“Six Saucepans to One: Domestic Sciences vs The Home in British Columbia, 1900-1939”

By Barbara Riley

In her essay, Barbara Riley explores the conflict which arose between parents and local school boards or councils in regard to giving female students access to home economic classes which was arguably to be taught by the child’s mother but allowed for a more thorough and scientific exploration of these domestic sciences.  Riley discusses the struggle “to establish domestic science as an accredited subject in the public school system of British Columbia” and touches on the “strong convictions about the role of young girls and women in the home, the role of the home in society, and the role of the educational system in strengthening both”(Riley, 138).  In her conclusion, she summarizes that home economic classes introduced B.C. girls “to exact measurements, white sauce, electric stoves, and the importance of food nutrients” (Riley, 154). Perhaps the implementation of these home economic classes was a mutually beneficial means for society to ensure women remained in their portion of the gender sphere while simultaneously providing universal system of measurement and standardized usage of household equipment which would be abided by all, or most, households. Domestic science implemented into public schooling was an efficient way to achieve a universalization of housekeeping. Some questions that come to mind when exploring these variations of classes for young girls, is what sort of classes were implemented for young men to be conforming to the gender sphere.

Creating the Ideal Man: Middle-class Women’s Constructions of Masculinity in Nova Scotia, 1840-1880

By Janet Guildford

In this article, Janet Guildford effectively utilizes a variety of primary sources such as newspaper articles, diaries, published works in magazines, and fictional works like novels and poetry. Guildford focuses her research on the construction of the middle-class woman’s “ideal man”, and their ideas about men, manliness, and the relationships between men and women (Guildford, 6). Throughout the article she illuminates the boundaries that were drawn between men and women, the tension which resulted from these boundaries, and the ways that women attempted to control the division of power and how they often succeeded in influencing the expectations of masculinity in ways that were beneficial for the family both at home and regarding finances. Guildford argues that women were influenced by the prevailing gender ideals of their society and by the social and literary conventions which regulated women writings. She notes that Catherine Hall argues the core “of middle class masculine identity was ‘the notion of individual integrity, freedom from subjection to the will of another’” (Guildford, 7). Guildford also discuses Anthony Rotundo’s “three overlapping masculine ideals”: the masculine achiever, the Christian gentleman, and the masculine primitive (Guildford, 7). The last of the three, masculine primitive is not technically considered ideal masculinity and relates to the Darwinian notion that “all males share primordial instincts for survival” which causes the favour of physical prowess in middle-class masculine identity(Guildford, 8). According to Guildford’s research, middle-class women’s ideals of masculinity are reflected and represented in both their works of non-fiction as well as their works of fiction and argues that those many women valued and encouraged men to identify with more feminine values like love, trust, respect, vulnerability, admiration of art, and actively taking on a domestic role.