division of labour

DIVISION OF LABOUR
1. Talcott Parson believe in the traditional division of labour
  1. Instrumental Role = (provider/breadwinner role)
  2. Expressive Role = (nuturing caring and emotion role)
  3. Segregated Conjugal Roles
    1. when couples have seperate roles within a household (male = breadwinner, female = homemaker)
      1. Parson agrees with this view!
  4. Joint Conjugal Roles
    1. roles between partners are shared, based on equality -tasks such as housework and childcare is shared and leisure time is often spent together
2. The Symmetrical Role/ Family
  1. Young and Willmott take a 'march of progress' view of history of the family
    1. - Family life is gradually improving for all its members (becoming more equal and more democratic
    2. - Families are moving away from segregated conjugal roles and towards joint conjugal roles and the symmetrical family
    3. - Women now go to work
    4. Couples now spend time together
    5. men now help with housework and childcare
  2. *More common among younger couples, those who are geographically and socially isolated and the more richer*
  3. Factors for the rise of symmetrical family
    1. 1. Changes in women's position - including women going out to work
    2. 2. Geograhical Mobility - more couples live away from the communities in which they grew up
    3. 3. New Technology - devices that make housework easier
    4. 4. Higher Living Standards
3. A Feminist View of Housework
  1. Many feminist reject the 'march of progress' view
    1. Men and women remain unequal within the family
    2. Women still do most of the housework
    3. *inequality stems from the fact that the family and society are patriarchal*
  2. Oakley criticises the 'symmetrical family'. She argues claims are exaggerated
    1. 'helping out' could simply mean cooking once a week (Young and Willmott's Research
    2. In her own research - Oakley found some evidence of a trend towards symmetry
    3. *Only 15% of husbands had a high level of participation in housework, and only 25% had a high level of participation in childcare*
  3. Later research supports Oakleys findings, Mary Boulton found that fewer than 20% of husbands had a major role in childcare
    1. Young and Willmott exaggerate men's contribution by looking at the tasks involved rather than the responsibilities
    2. Mother's responsible for child's security and well being. Fathers help with basic tasks
  4. Oakley disagrees with Young and Willmott to such an extent that she believes the housewife role has become more dominant for married women
    1. even though the 20th century saw an increase in the number of married women working, the housewife role is still women's primary role
    2. women who work are more concentrated in low - paid jobs that are often an extension of the housewife role
  5. Warde and Hetherington did find evidence of a slight change of attitude among younger men. They no longer assumed women should do the housework, and we more likely to think they were doing less than their fair share
    1. This generation change is partially supported by other research. The Futures Foundation Study of 1000 adults found that 60% of men claimed to do more housework than their fathers, while 75% of women claimed to do less housework than their mothers

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	Created by Dalena about 9 years ago