Rosie Cox

Playing Happy Families: rules and relationships in au pair employing households in London, England

This article examines the way that rules about use of rooms, guests and eating practices operated within au pair employing households in London, England, and how these worked to structure relations between au pairs and their employers. Au pair employment has been growing in Britain in recent years and the au pair scheme provides a particularly interesting situation in which to examine quasi-familial relations because it requires host families to treat au pairs ‘as a member of the family’. Using findings from a questionnaire survey of 144 au pairs and in-depth discussions with 50 au pairs, seven au pair employers and seven agencies that place au pairs, it is argued that house rules are an important part of the au pairs relationship to her employers family. Employers could take a strict ‘positional’ parenting approach, a more negotiated ‘personalising’ approach, or a mixture of the two. Those employers who most literally treated au pairs like members of the family, i.e. like children, did not encourage close relations by doing so. It is suggested that whereas studies of other forms of paid domestic employment have found that employers encourage the development of false kin relations in order to place additional demands on domestic workers, in au pair employment, employers may seek to create distance from rather than intimacy with their au pair and so counter some of the demands of the au pair scheme.

The Au Pair Body Sex Object, Sister or Student?

The employment of au pairs to provide childcare, cleaning and other domestic services has been steadily increasing in the UK. This article provides an analysis of representations of au pairs in the British press and on the websites of agencies placing au pairs. This analysis seeks to understand how such imaginings of au pairs affect their life in Britain and how au pairs themselves respond to such imaginings. It argues that the competing portrayals of au pairs as both sexual sirens and committed carers works with other ambivalences in the scheme to facilitate the growth of au pair employment in Britain while simultaneously denying their place as an important source of domestic labour for British families.

Some problems and possibilities of caring

Writing on care highlights that caring is full of both problems and possibilities. Caring for others can be a source of pleasure and fulfillment, but it can also be undervalued and denied, a source of degradation and exploitation. Care not only exists within intimate relationships but is also located within global-scale hierarchies of gender, class and race/ethnicity. Care can be problematic for those who need it, who give it and who arrange care for others, but it can also be the most precious thing in the world to them. As Fiona Williams writes, ‘care is not only personal; it is an issue of public and political concern whose social dynamics operate at local, national and transnational levels’ (2001, p. 487). Care is political both in terms of its current organization, which can support and enhance inequalities, and in terms of the possibilities it offers to counter dominant discourses of individualism, independence and competition. An ethic of care offers a way to foreground the connections, rather than the differences between people; to question the ways that different groups are valued. A focus on care reveals mechanisms which enable unequal access to resources and the vicious circles that perpetuate such inequalities. There has been a recent burgeoning of writing on care within the geographical literature and this paper looks at two examples of ‘caring’ in paid domestic labour and ‘ethical’ consumption practices, particularly food production/consumption, to examine the possibilities and problems that conceptualizations of care present. Within the literature on food and consumption care appears to be a positive force, offering opportunities for progressive political, economic and environmental actions, linking people across the world to each other and to the natural environment (see for example, Goodman 2004, Popke 2006, Kneafey et al. 2008). Ideas from the literature on care ethics have been readily adopted by writers on alternative consumption and have proven useful in elucidating ‘ethical’ consumption/production. Discussions of consumption behavior have also suggested ways that people can ‘care at a distance,’ and so have contributed to this important question in debates on what an ethic of care would be like in practice. It is not only the case that researchers have used theorizations of care to enrich their understandings, but also, this work offers empirical examples of people acting with care in diverse and positive ways. In contrast,

'Doing food differently': reconnecting biological and social relationships through care for food.

‘Food’ is essentially a biological entity, consumed by living creatures: plants, fungi, fish, animals or their products, are processed by various means at domestic or factory sites to produce the cornucopia of dishes, cuisines and ways of eating which have long characterized food systems (Tansey and Worsley, 1995; Beardsworth and Keil, 1997). A marked feature of the modern global food system is its divorcing of foodstuffs from the biological: increasingly, food is an industrialized product of global capitalism. Thus the drive is to make it uniform (remove as much natural variation as possible – carrots are always orange, and largely taste the same), safe (containing as few pathogens or contaminants as possible, and as good for consumer health as possible with minimum effort on the consumers’ part) and predictable in processing, appearance, cost, preparation and taste. These attributes apply to raw ingredients (such as vegetables, fruit, meat) as much as to processed foodstuffs (whether longstanding and familiar such as bread, or newer, ready prepared dishes) (see for example Tansey and Worsley, 1995; Lawrence, 2004; Steel, 2008). Furthermore, this separation contributes to the emotional, intellectual and cultural distancing which people experience in their understanding of and relationship to food, a circumstance lamented by primary producers and policy makers and subject to growing academic attention (eg Cook and Crang, 1996; Cook et al., 1998; Pretty, 2002; Morgan et al., 2006). Until recently environmental and social sustainability were largely ignored in the interests of industrialization and commercialization of what had traditionally been an eclectic relational exchange (Beardsworth and Keil, 1997; Pretty, 2000). Over the last few decades, however, the realities of the food system’s contribution to greenhouse gas emissions, depletion of water, oil and other key resources, as well as predictions about the implications for future food production from climate change, have achieved more mainstream recognition both in writing and research (eg Pretty et al., 2005; Ericksen, 2008; Garnett, 2008; Leahy, 2008; Roberts, 2008), and in policy discourse (eg The Strategy Unit, 2008). Furthermore, challenges over the social sustainability of an industrialized, neo-colonial global food system increasingly come, not only from

Food, gender and Irishness– How Irish women in Coventry make home

Abstract This paper focuses on the spaces and social relations of food consumption in order to examine how Irish migrants to Coventry, a city in the English West Midlands, form a sense of identity. On the basis of in depth interviews with first generation migrants, it is argued that food consumption practices are linked to Irish identity in three ways. First, migrants in Coventry were often part of extended family networks that exchanged foods between Britain and Ireland. Second, knowledge about foods and‐cooking was gained by many of the interviewees in Ireland, making them familiar and comfortable with specific local foods. Last, and related to this, certain foodstuffs were sought out by interviewees because they were Irish and remembered from ‘home’. Specific gender relations pervaded food consumption practices and it was found that women, through their involvement in food purchase and preparation, were key actors in constructing an often ambiguous sense of Irishness in Britain.

Gendered spaces of commoditised care

Geographical work on care is flourishing at present and an inspiring range of articles and special issues has emerged within the discipline in recent years (see, e.g. themed section in Environment and Planning A 35, 2003 edited by Staeheli and Brown; themed issue of Ethics, Place and Environment 2010 edited by McEwan and Goodman and a recent issue of this journal 12 (6) 2011, edited by Atkinson, Lawson and Wiles). These explore care at various scales, from the body to the global natural environment and within a range of settings, arrangements and relationships. Geographers have extended our understanding of the meanings and experiences of care, both paid and unpaid, for the self and for human and non-human others and for those both physically close and distant. Wide-ranging debates have emerged about the ethics of care and our ability to care across extended spaces (Atkinson, Lawson and Wiles 2011; Lawson 2007; McEwan and Goodman 2010; Popke 2006) and also about changing experiences of spaces of care as shifting welfare regimes and ongoing neoliberal reforms refigure the meanings and relationships involved in caring (Milligan 2000; Milligan, Atkinson, Skinner and Wiles 2007; Milligan and Power 2009). Geographers have been particularly good at showing care to exist outside the traditional settings of care work (see, e.g. Goodman and Boyd 2011; Morgan 2010; Popke 2006) and have used the concept of care to understand relations well beyond the obvious terrain of childcare, elder care or nursing. Geographers have built on the work of philosophers, particularly Tronto (1993) and Kittay (1999), in conceptualising an ethic of care and exploring its spatialities and political possibilities. Geographers have argued for an ethic of care to be considered in situations ranging throughout politics and economy and have argued that a disposition towards care could undermine the individualising processes of neoliberalism and draw attention to the interdependence that shapes all lives (Jarvis 2007; Lawson 2007; McDowell 2004; Smith 2005). As the philosopher Virginia Held (2006) has argued, the ethic of care can provide a more nuanced way to address issues of global justice. Social & Cultural Geography, 2013 Vol. 14, No. 5, 491–499, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14649365.2013.813580

Invisible labour: Perceptions of paid domestic work in London

Paid domestic employment is increasing in Britain. This is the result of income polarisation and the growth of female employment. In other parts of the world domestic employment has been shown to be of low status and to be denigrated by those involved. Interviews with domestic workers and their employers in London show this to be the case in Britain too. Domestic work is unpopular. Work performed by domestic employees is often invisible or under‐rated. Domestic workers devalue the work they do, perceiving it as non‐work. This is because most household work is done for free by household members. Reproductive work has long been seen as naturally wormens work. It becomes invisible when women perform household tasks as a paid occupation.

The complications of ‘hiring a hubby’: gender relations and the commoditisation of home maintenance in New Zealand

This paper examines the commoditisation of traditionally male domestic tasks through interviews with handymen who own franchises in the company ‘Hire A Hubby’ in New Zealand and homeowners who have paid for home repair tasks to be done. Discussions of the commoditisation of traditionally female tasks in the home have revealed the emotional conflicts of paying others to care as well as the exploitative and degrading conditions that often arise when work takes place behind closed doors. By examining the working conditions and relationships involved when traditionally male tasks are paid for, the paper raises important questions about the valuing of reproductive labour and the production of gendered identities. The paper argues that whilst working conditions and rates of pay for ‘hubbies’ are better than those for people undertaking commoditised forms of traditionally female domestic labour, the negotiation of this work is still complex and implicated in gendered relations and identities. Working on the home was described by interviewees as an expression of care for family and a performance of the ‘right’ way to be a ‘Kiwi bloke’ and a father. Paying others to do this labour can imply a failure in a duty of care and in the performance of masculinity.

Materials, skills and gender identities: men, women and home improvement practices in New Zealand

The article explores the interactions of materials, skills and gender identity through examining DIY practices in New Zealand. It traces the relationship between materials used for home repairs, the competences needed to use them and the (re)production of specific gendered identities. It argues that housing and building materials were an important part of the European settler history of the country and this history forms the context within which New Zealanders work on their houses today. Drawing on interviews with 30 Pākehā homeowners, it explores how both men and women respond to the materials of their homes, how skills are acquired in relation to the demands of the materials used and how these skills become part of the (re)production of specific white, heterosexual gender identities. The figure of the ‘Kiwi bloke’ is discussed as an important imaginary in the negotiation of gender identities for both men and women. Interviewees saw their DIY activities in the light of the creation and re-creation of this specific national and gendered identity. The article reveals the intertwining of history and materiality in the continual negotiation and contestation of gendered identities.

This is the life I want

Abstract London is an important destination for au pairs, who, like many other young migrants, are attracted by the social, cultural and economic opportunities the city offers. London also has strong demand for au pair labour, shaped by childcare regimes and working practices that have made in-home, privatised childcare popular with many families and a migration regime, including the deregulation of au pairing, which has funnelled migrants into low-paid domestic and caring work. This article examines the effects of au pairs’ perceptions of London. We argue that in the context of deregulation, au pairs aim to use the opportunities that London affords in order to develop networks and skills that they will use for future migration and careers, trading good conditions for the chance to be in the capital. Thus, positive perceptions of London work in host families’ favour as au pairs will accept poor pay and conditions in order to be located in London.