Reasons husbands and wives give for why wives work and the structural factors related to reasons given are examined along with the impact of these reasons on husbands' and wives' personal well-being and quality of marital relationships. Although financial and other structural factors are important in understanding why wives work, interpretations using gender and family roles also explain the findings. Working for financial reasons is related to neither wives' nor husbands' personal well-being and quality of (...) marital relationships; however, working for reasons that bring rewards to the wife alone has positive consequences for women and mixed results for men. These findings point to the need to assess both structural and interpretive explanations when examining the impact of work on the family. (shrink)

This investigation places recent research about changes in wives' and husbands' domestic labor in the context of well-known reporting differences between different kinds of housework surveys. An analysis of the “reporting gap” between direct-question reports of housework hours from the National Survey of Families and Households and time-diary reports from Americans' Use of Time, 1985, shows that both husbands and wives overreport their housework contributions. Furthermore, gender attitudes, total housework, class, education, income, family size, and employment status together (...) significantly affect the overreport, although the variables operate in different ways for wives and husbands. It is concluded that changing and uneven social perceptions of the appropriate domestic roles of women and men have resulted in reporting biases that do not necessarily correspond to actual changes in housework behavior. These findings cast doubt on claims that contemporary husbands are doing more housework than their predecessors. (shrink)

The majority of the women who campaigned to save the Vane Tempest Colliery from closure in 1993 were involved because of their political understanding and allegiances rather than as a consequence of their practical involvement in mining life. Even those women who were married to miners did not conform to the stereotypical conception of ‘miner's wife’. However, the supporting labour movement and the media persisted in conceptualizing the Women's Vigil through romantic and masculinist discourses of miners and mining communities which (...) could only locate the women as ‘wives’, which confined the campaign within historical stereotypes no longer appropriate to the actual situation and which persistently set the idea of socialism against that of feminism. This not only situated the women's campaign as secondary and subject to that of the NUM but it also subverted the possibilities of the women fully articulating their own experience and understanding within the campaign. The situation was further complicated by memories of the miners’ strike of 1984–5 in which women played such an important role. One aspect of this role, that of maintaining mining families in the face of hardship, continued to inform understanding of the women's role in the fight to prevent closure, although it was no longer appropriate. The Women's Vigil engaged with a much wider set of concerns and with a wider range of individuals and groups than did that of the miners themselves. There were serious possibilities for broadening the political campaign around the women's slogan of ‘Jobs, community and environment’ which were never fully exploited because of the difficulties of admitting that women could inhabit any position other than that of ‘miners’ wives’. This experience of the Vane Tempest Vigil indicates the significance and the centrality of gender issues within class based political action. (shrink)

Based on a series of interviews with blue-collar women and their husbands in Istanbul, Turkey, this article examines the negotiation of family work in households in which the wives are major providers. The relationships between provider status, women's expectations, and the actual configuration of family work are complexly mediated by cultural constructions, perception of women as providers, marital dynamics, and extended family relationships. Three different discourses characterize family work. Woman's evaluation of her husband as “responsible” or “irresponsible” informs the (...) construction of the male role in the household. Conflict is heightened when men default on both domestic and economic grounds. This study makes a contribution toward a comparative understanding of negotiation of family work by providing an analysis of how structural conditions and cultural ideology interact to construct a gendered division of family work in the household in the context of continuities and discontinuities in sociocultural patterns. (shrink)

The neologism ‘sexist’ has gained entry to an Oxford Dictionary, The Advanced Learner's Dictionary of Current English, third edition , where it is defined as ‘derisive of the female sex and expressive of masculine superiority’. Thus ‘sexpot’ and ‘sex kitten’, which are still defined in exclusively feminine terms in the fifth edition of The Concise Oxford Dictionary , have finally met their lexicographical match. This point about current English usage has of course a serious, and general, application. For language reflects, (...) when it does not direct, prevailing social conceptions. Thus it is not accidental that there is no masculine counterpart to the word ‘feminism’. ‘Male chauvinism’, the nearest we have come to coining one, is more emotive than descriptive and so involves ambiguity; while ‘sexism’, even when it is given an exclusively masculine connotation, is still, formally, sexually neutral. ‘Feminism’, by contrast, unequivocally denotes the striving to raise women to an equality of rights and status with men. It has been suggested, it is true, that there were inchoate feminist movements or tendencies in the ancient Greek world, for example in the Classical Athens of Aristophanes and Plato . But feminism in the modern sense did not really emerge before the eighteenth century; and in Britain, for instance, it was only with the passage in 1975 of the Employment Protection, Equal Pay and Sex Discrimination Acts that women raised themselves on to an all but equal footing with their male fellows — at any rate in the technical, juridical sense. (shrink)

The concubines, with whom the sultans lived a family life, were classified according to a certain hierarchy in the Harem. The first wives of the sultan and those who gave birth were called Kadınefendi. The other wives with a lower status than the Kadınefendi wives were called Ikbal Hanımefendi. According to Islamic law, marriage with a concubine is not like a marriage with a free woman. If a marriage is desired, the concubine must be freed. Until the (...) 19th century, sultans did not marry their concubines for a few exceptions. In the 19th century, the legal status of concubines in the Ottoman Empire became controversial. The countries of origine changed when the Ottoman Empire was unable to conquer new territory. Consequently, the enslavement procedure of prisoners of war disappeared. Instead, Caucasian immigrants, who had to leave their homeland mainly due to the Russian attacks, gave their daughters to the Ottoman palace so that they would not suffer misery and could reach important positions in the future. Among these were orphans from poor families as well as those from noble Caucasian dynasties. Even though the young women in the palace were called concubines, at least some of them were free/Muslim persons. This meant, that they could not be enslaved according to Islamic law. Although there was no problem for those who served in the palace, a remarkable situation emerged for the would-be spouses of the sultan. Could a woman from a free and Muslim family be the sultan's wife without a marriage bond? Was the limitation of the Kadınefendi numbers to four (in times of Sultan Abdülaziz) due to the Islamic law principle, that a man could marry maximum four wives? Was there a marriage ceremony (nikāh) for Kadınefendi wives? What was the situation of the Ikbal? Satisfactory answers to these questions have not been given yet. However, there are no official records it was claimed that lately sultans married especially their concubines who were Abkhaz descendants and included them among their wives in this way, because they were free and Muslims. Thus, the matter whether Sultan Abdülhamid II's wives were concubines or wedded became the subject of some research today. Memoires claim that almost all of Sultan Abdülhamid's wives were free and of Muslim origin. According to this, it was said that the wives of Sultan Abdülhamid could not have the status of the concubine and that their relationship should have been by marriage. On the other hand, considering that a maximum of four women can be married according to Islamic law, the marriage of the Sultan, who had thirteen wives, raised juristic questions. This problem was most clearly seen in the inheritance case filed by his heirs after the death of Sultan Abdülhamid. In this case, where it was claimed that Sultan Abdülhamid was married to nine wives, no objection was made to that claim. In this study, information about the wives of Sultan Abdülhamid and their legal status was tried to be determined through the documents related to their salaries during the 2nd Constitutional Era. Besides, the issue of nine wedded women, which emerged in the case of Sultan Abdülhamid's inheritance, was evaluated in terms of fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence). Sultan Abdülhamid was never accused of marriages contrary to Islamic law by his opponents during and after his reign. From this point of view, it can be said that there was no situation contrary to Islamic law regarding the Sultan's harem at that time. This might be due to three possibilities: Firstly, some wives have concealed the truth in the court, which is the weakest possibility according to the data obtained. Secondly, the talaq (divorcement) was hidden by Sultan Abdülhamid and his wives were not aware of it. This possibility has been found to be problematic when evaluated in terms of Hanafi fiqh. Thirdly, the practice of al-nikāh al-tanazzuhī (marriage performed in order to avoid from fornication). Considering the correspondence between the state departments in the period starting with the 2nd Constitutional Monarchy and until the Republic, it is clear that the Kadınefendis were regarded as married wives (their number was limited to four), while the Ikbals were regarded as concubines. From this point of view, it is thought that the most plausible possibility is that the Ikbals were regarded as concubines and their marriages were al-nikāh al-tanazzuhī. (shrink)

This article represents a response to ‘the problem of women and African philosophy', which refers mainly to the absence of strong women's and feminist voices within the discipline of African philosophy. I investigate the possibility that African women are not so much excluded from the institutionalized discipline of philosophy, as preferring fiction as a genre for intellectual expression. This hypothesis can be supported by some feminists who read the absolute prioritisation of abstraction and generalization over the concrete and the particular (...) as a masculine and western oppressive strategy. Attention to the concrete and the unique which is made possible by literature more readily than by philosophy, could thus operate as a form of political resistance in certain contexts. If fiction is currently the preferred form of intellectual expression of African women, it is crucial that the community of professional philosophers in a context like South Africa should come to terms with the relevance of such a preference for philosophy's self-conception, and it should work to make these intellectual contributions philosophically fruitful. In the process, we may entertain the hope that philosophy itself will move closer to its root or source as ‘love of wisdom'. South African Journal of Philosophy Vol. 27 (4) 2008: pp. 413-429. (shrink)

This article examines factors related to husbands' contribution to housework when their wives become newly impaired. Data are from a sample of 319 married couples who participated in the National Survey of Families and Households, and in which wives developed physical limitations between baseline and five-year follow-up interviews. Using ordinary least squares regression, we found that husbands who have egalitarian attitudes toward marital roles and are happy in their marriage at baseline do more housework at follow-up than husbands (...) who are traditional and/or are less happy. Given the slow rate of change in household division of labor, the lack of public policies to support people with impairment and family caregiving disproportionately burdens women. (shrink)

This article represents a response to ‘the problem of women and African philosophy', which refers mainly to the absence of strong women's and feminist voices within the discipline of African philosophy. I investigate the possibility that African women are not so much excluded from the institutionalized discipline of philosophy, as preferring fiction as a genre for intellectual expression. This hypothesis can be supported by some feminists who read the absolute prioritisation of abstraction and generalization over the concrete and the particular (...) as a masculine and western oppressive strategy. Attention to the concrete and the unique which is made possible by literature more readily than by philosophy, could thus operate as a form of political resistance in certain contexts. If fiction is currently the preferred form of intellectual expression of African women, it is crucial that the community of professional philosophers in a context like South Africa should come to terms with the relevance of such a preference for philosophy's self-conception, and it should work to make these intellectual contributions philosophically fruitful. In the process, we may entertain the hope that philosophy itself will move closer to its root or source as ‘love of wisdom'. (shrink)

Travelling through the foothills of the Pyrenees, the episcopal visitor Guerau Caluet arrived in the parish of Sant Martí de la Vajol on an autumn day in 1314. As in so many parishes visited on his journey, the visitor found that the rector Berenguer kept a concubine, and in this case, was also known to celebrate mass with his grandson and young son. This was not, however, the only blatant violation of canon law and synodal statutes. Berenguer testified that one (...) day in May the sacrist Bernat, from the suffragan church of Agullana, had called on him to deliver the mass for the burial of a female parishioner. The rector recounted that while reciting the gospel for the funeral, he was in need of hosts and was unable to proceed with the mass “until Guillema, the concubine of the sacrist, sent the key to the sacristy where the hosts were.” As it happened, the priest Bernat was out of town and he had entrusted the sacristy keys not to his colleague Berenguer, but to his concubine. (shrink)

This article explores an aspect of women’s transnational labor migration that has been understudied in many labor-sending countries: how men experience shifts in the household labor division triggered by women’s migration. In so doing, we shed light on the diverse ways notions of masculinity and gender identities are being reworked and renegotiated in the transnational family. Drawing on qualitative data collected from in-depth interviews with carers of left-behind children in Northern Vietnam, we show how men are confronted with the need (...) to take on child care duties, which have traditionally been ascribed to women, while at the same time being under considerable pressure to live up to locally accepted masculinity ideals. We provide interesting insights into the changing family structures and dynamics in Vietnamese society where patriarchal norms continue to exert significant influence on different facets of life. (shrink)

Cet article analyse une supplique adressée par une artisane turinoise au roi dans le but d’être admise dans la corporation des fabricants de boutons en bénéficiant d’une importante réduction des frais pour le chef d’œuvre. Le texte suggère la complexité et l’ambiguïté de l’identité des travailleuses de l’artisanat ; celle-ci est le résultat d’une stratification de facteurs culturels et économiques. La supplique montre que les femmes peuvent (et savent) négocier leur place dans le monde du travail. D’un côté, la suppliante (...) s’appuie sur des argumentations qui évoquent explicitement sa place dans l’économie familiale et font appel aux stéréotypes sur son sexe (et notamment à son rôle d’épouse et mère soucieuse d’assurer le bien-être de sa famille). De l’autre côté, en rappelant qu’elle a investi sa dot dans l’activité artisanale, elle évoque le risque d’en rester dépourvue (et devenant ainsi “indotata”) et la chute sociale et économique conséquente. (shrink)

This case note considers the Court of Appeal decision in Royal Bank of Scotland v. Etridge (No. 2) and other appeals [1998] 4 All E.R. 705. It concerns the familiar scenario of a wife jointly mortgaging (or providing a guarantee for a mortgage of) the family home in order to secure financial support for a business run by her husband. The House of Lords decision in Barclays Bank v O'Brien [1994] A.C. 180 has given rise to a range of litigation (...) in this area, and the spotlight has now moved from the banks to an examination of the quality of advice given by solicitors. The banks have heeded the warnings in O'Brien and now insist that wives are told to obtain independent legal advice. It will be seen that, following Etridge, if the bank tells the solicitor to give the wife legal advice upon undertaking the transaction, that will be sufficient to protect the bank, notwithstanding that the advice was either inadequate or even not actually given. The onus to ensure that proper advice is given is shifted squarely on to the solicitor. The note concludes that the decision is indicative of the shift of judicial opinion against wives seeking to avoid charges over matrimonial homes and in favour of banks. (shrink)

This note considers the recent House of Lordsdecision in Royal Bank of Scotland plc. v.Etridge (No. 2). It concerns the familiarscenario of a wife jointly mortgaging (orproviding a guarantee for a mortgage of) thefamily home in order to secure financialsupport for a business run by her husband. Ina landmark judgement, Lord Nicholls set out newand specific procedures to be followed bylenders and solicitors who are providingindependent advice, in order to counter anyargument by the wife that the charge should beset aside (...) because her signature on the lender'scharge has been obtained by the undue influenceof her husband. This note considers the impactof the decision upon the parties involved insuch transactions. Special consideration isgiven to the surety wife and her chances ofdefending possession proceedings brought bylenders in the post Etridge era. (shrink)

The _Biakē _custom, an ancient practice among the Ogoni indigenous people, refers to a system by which certain girls or women are not allowed to marry, but are legitimately allowed to raise children for their parents or family, because of some peculiar circumstances of the household, thus the idea of ‘mothers but not wives.’ However, the _Biakē _practice has been misconstrued with the malapropism called ‘_Sira_-Custom,’ implying a system in which the first daughters are not given out for marriage. (...) This study focused on the philosophical foundation of _Biakē _and its implications on the Ogoni contemporary society. The study discovered that there was never a time in Ogoni history when _Sira _(first daughters) was denied the right to marry out. Every Ogoni daughter is eligible for marriage. The study argues that though the philosophy of _Biakē _emphasizes the continuity of the family/lineage, women serving under _Biakē _and their children may experience psychological trauma due to the absence of a “father figure” and other unmet needs. Using the prescriptive method, this paper advocated for the promulgation of laws, and regulations to modify the _Biakē _custom to accommodate the Ogoni modern-day reality. (shrink)

This article presents insights from a research project on sex work that took place in the Caribbean region during 1997–8. First it briefly summarizes common themes in historical and contemporary studies of sex work in the region, then describes the aims, methodology, and main trends of the project. It pays particular attention to the differences between definitions and experiences of sex work by female and male sex workers and of male and female sex tourists, as well as describing conditions in (...) the Caribbean sex trade. Finally the article identifies some implications of the complexity in the region that were uncovered through the research project for feminist theorizing about sex work. (shrink)

L’histoire européenne s’est construite sur des mariages entre familles souveraines européennes. Pourtant, ce modèle n’est pas universel : de l’autre côté de la Méditerranée, l’Empire ottoman proposa un autre modèle d’unions matrimoniales royales, qui étonnait les voyageurs occidentaux : les sultans ottomans ne prenaient pas d’épouses de noble lignée ; ils cessèrent même progressivement de prendre des épouses tout court, pour leur préférer des concubines esclaves. Leurs filles mêmes, plutôt que d’être mariées “selon leur rang”, étaient données à des “esclaves”. (...) C’est le pragmatisme politique des Ottomans, ainsi que leur constante volonté d’afficher leur supériorité lignagère, qui explique l’apparition de ce modèle à la fin du xve siècle. L’objectif de l’article est de mettre en perspectives les ressorts politiques d’une telle transformation des règles matrimoniales dynastiques et d’en expliciter les conséquences. (shrink)

The banker Pasion, father of the notorious fourth-century litigant and politician Apollodoros, some of whose speeches have survived under the name of Demosthenes, was originally a slave; freed by his owners, he made a substantial fortune from banking and subsequently received Athenian citizenship for his generous gifts to the city. At [Dem.] 59.2 we are given a paraphrase of the decree which enfranchised him: 'Aθηναον εναι Πασωνα κα κγνους τος κενου ‘[the Athenian people voted] that Pasion and his descendants should (...) be Athenian’. In common with inscriptions recording grants of citizenship, and unlike Roman military diplomata, the decree appears to have ignored Pasion's wife Archippe. The silence of the decrees of enfranchisement is echoed in the literary sources, with the result that we have no explicit testimony to the legal status of the wife of an alien who was granted Athenian citizenship. M. J. Osborne assumes that the status of the wife was in no way affected by the grant; she remained an alien. D. Whitehead has argued that in such cases the wife's status was indeterminate; in the event of the death of her first husband she might find herself married either to an Athenian citizen or to an alien, whereupon her status would be defined according to that of her husband. This article will argue that Archippe's status was unaffected by Pasion's receipt of citizenship, that is, that she remained a metic. I shall then proceed to consider the question of the implications of the difference in status of Pasion and Archippe subsequent to his enfranchisement for the legal basis of the relationship between them, and finally draw a tentative conclusion about the date of Pasion's receipt of citizenship. (shrink)

This note considers the recent House of Lordsdecision in Royal Bank of Scotland plc. v.Etridge (No. 2). It concerns the familiarscenario of a wife jointly mortgaging (orproviding a guarantee for a mortgage of) thefamily home in order to secure financialsupport for a business run by her husband. Ina landmark judgement, Lord Nicholls set out newand specific procedures to be followed bylenders and solicitors who are providingindependent advice, in order to counter anyargument by the wife that the charge should beset aside (...) because her signature on the lender'scharge has been obtained by the undue influenceof her husband. This note considers the impactof the decision upon the parties involved insuch transactions. Special consideration isgiven to the surety wife and her chances ofdefending possession proceedings brought bylenders in the post Etridge era. (shrink)

L’article s’intéresse aux sages-femmes dans la Bosnie habsbourgeoise montrant comment ce groupe professionnel joue un rôle de médiation inédit entre l’Empire austro-hongrois et la population bosnienne. À partir des méthodes et concepts de l’anthropologie sociale, il s’agit de comprendre la configuration des relations qui s’instaurent entre administrateurs, sages-femmes et habitantes à partir de la réforme statutaire des sages-femmes en 1898. Ces relations, qui remettent en cause l’ordre social existant hérité de l’époque ottomane, constituent pour les différents acteurs historiques à la (...) fois un défi et un espace de possibilités comme le montre l'exemple parmi d’autres de la sage-femme Ivka Ratković à Bosanski Petrovac. (shrink)

Although there is growing debate among feminist scholars on how fathers often socialize their male children to aspire to embody specific values and behaviors, there is limited academic research on how fathers themselves construct and represent masculinity in Ghana. This article draws on data from six focus group discussions held with forty men to foreground men's negotiations, expressions, and representations of masculinity among the Dagaaba in northwestern Ghana. Our findings suggest that men in rural northwestern Ghana are likely to embody (...) hybrid masculinities where traditionally hegemonic masculine ideals—such as men being seen as independent breadwinners—and contemporary gender-conscious norms—such as men as supportive partners—interact in complex ways. Yet the hybridization of masculinity both challenges and reinforces patriarchal gender arrangements in subtle ways. By maintaining a keen interest in their heteronormative breadwinning role as a model of masculinity, educated and gainfully employed men are critical of patriarchal norms that may be destructive to feminist discourses, yet their representations of masculinity indirectly embolden male hegemony in marriage relationships. Our findings further reveal considerable ambiguity in how men define themselves as supportive allies of feminist discourses by endorsing gender egalitarianism, yet none of them visibly challenges why women cannot also be breadwinners. (shrink)

Previous research has examined growing globalized divisions in domestic labor through the perspective of poor migrant women who perform care work in advanced industrialized societies. This article explores this global trend in reverse, focusing on first-world women who migrate into developing countries and engage with local dynamics of care through volunteer work. Based on 15 months of ethnographic fieldwork with Helping Hands, an organization of expatriate wives that assisted a local state-run orphanage in Beijing, China, I argue that gendered (...) processes of privileged migration caused women to develop a “logic of care” that equated good care solely with maternal nurturance and emotional connection. This logic permeated their volunteer efforts, causing conflicts with Chinese state caregivers who prioritized the performance of reproductive tasks. This case demonstrates the socially constructed nature of logics that underlie care practices and their relationship to increasingly transnational configurations of privilege and inequality. When applied to first-world women’s charitable activities in developing countries, unquestioned gendered logics can reinforce larger global disparities of power through the stratified provision of care. (shrink)