occasionally used referring to the person who does the majority of the chores within a farm's compound, as opposed to field and livestock work.

India

Being a diverse country, India has different approaches in different demographic groups.

In a Hindu family, the head of the family is the Griha Swami and his wife is the Griha Swamini. The Sanskrit words Grihast and Grihasta perhaps comes closest to describing the entire gamut of activities and roles undertaken by the householder or housewife. Grih is the Sanskrit root for House or Home; Grihasta and Grihast are derivatives of this root, as is Grihastya. The couple lives in the state called Grihastashram or family system and together they nurture the family and help its members (both young and old) through the travails of life. They are a housewife team. The woman who increments the family tree and protects the procreated wealth of the family is described as the Grihalakshmi (the wealth of the house) and Grihashoba (the glory of the house). The elders of the family are known as Grihshreshta. The husband or wife may engage in countless other activities which may be social, religious, political or economic in nature for the ultimate welfare of the family and society. However, their unified status as a householder or housewife is the nucleus from within which they operate in society. This 'status', as housewives, anchors them in society and provides meaning to their activities within the social, religious, political and economic framework of their world.

In Muslim families, use of the term housewife (or its equivalent) is uncommon, even though housewives are very common and stay-at-home husbands are extremely rare. Muslim society sets different expectations from the husband and wife, but respects their individuality. Families are generally viewed as sets and not units.

China

In imperial China (excluding periods of the Tang dynasty when women had higher status in society), women were bound to homemaking by the doctrines of Confucianism and cultural norms. In most cases, the husband was alive and able to work, so the wife was almost always forbidden to take a job and mainly spent her days at home or doing other domestic tasks. As Confucianism spread across East Asia, this social norm was also observed in Korea, Japan, and Vietnam.

After the founding of the Republic of China in the early 20th century, these norms were gradually loosened and many women were able to enter the workforce (a growing number of women, beginning at this time, also began to receive education). Starting with the rule of the People's Republic of China, all women were freed from compulsory family roles. During the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution, some women were required by the government to do heavy work that they were not physically suited for. This policy was later abolished.

In modern China, housewives are no longer as common (particularly in urban areas). Nearly all women work simply because one person's income is insufficient to support the family, a decision made easier by the fact that it is common for Chinese grandparents to watch after their grandchildren before they are old enough to go to school or are very young.

Formal education

In previous decades, there were a large amount of mandatory courses for young women to learn the skills of homemaking. In high school, courses included cooking, nutrition, home economics, family and consumer science (aka F.A.C.S) and food and cooking hygiene. This last one can be the reason of a traditional housewife is always portrayed wearing an apron. More recently, these courses have been mostly abolished, and many younger women in high school and college would be more likely to explore resources on the topic of child development and managing children's behavior.

Modern mothers

Some contemporary women are leaving the paid workforce and concentrating full-time on parenting. Many of these women have left the paid workforce so that they can focus on raising their children, particularly through the children's early years before entering kindergarten. There is considerable variability within the stay-at-home mother population with regard to their intent to return to the paid workforce. Some plan to work from their homes, some will do part-time work, some intend to return to part or full-time work when their children have reached school age, some may increase their skill sets by returning to higher education, and others may find it economically feasible to not return to the paid workforce.

Similarly, there is considerable variation in the stay-at-home mom's attitude towards domestic work not related to caring for children. Some may embrace a traditional role of housewife, cooking and cleaning in addition to caring for children. Others see their primary role as that of child-care providers, supporting their children's physical, intellectual, and emotional development while sharing or outsourcing other aspects of home care.

Feminist critique

Many feminists, such as Betty Friedan, have criticized the marginalization of women as 'housewives '. Feminists generally suggest that 'housework' should be an appropriate role for a parent of either sex, believing that gender roles do not have any basis other than social conditioning. Also, they maintain that women can become socially isolated by being tied to their home. Some feminists would argue that the goal of feminism is not to close off any options for women, but to create opportunities for women to pursue careers in traditionally male occupations, as well as providing males an option to pursue roles that so far have been perceived as "strictly female". Indeed, the role of the stay-at-home dad or househusband has become more socially recognized as an available option.

Some feminists^[1][2] as well as certain non-feminist economists (particularly historical materialists) also point out that the monetary contribution of housewives' work to society is ignored in standard formulations of economic output, such as GDP or employment figures. Housewives work many unrecorded hours a week, while depending on their partner's employment to provide health insurance and household income. Proponents of collective economics argue that housewives' work does not contribute to the general economy, and should not be rewarded with tax breaks. However many feminists have refuted this idea, citing the staggering costs (e.g. childcare) that the state or individuals would be forced to assume in the absence of unpaid homemakers.

See also

Look up homemaker in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• Gender roles in agriculture
• Good Wife's Guide
• Soccer mom
• Retro housewife
• Home and family blog

References

External links

• Homemaking at the Open Directory Project
• Home Economics Archive: Tradition, Research, History (HEARTH)
  An e-book collection of over 1,000 classic books on home economics spanning 1850 to 1950, created by Cornell University's Mann Library.