Let's have a chapter on men

[swan_tower]

I'm starting to wonder what it would be like to read a book on daily life in X place and time that starts out by telling you most people, even among the upper classes, spent their days running their households, engaging in textile production, raising children, or (if they were wealthy enough) overseeing servants who did that work for them, and then has a section describing how men's lives differed from that norm.

I know there are reasons other than direct patriarchy why such books aren't organized that way -- because men's lives have historically been more varied, the descriptions of their activities requires more words if you aren't just going to blow them off with a few sentences, which would make for a hell of a long chapter on the male experience -- but I've read a lot of works in this informal genre, and after a while you really start to notice how thoroughly that experience is centered, and then women's lives are a sidebar. It would be an interesting trick to flip it around, highlighting the fact that by far the most common occupation across a given society was "domestic manager," and most of 'em were women.

(originally posted at Swan Tower: https://is.gd/yAwQOE)

Comments

[watersword]

I want this.

[bookblather]

This sounds like a fantastic book and I'd buy five.

[edenfalling]

YES PLEASE.

[mrissa]

YES

[jazzlet]

I so want this, you get some of it in older books on household management or cookery, but only a sideways glance at the huge subject.