Type
Text
Type
Dissertation
Advisor
Michael Kimmel | Kenneth A. Feldman. Javier Auyero. | Nancy Tomes.
Date
2011-05-01
Keywords
Sociology -- Gender Studies | division of labor, family, food, household, power, women
Department
Department of Sociology
Language
en_US
Source
This work is sponsored by the Stony Brook University Graduate School in compliance with the requirements for completion of degree.
Identifier
http://hdl.handle.net/11401/71646
Publisher
The Graduate School, Stony Brook University: Stony Brook, NY.
Format
application/pdf
Abstract
The Household Meals Project (HMP) looks at the division of food-related chores (shopping, putting supplies away, food preparation, cleaning up, garbage, and recycling) in 150 middle-class households in suburban and urban New York. The mixed-methods study employs quantitative, qualitative and visual (photographic) data. Issues focused on include: the micro-sociological dynamics of power and accommodation within households; how the praxis of household food chores serves as a distinct power base for women, and one that is transmitted inter-generationally as a vital component of female identity; how the cultural territory of domestic food practices serves as a site where social change is both produced and resisted, often simultaneously; and identification of several socio-historical trends in the U.S. over the last century which have acted to increase the gender imbalance in domestic food work, even as paid work and other domestic labor have moved toward gender equality. These issues all stem from a seemingly simple question: What factors lie behind the continuation of female responsibility for the majority of food-related chores in dual-headed households? Among the findings: both women and men tend to see the praxis of food chores as a health-related, emotionally freighted vocational discipline---an unpaid job particularly geared toward women that engages the work ethic traditionally associated with paid employment---rather than as a neutral set of tasks that can be done equally well by anyone. In addition, a comparison of chore-specific data from a 1980s study with the HMP’'s data reveals identifiable change in who does the work, while still maintaining female-dominated “ownership” of these responsibilities. This work explores how the combination of personal expectations and experiences, larger social trends, and the physical setting of kitchens influence and shape the daily fulfillment of food-related responsibilities. Through this synthesis, it becomes clear that the food-related home environment---conscious, unconscious, physical, and symbolic---serves as a source of both social stability and instability as it reflects and generates social change. Far from a passive repository of private practices, household meals are seen to be a potent force in cultural, political, and economic life.
Recommended Citation
Lindquist, Carol Shepherd, "The Household Meals Project: Feeding Power" (2011). Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions). 851.
https://commons.library.stonybrook.edu/stony-brook-theses-and-dissertations-collection/851