Response to "Maid to Order"

In her essay “Maid to Order: The politics of other women’s work,” Barbara Ehrenreich undescores the “gender oppression” (60) that is often yielded as a consequence of housework. She accordingly comments on the equalizing force of housekeeping, in the sense that all women (excluding an upper class minority) must come home to a task list of cleaning regardless of their differences in professions. As Ehrenreich bluntly states, “whatever else women did… we also did housework” (60). Men are not generally confronted with these domestic and social expectations to fulfill cleaning responsibilities, but women are seemingly obliged to satisfy housework requirements even when faced with “jobs, school, [and] child care” (60). While Ehrenreich illustrates both the potentially oppressive and equalizing qualities of housework, she does not explicitly mention the admirable fortitude and ability that are necessary ingredients for women to accomplish these housekeeping duties. The fact that females are capable of successfully balancing their outside lives alongside their burdens of housework is an extraordinary measure of endurance at the very least. Being a writer with a somewhat feminist bent, it was surprising that Ehrenreich did not further expand her descriptions to include this praiseworthy angle of the feminine characterization. The author provides valid arguments in acknowledgement of the exploitation and standardization of women via housework, but she does not extensively develop the perspective of housework as a possible means to showcase the remarkable strength and skill of women in this context.