How did wife literature become popular in North America?
Estee Williams is a short-form video blogger with 170,000 followers on TikTok. Her gentle appearance with short curly blond hair and floral dresses and lace aprons is her distinguishing feature.
In the short video, she shares her housework experience, daily wear, and how to serve her husband who works outside the home at home - just like a "classic Barbie" who was taking care of housework in the United States in the 1950s.
On the internet, Estee and other girls with similar styles call themselves "Tradwives". Tradwife is an abbreviation for traditional wife, which means "traditional wife".
On their online accounts, young women, some of whom are not even married, portray themselves as elegant, gentle, housewives who keep their family life in order.
The Instagram profile of the well-known Tradwife account @The tradwives club is: "Housewives who live in the world of the moment, but have traditional ideas. ”
A "wife culture" seems to be spreading in North America. And behind this seemingly "retro" wave is a strong emotion that belongs to American women at the moment.
Become a traditional wife
Estee, 26, was originally a meteorologist. After getting married, she gave up her job and became a Tradwife, living in Virginia with her husband. In the video, she finds time to fix her hair and make-up while doing housework, while talking about her understanding of the concept of Tradwife.
Tradwife often emphasises the so-called "natural" difference between men and women. In a video with more than one million views, Estee said: "We encourage men to go to work and women to take care of the housework, and we want women to serve their husbands...... But that doesn't mean we're not as important as men, it's just that we have a different division of labor. ”
ins@esteecwilliams
Hannah is another Tradwife with 8.9 million followers. She is a mother of eight, a ballet dancer, and a former interstate beauty pageant champion. Now she lives with her husband and children on a farm in Utah, USA, living an idyllic traditional American life.
On her account @ballerinafarm, she shares her family routine of growing, cooking, and taking care of her children on the farm, which has a retro feel and a laid-back vibe — even bread is made from flour.
Hannh's daily life shared @Ballerina Farm account
Alana Peti, who is considered to be the face of Tradwife, wrote an article on her personal website called "What is Tradwife", in which she mentions that "Tradwife will be submissive to her husband, but she will not make herself unimportant or have her rights compromised." ”
"They will choose a responsible, caring partner to marry. In an interview with the BBC, Alana said she would be "submissive and doting on her husband like a housewife in 1959".
Tradwife slogan. Image source network
There are also some more extreme Tradwives. A blogger named Ayla Stewat had launched the White Baby Challenge a few years ago to encourage her followers to have as many white children as possible. She wrote on her social media account: "I've given birth to six! Come catch me or beat me!", and the post was eventually deleted because it attracted too much criticism from the audience.
The resurgence of housewives is not because the past was too good
"Trying to be a man is a waste of a woman. "A woman's place is at home. Tradwife's philosophy sounds traditional and conservative. But on the other hand, unlike the traditional wives of the United States a few decades ago, Tradwives on the Internet seem to be more "confident" and "autonomous".
ins@insider
Tradwife proponents emphasize the value of housework in itself, and can also be critical of the pressures of working women in the free market. For example, one Tradwife asked, "When a woman submits to her boss, no one will say anything, but when a woman submits to her husband, she will be considered a slave?"
Despite her seeming gentleness and innocence, Tradwife is clear and powerful when it comes to asserting her claims.
A few days ago, Estee shared on social platforms "Why is the concept of Tradwife suddenly going viral?", and she concluded: "Our culture is blurring the distinction between men and women. Most families are couples working, but we've witnessed an entire generation of women exhausted by juggling work and household chores. As a result, many women want to return to their families. ”
ins@esteecwilliams
She agrees: "At a time when fast food is everywhere, the process of slowly making delicate food shown in Tradwife's video provides a kind of scarcity in universal life." Young girls also want to learn hard-to-learn housework skills in videos like this. ”
In the comment section of Estee, a male netizen left a message saying: "We men like women like you. Thank you for being willing to be a 'woman'. ”
It is not difficult to see that the dilemma of women in the workplace emphasized by Tradwife is in line with the experience and emotions of women today. Today's American working women face the dual pressures of work and family, and they are even more difficult than the "housewives" of ancient times.
Therefore, this group of Tradwives believes that the era when women went out of the family and competed with men in the workplace belonged to the previous era, and returning to traditional life was a way to save life.
The Big Bang Theory
So, on the surface, Tradwife is a kind of "vintage", but in a way, it is a very "current" existence.
Some researchers have linked Tradwife's popularity to the rise of Donald Trump and the alt-right since 2016, but many have denied the connection, stating that it was their own rational choice and that they did not want to interfere with other people, but "just wanted to attract people who share their own values." ”
Mrs. America
In the past, the choices of traditional wives would have been more morally hijacked. According to sociologist Chizuruko Ueno, "love" is to allow women to mobilize their own energy and regard the purpose of their husbands as their own goals, while "motherhood" is to motivate women to restrain their own needs and see the growth of their children as a mechanism for their own happiness by triggering self-dedication and sacrifice.
If the traditional women of the 50s of the 20th century believed that housework and childcare were women's natural duties, then Tradwife was very aware of the commodity nature of housework, and also emphasized the value of full-time housewives.
Account @The Tradwives Club wrote in a post: "Being a housewife is a job, in fact, it's the ultimate job. It includes: Chefs, Drivers, Creatives, Doctors, Event Planners, Teachers, Interior Designers, Private Buyers, Stylists, Gardeners, Housekeepers, Accountants, Organizers, ...... There are countless examples of this. ”
Tradwives claim that the work of housewives is worthwhile and that it is their rational choice. "Becoming a wife" is more like an extreme choice derived from their contradictory unequal reality. And returning to the family seems to have become a reasonable "harbor" for them to choose.
Therefore, some people believe that Tradwife does not really want to return to the United States in the 50s of the 20th century, they are just disappointed with the current times.
These Gen Z girls are not happy enough to see their mothers become working women, but they are still facing the dilemma of work and life under the capitalist system. When young girls are suffering from burnout, nostalgia becomes a comfort and a sense of rebellion.
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel
Tradwife伤害了谁?
Obviously, the presence on the web is the most important means by which Tradwife communicates her values. The main difference between Tradwife on the Internet and the "traditional housewife" in reality is that Tradwife in the video is perfect.
As a result, these tradwives have been criticized as "an illusion created by a section of the 'privileged class'". It was discovered that several Tradwife bloggers had family backgrounds beyond the average person and had access to resources that most American women did not have. And this makes the chores that seem "perfect" in the video easier to achieve.
Because not everyone has the time to start making bread from flour or spend hours a day shooting, editing videos. What's more, not every housewife can have a husband who is financially powerful enough and knows how to respect his wife.
While Tradwife on the Internet shows her attractiveness with glossy and heartwarming videos, the real "traditional wife" in reality is bursting the bubble of fantasy.
CNN once interviewed a "traditional housewife" named Enitza Templeton. For the past ten years, she has started making bread at 4 a.m. every day, preparing the family's meals for the day, and taking on all household chores including raising four children, while her husband focuses solely on earning money to support the family.
And this year, at the age of 41, she chose to divorce. "Social media can make everything look really beautiful because it's just a 30-second clip, but those 30 seconds ignore a lot of the ugliness in a long relationship," she says. Now, on her podcast, she lashes out at misleading Tradwife bloggers.
It cannot be denied that there are also happy "traditional wives" in reality.
Christine Borzumato Gainey, a professor in the Department of Anthropology at Elon University in the United States, said: "In traditional marriage, some people are happy, absolutely happy. But it is difficult for a husband who has financial power not to extend his sense of control to his life. In fact, it carries a high risk that someone can get lost and be overwhelmed by the responsibilities she has assumed. And the partner, who is only responsible for finances and other major decisions, will not respect and appreciate her. ”
It has also been pointed out that the reason why most of the followers of the Tradwife trend are white women is also related to the privileges that white families once had.
In the 50s after the end of World War II, most white families in the core industrial areas did do well, and the husband's salary was enough to support a family. But for people of more marginalized races and classes at the time, this kind of life was actually difficult to achieve.
Another interesting paradox is that while Tradwife bloggers persuade women to "return to the family" and rely on their husbands to earn money to support their families, they themselves make a lot of money on the Internet by performing this return – sometimes by receiving tips, sometimes by "bringing goods" online.
Social platforms provide them with enough visibility. Rather than rejecting capitalism, Tradwife is deeply rooted in it. While calling on other women to quit the workforce, they themselves are participating in employment through the creation of content.
Therefore, some netizens hit the nail on the head and concluded: "If you are just an ordinary person, then for you, what Tradwife preaches is just an unattainable life." ”
Deadly Woman
Author: Si Ye Content Editor: Felicia