Difference between revisions of "426--Week 4 Questions/Comments--Tuesday"
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'''Comparison''' I thought the differences in the use of sources was very interesting. Boydston used a lot of numerical data and analysis thereof to formulate an understanding of the meaning of being a poor woman in American cities. Stansell on the other hand seems to be using other sorts of records, including first hand accounts of people who were living in New York at the time. I found it fascinating to look at the similar outcomes that came from these two different methods of study. | '''Comparison''' I thought the differences in the use of sources was very interesting. Boydston used a lot of numerical data and analysis thereof to formulate an understanding of the meaning of being a poor woman in American cities. Stansell on the other hand seems to be using other sorts of records, including first hand accounts of people who were living in New York at the time. I found it fascinating to look at the similar outcomes that came from these two different methods of study. | ||
| − | '''“Family Wage”''': All three readings for Tuesday in some form dealt with the notion of a family wage. Boydston defined it as the ability for the male, head of household to be able to provide enough income for his family to survive as well as prevent women in the family from working outside the home. Mintz and Kellogg also discussed it as the father’s responsibility to provide a sufficient income for the entire family. All three readings deal with this ideal that was established by the middle-class that women were expected to remain at home and work within the sphere of domesticity, while fathers were the sole economic provider for the entire family. Boydston discussed how women were responsible for stretching the income of their husbands by buying items in bulk, utilizing food from a garden, and working outside the home either helping husbands or being a domestic servant. Stansell spent a significant time discussing that the cult of domesticity was class specific and created by a bourgeois self-consciousness. The notion of “poor” changed substantially from ideas of elder, handicapped or widowed individuals to those people simply struggling to survive in a new system of manufacturing. Stansell also alludes to the notion of charity extended by genteel women to working-class women. We see again the struggle to meet an ideal based upon religion and the home as appropriate spheres for women, yet these spheres are unrealistic for working-class women who cannot work just within their homes or participate fully in religious clubs or activities. In all three readings we see the working-class family struggle to live up to an ideal that is simply unrealistic and out of reach. We also see how this ideal family causes stress and tension on the working-class family as they struggle to meet this ideal, but more importantly as they struggle to survive. – Mary Beth | + | '''“Family Wage”''': All three readings for Tuesday in some form dealt with the notion of a family wage. Boydston defined it as the ability for the male, head of household to be able to provide enough income for his family to survive as well as prevent women in the family from working outside the home. Mintz and Kellogg also discussed it as the father’s responsibility to provide a sufficient income for the entire family. All three readings deal with this ideal that was established by the middle-class that women were expected to remain at home and work within the sphere of domesticity, while fathers were the sole economic provider for the entire family. Boydston discussed how women were responsible for stretching the income of their husbands by buying items in bulk, utilizing food from a garden, and working outside the home either helping husbands or being a domestic servant. Stansell spent a significant time discussing that the cult of domesticity was class specific and created by a bourgeois self-consciousness. The notion of “poor” changed substantially from ideas of elder, handicapped or widowed individuals to those people simply struggling to survive in a new system of manufacturing. Stansell also alludes to the notion of charity extended by genteel women to working-class women. We see again the struggle to meet an ideal based upon religion and the home as appropriate spheres for women, yet these spheres are unrealistic for working-class women who cannot work just within their homes or participate fully in religious clubs or activities. In all three readings we see the working-class family struggle to live up to an ideal that is simply unrealistic and out of reach. We also see how this ideal family causes stress and tension on the working-class family as they struggle to meet this ideal, but more importantly as they struggle to survive. – Mary Beth |
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| + | '''Misfortune''' So are we to assume from this week's readings that women of the time were either itinerant peddlers or brothel fodder? | ||
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== Boydston == | == Boydston == | ||
