Women's Experience of Domestic Labor Division

The division of domestic labor or the distribution of responsibilities and necessary tasks for maintaining the home and family members has historically evolved since the industrialization period and has had important as a social phenomenon in academic discussions since the 1970s. Social and economic contexts have always influenced the relationships and interactions between men and women and their gender roles in the family. They have regulated the relationships between them throughout the history of family development. This paper describes the women's experience of domestic labor division with their husbands in the family. In addition, analytical concepts such as gender equality in the division of domestic labor, economic dependency, and gender deviation neutralization (in gender roles) under the theory of relative resources have been used. Also, the thematic analysis method and semi-structured interviews with 15 women, including employed women and housewives in the age groups of 20 to 60 years used in this paper. Then interviews were analyzed by Max QDA 2018 software to extract the relationship pattern of couples in the division of domestic labor. The findings indicate the extraction of 2 main themes of non-participation in the division of domestic labor and participation in the division of domestic labor, seven sub-themes including stubborn femininity, hegemonic masculinity, favorable or unfavorable obvious challenge, economic triangulation, passive/hidden resistance, gradual participation of men. and equality in relations, and 228 concepts. stubborn femininity or hidden feminism theme refers to the power and dominance of women in the family. The second theme refers to self-sufficiency because of absence of a man at home, the man's imprisonment, the man's incapacity, or the death of a man are forced to take care of and breadwinner. In relationships based on persuasion, women accept more tasks because of some reasonable evaluation of men’s function during other areas. The economic triangulation of women is a form of the relationship between men and women when they are equal in strength and power. Women’s hidden and passive resistance gradually causes men to participate in household chores. In gradual participation, men learn to participate in household chores through socialization from the group of relatives and friends and the assignment of partial and incremental tasks from the woman to the man. The last theme of couples' relationships is based on the understanding or extensive participation of men and women in household chores which ends to equal involvement. Both men and women try to participate intellectually, emotionally, psychologically, and behaviorally and experience gender roles as much as possible. The variety of types introduced in the Iranian family shows the change and evolution in the traditional Iranian society and the agency and rethinking by women in gender roles and the division of conventional domestic work.However, regarding the causes and contexts of the formation of this ideal relationship between the studied couples, it is not possible to refer to foreign studies and the experiences of women in other countries, such as Eastern European countries and France, which are based on egalitarian ideas through the promotion of women's participation in the workforce or countries with family policies such as Norway and gender ideology, he said. Instead, the ethnic, cultural, and social diversity under the macro-policy strategies in the field of the Iranian family under Islamic thought and influenced by the characteristic of collectivism in the Iranian culture creates a different experience for Iranian women and can be a debatable issue in future studies. But what can be accepted without a doubt is that Iranian women are entering a process of rethinking the division of work and power in the family and the beginning of the process of redistributing family responsibilities.