Feeding the Family Ethnography Review

            We all have said at least once that we have nothing to eat in the fridge or there is no food around the house to eat. Sometimes we take for granted the basic things in our home. Food is one of our basic needs but it has so many levels to where it connects with our lives as a worker, a parent, a spouse and as an individual. The ethnography I chose to review is called “Feeding the Family: The Social Organization of Caring as Gendered Work” by Marjorie L. DeVault. This essay presents the deeper meaning of the roles of mostly women in their daily lives as a food provider and their job in feeding the family. One of the main points I want to address is the different strategies and thought processes women and some men go through when they have to provide for their spouses and children. It not only presents the anxieties that they experience but the way they view their work as well. I believe this ethnography change my perceptions of this gendered work and brought me to analyze the background story to how this came to be as well as relating it to my own experience with my mother as a family feeder.

            This ethnography takes the work of feeding the family through a journey of what defines it and analysis of it as an activity rather than a concept or emotion. DeVault explores the implications of "feeding the family" from the perspective of those who do that work. Along the way, DeVault offers a new vocabulary for discussing nurturance as a basis of group life and sociability. Drawing from interviews conducted in 1982-83 in a diverse group of American households, she reveals the effort and skill behind the "invisible" work of shopping, cooking, and serving meals. She then shows how this work can become oppressive for women, drawing them into social relations that construct and maintain their subordinate position in household life. This work was such an interesting research and I enjoyed it very much. One reason why I liked this work was because it reminded me of the work my mother did for my family and some of the things she has told me whenever she got stressed from doing housework was very similar to some of the findings in the ethnography. It made me feel empathetic toward my mother as well as my father for the work at home they have done for me and my family. I was very engaged with the reading because it gave me a larger understanding toward something that I have overlooked my whole life; at least in the way that was presented in the ethnography. One thing I did right after reading the first few chapters of the book was call up my mother to talk to her about the material I learned in the ethnography. It was funny and amazing how much she understood what the author was presenting. My mother told me she was glad that I got to read about the one thing she does every day and thanks me for my appreciation for her work in the house.

            This ethnography’s main point of how the work of feeding a family presents this image of womanhood confirms my understanding of genderized work in our society. One example from the work showed how feeding the family is a pattern at home. One woman in the interviews said “It’s just routine to me. It’s just all up there, you know. Just what comes natural. It’s just a part of – just like, my work” (DeVault 57). This is exactly how my mother described her work in the kitchen. She has this organized structure of what to make and when to make it in order for the day to go smoothly. Whenever I am just sitting at home, my mother is constantly moving around. She sometimes talks to herself indicating certain times she needs to push the button for the rice cooker or what to take out of the freezer to cook.

One idea in the ethnography that I want to bring light into is the concept of feeding viewed as women’s work. DeVault showed findings in women doing the feeding not as a simple and mindless chore but as a coordinated and organized structure of work. Some couples believed “…cooking is, at least in part, activity that comes with mothering a young child” (DeVault 102). As one can see, feeding a family is apparently conjoined with the work of raising a child. This gendered view of what is considered the woman’s work demonstrates how much is rested upon their shoulders due to the similarities between the different household works. This specific point in the book reminded me of a similar issue of women’s roles in society in the article Endangering safe motherhood in Mozambique: prenatal care as pregnancy risk by Rachel Chapman. She discussed the women’s failing reproductive roles and health due to poverty. “It is proposed that women respond actively to social and economic pressures they believe constitute the greatest threats to their reproductive health and unborn infants” (Chapman 356). This clearly demonstrates how the women’s nature is perceived in the society in regards to their family. I saw the connection between these two works as since women already have the role of birthing, they must take up the follow up roles as well as cleaning and cooking. The pressure to act in accordance to these norms of a woman results in this concept of genderized work. Following up with DeVault’s explanation, I agree with her interpretation because I see this daily at home when I see my mother cooking. In fact, I believe in many households, the woman most likely has this job at home which they find ways to coordinate their kitchen tasks. Thus, society then and now have this structure of what kind of care is considered to be a woman’s kind of work.

Another idea I want to present is DeVault’s role and perspectives in her work. I find it very important to identify what the author discovers and how she does it. Her role in this work is clearly defined as an interviewer and data gatherer on the different responses given by both women and men of the family. DeVault’s goal was to talk to women of different relationship status and financial situation to understand their perspectives with their roles as the feeder of the family. The different voices and perspectives come through from the ethnographer herself, who provides analysis and interpretation of the women’s experiences, and the women who explain their roles in their family and what they think of it based on their statuses economically and relationship-wise. These are used by women telling stories of a certain experience to explain their emotions of the labor they do not just as women but as a mother and a wife as well. Throughout the ethnography, DeVault diffuses analyses of each woman’s experience with cooking. I believe that this is one of the strengths of her piece because DeVault talked to women of different situations in their thoughts and feelings of the work they do for their family. It really demonstrates how similar and different they are with the care they have for their family and also how they deal with the hardships that they go through.

            One thing that I thought about this work was that it is not about a global health issue because it is not something that can really be fixed. The ethnography mainly gives a foundation to what women do and how they respond to those activities. Rather than a health issue, it is more like an educational understanding of a common episode we see every day. DeVault is presenting acknowledgement for readers. “This perplexing situation is a puzzle missing a piece, and that piece is the acknowledgement of caring work in all its complexity, as activity deeply compelling for those who do it and critically important for group life” (DeVault 3). Although it does not negatively affect other people’s health, this work contributes to the work of society in general because it is a daily process in every home. Every mother and wife would know this experience of taking responsibility to care for their family by providing meals on the table or cleaning the house. It is an international language in a way because it is a common task for every family.

Another idea that interested me is the discussion of affluence and poverty with the women in their households. Economy is a large factor in how the women are successful in feeding their families and the methods they go by. It is obvious that higher class would be able to afford more food and a variety of choices while the lower class can only afford so much. DeVault had a very important point from the conclusions she came up with due to these differences. “In families with more resources, food becomes an arena for self-expression, providing a chance to experience family as a reward for achievement in poor families, feeding and eating are themselves the achievement” (DeVault 201). It may seem like these gaps in financial status just look black and white but the way these people express themselves in these situations define who they are as a worker, parent and a caring individual in general. I agree with her statement because it is a different way to view the concept of feeding the family. Looking at it in a different angle really opens my mind to how these women go about their lives while being a homemaker and how they respond to these situations.

I found this ethnography fascinating and relatable in some ways. Not only does this apply to women who feed their family, it applies to those who are affected by the work of the women doing the feeding. One possible use of this ethnography is to provide an insider look on what these women do and how it affects their lives. It gives a great background and an empathetic feeling toward them that will result in appreciating them more. This would work especially for children when they are old enough to understand and men. I know that after reading this, I feel so thankful to have a mother who has worked hard to feed me and my family. It would open everyone’s eyes to see the behind the scenes in the kitchen. There is a section in the ethnography that explained the term “invisible work” that the women do at home. DeVault explains that “... [w]e find clues to the invisible work of feeding in people’s accounts, as they refer to their planning toward family meals. Though preparation time is bounded, the strategizing that supports preparation extends throughout the day” (DeVault 56). This is very important to realize because it reflects the constant thinking that these mothers and wives do and it does not stop.

All in all, this essay points out the importance of the invisible work that women do in feeding their family. Not only does it present the different emotions and types of duties each woman has but how they deal with it in each of their unique circumstances. I discovered that the caring work of feeding a family is a lot more complex and exhausting than it seems. No one truly understands what goes through a mother’s head when thinking up a strategy for preparing meals or organizing a time frame in her busy schedule with the needs of her children and husband. Therefore, this essay and the ethnography itself highlight the many tribulations these women go through and encourage readers to recognize and appreciate them. The genderizing of the caring work can bring a sense of revelation once people put themselves in their shoes. DeVault brilliantly displays the representation of a particular group of women through interviews and demonstrates that speaking up about the understanding of women’s work “…is a move toward fuller representation of women’s multiple interests […] and producing connection and sociability” (DeVault 243). It is about time to make a difference about the care of women’s work beginning right in our own home.

Works Cited

Chapman, Rachel R. "Endangering Safe Motherhood in Mozambique: Prenatal Care as Pregnancy Risk." Social Science & Medicine 2003: 355-74. Web.

DeVault, Marjorie L. Feeding the Family: The Social Organization of Caring as Gendered Work. Chicago: University of Chicago, 1991. Print.