The latest from my women's studies class...

For the past week, we've been reading a book called The Package Deal by Nicholas Townsend, which focuses on the demanding expectations put on fathers in our society. In all of our talk about how women are confined by domesticity and feminitiy, I think it's easy to forget that male counterparts are facing significant pressures by our culture to perform in a certain way as well. That being said, something in my last reading assignment made my ears perk up and think of how women's work is being appreciated and defined.

First of all, the book discusses how fathers are generally expected to act as providers for the family - this means working long hours in a job or career in order to earn money for their wives and children. One part even quoted a man saying "I think that most of us turned out the way we did - strong work ethic and real feeling of responsibitlity for ourselves - because of him" (118). I realize that work in the public sphere has long been recognized as more valuable than work done in the private sphere, but is a woman's work in the home going completely unaccounted for? I know that my father worked 8-5 hours while I was growing up, while my mom stayed at home. Does this mean that he was working significantly harder than my mom, who let's face it spent up to 15 hours a day doing childcare and household work? It just doesn't sit right with me that we have become so fixated on the hours someone spends away from home and measure that on a scale of work ethic.

This thought made me think of the last book we read which focused on transnational families located in the Philippines. In these families, one parent or the other was often working across the world in order to provide financial support for their spouse and children. Interestingly, the men were seen as loving fathers merely because their absence showed their dedication to making money. Mothers, meanwhile, had to give much more to their children than the financial support to be considered good mothers. Where does this double-standard come into play? Do children actually view the work their parents do differently based on the gendered expectations that society has placed on them? I just really wonder what differences in child-rearing practices would change the perceptions children have of their parents' financial support.