An online friend sent me the link to this contentious, thought-provoking article by Linda Hirshman of Brandeis University. It's about the legions of elite, intelligent, highly-educated women who are increasingly rejecting the world of work and choosing full-time, stay-at-home motherhood instead. Hirshman's explanation for this phenomenon? "...[W]hile the public world [of work] has changed, albeit imperfectly, to accommodate women among the elite, private lives have hardly budged. The real glass ceiling is at home."
And it's true. Women are realising that if 'having it all' means having to work the 'second shift' - of childcare and household responsibilities, at the end of a long working day outside the home - what kind of life is that? Raising children and looking after the home are still largely regarded as women's responsibilities. And although more men now participate in those activities than ever before, women still perform the lion's share of the labour.
It doesn't help that the workforce doesn't really support women with families. It's not enough to grant women access to the corridors of power, if they are expected to work like men and yet still somehow look after homes and families. The traditional 9-to-5 office workday is a nineteenth-century construction, devised by men for the convenience of men. It works perfectly well when one has a partner at home to look after all the housekeeping and childcare responsibilities. But for working women without that support (whether due to single motherhood, or male partners uninterested in domestic labour), its inflexibility makes it extremely difficult. It requires women to make personal-life sacrifices which are rarely asked of men.
It's the old conundrum, then - do women need to change to suit the working culture? Or does the working culture need to change to suit women?
1 comment:
Women need to change to suit the working culture! Life has evolved and that includes the full-time, stay-at-home motherhood. Which btw, is now also stay-at-home kidless. I am "The Opt-Out Generation" and life is good! Childcare and household responsibilities are a full time carreer which indeed has changed! We are a well connected, busy group of women who are experts at balancing our business, family responsibilites and recreation. We operate home businesses (large and small)or work virtual. We do volunteer/charity work, household financial planning and maintanance, child education/activity research, planning and logistics, as well as many other important functions. On the recreational side of things, we golf/play tennis (during the day), exercise (yoga,pilates,walk/run), we have hot stone messages and facials, we plan parties and take trips together (sometimes we invite our husbands), and we keep in close touch with each other via email. No more long, time wasting telephone conversations. We are the women that have it all, soon to be known as "The Opt-In Generation"
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