Home Economics: Stitching Everything Together

A post-Civil War analysis of the pathways to success for women in academia, business, and
medicine in the U.S. and beyond.

Sofia Romero Campbell

Passages I
2015
Mrs. Hansen Passages Teacher

Introduction
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Home economics has created a reputation for itself as being an overbearing study that subjects

women to work in the domestic realm. Roles including cooking, cleaning, and taking care of the

family are supposed focuses that both women and men in todays world have overlooked as an

illegitimate subject. While the history of home economics has often been overlooked, its

important to note the positive influences it has had for women from post-Civil War times to the

twenty-first century. Home economics has helped women increase credentialism in business,

academia, and medicine to provide educational and economic opportunities for themselves

around the world.

This paper will explore the results of home economics in the United States and around the world,

by focusing on the gains women have made in academia, medicine, and business. In addition,

this paper will analyze the scope of home economics and its influence in providing careers that

have drawn women into new opportunities for economic and educational advancement.

Important differences will be outlined in terms of the historical significance of home economics

and what that means for women today. As well as examining the disparities of women of color in

the study and including real world examples where home economics has improved the lives of

women across the globe in developing countries. This paper concludes with an analysis of the

importance of valuing home economics programs in developing countries and the United States,

and includes areas of possible directions for future research.

History of Home Economics

So far, home economics has had an especially difficult time defining itself as a result of the

immense reach the subject covers. In addition to the primary visions of its early founders, home

economics and its name has been edited and tweaked as history, society, and governmental

entities have shaped it over time to fit specific needs. Household arts, domestic economy,
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domestic science, and home economics are all different terms that have been used at one point or

another to describe the same subject.

Household arts implied cooking and sewing and was tied to manual training in public schools

and cooking schools like the one popularized by the American culinary cooking expert Fannie

Farmer in Boston (Cornell University 5). Domestic economy as it was used in the 1890s,

focused on the wealthy housewife and her problems, particularly the servant problem. As

immigration patterns shifted in the United States during the 1880s and 1890s, middle- and upper-

class women found it difficult to find paid help. Many of the activities pursued under the scope

of domestic economy addressed this problem by attempting to upgrade the training for

immigrant girls, and putting employers in touch with employees. The theory of domestic

science connected the kitchen to the chemical laboratory, emphasizing nutrition, and sanitation.

This term was much more favored by Ellen Richards who is considered to be the engineer of

the modern home economics movement (MIT Libraries). She studied chemistry at Vassar and

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and saw domestic science as a way to move

women trained in science into employment in academics and industry. Lastly, the concept of

home economics as we know today takes its point of view from the emerging social sciences

of the time, and most clearly positioned the home in relation to American interests to encourage

reform and municipal housekeeping.

What historians often leave out of their treatment of home economics has been an understanding

of the significant development of the concept of the Victorian domesticity supported by

Catherine Beecher into the official home economics movement started by Ellen Richards in the

early twentieth century. Even though Ellen Richards championed the more science based focus

of home economics as domestic science, she continued to progress the home economics
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movement that began with the Lake Placid conferences (1899-1907) and resulted in the

establishment of the American Home Economics Association (AHEA) (Cornell University 5).

During this period the pioneers of home economics struggled to define the field, a task that was

and continues to be difficult, fraught with tension, confusion, and compromise (Cornell

University 5). This struggle for definition bears close scrutiny as we seek to understand the

nature of home economics and how it sheds light on the intersection of gender and

professionalism (Cornell University 5).

In womens history, home economics makes up a classic case of interaction between politics and

domesticity. At the turn of the century, economists politicized domesticity by urging women to

use their skills in that larger household the city (Cornell University 2). In addition to the

settlement house movement, home economics moved women into public policy through social

and public housekeeping. Much more than just glorified housekeeping, home economics began

as a part of the broader movement for progressive reform for women in academia.

Academia

Reform came most prominently at the hands of Ellen Richards. In 1882 Richards published The

Chemistry of Cooking and Cleaning: a Manual for Housekeepers. After setting up model

kitchens open to the public, establishing programs of study, and organizing domestic science

course at MIT (MIT Libraries). Richards wanted to continue the reach of home economics and

introduce it to academic settings especially at elite womens liberal arts colleges on the east

coast. Although Richards was successful in getting domestic science courses at Smith and

Wellesley, she met great resistance from academic programs at Bryn Mawr. Administrators at

Bryn Mawr worried about the benefit of this subject for their students, believing that home

economics was intensely sex-stereotyped and didnt replicate the classical academic rigors of the
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male Ivy League colleges. Furthermore, home economics suffered from being confused in the

public mind with household skills, deemed nonacademic, and from its association with the

agricultural colleges in the Midwest (presumed inferior to eastern schools) and its lowly eastern

precursors, the schools of cookery (Cornell University 7).

In response to the feedback received by academic institutions, Richards recognized that she

needed to standardize, upgrade, and professionalize home economics before it could gain

academic acceptance. At the same time, the United States became increasingly industrialized and

advances in technology changed the ease of access for household products. As Richards

constantly pointed out, womens primary role had shifted from the production in the home to

consumption in the marketplace (Cornell University 7). With more ready made products on the

market, the need for women to have the knowledge to produce for themselves and for their

family shifted the goals and objectives of home economics according to Richards.

Even before the multiple attempts by Richards to get home economics in a collegiate setting,

following the Civil War home economics formed part of the broader movement for vocational

training (Cornell University 11). More than any other facet of academia, home economics mostly

influenced vocational training during the time of industrialization. As educational and social

reformers saw the need to educate and prepare students for the new mechanized world of the

twentieth century, social and educational reformers mandated changes in the traditional

curriculum. As subjects like home economics we adopted, classical Greek and Latin subjects

began to fade away because they were no longer useful in training workers and farmers in the

newly automated world.

Although manual or vocational training for boys at the core of a new staple curriculum seemed

promising, little time was taken in determining how girls would be trained. Many argued that
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girls needed domestic training in homemaking, and should have the same opportunities as boys

in agriculture and manual programs (Cornell University 99). Even if at one time advocates

supported cooking and wood making courses for both sexes, manual training and home

economics soon became sex-segregated, much to the dismay of women labor leaders who urged

that girls be trained in ways that would lead to paid employment in industry. Even with efforts to

promote opportunities for girls, as conservative perspectives continued to set in, home economics

began to change into the more traditional and limiting subject it is known as today.

In the United States legislators became fond of the more approachable shaped home economics

that was taking place and agreed to fund training for girls as long as it promised to reinforce

gender stereotypes. As a result, Midwestern land-grant schools established home economics

departments intended to promote domestic roles for young women. Paradoxically, the

departments they formed provided career prospects for college-educated women to be employed

outside of the home and to gain a foothold in academia. These land-grant schools prepared

students for careers in teaching and institutional management rather than housekeeping. By 1910,

literally hundreds of women found employment teaching home economics at every level from

grade school to the college and university (Cornell University 8). Although home economics

never solidified itself at the elite Seven Sisters schools, Richards maintained her fundamental

work in home economics until her death in 1911. By that time Midwest land-grant colleges

embraced home economics and the department of Agriculture, which actively supported research

in home economics through experiment stations, had jobs and resources to support women.

In an effort to expand womens opportunities and gain some measure of gender equity, home

economics proved willing to trade on traditional views of womans place-to use traditional term

to cloak nontraditional activities (Cornell University 9). As the benefits and drawbacks of this
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strategy continuously began to reveal themselves, the agenda for home economics in the

twentieth century began to look increasingly problematic. Early land-grant schools profited from

legislative decisions that temporarily helped home economics departments, but disadvantaged

the field in the long run. Initial female professors in home economics encouraged a much more

radical practice of the subject compared to the more conservative male legislators that granted

them with monetary support (Cornell University 127).

In 1914, the United Stated department of Agriculture enacted the Smith-Lever Act, which

provided funds for home economics through a newly created extension program. The extension

program stated that the work shall consist of the development of practical applications of

research knowledge and giving of instruction and practical demonstrations (Clemson

University). Much to the advantage of rural women, these extension programs gave women

studying home economics a job, and also elevated the knowledge of self-sufficiency for women

when the country was becoming increasingly urban. In addition to the Smith-Lever Act, the

Smith-Hughes Act in 1917 provided funding for home economics teachers at both primary and

secondary schools. It also encouraged the expansion of home economics on college campuses. In

the early twentieth century, women who wanted to pursue careers in scientific research were

frequently counseled to study home economics (Cornell University 85). Though less prestigious

than other scientific fields, home economics opened the door for women to develop scientific

careers.

Although the implementation of this legislation seemed positive for the home economics cause at

the time, unfortunately the Smith-Hughes Act tied home economics to vocational training

(Cornell University 9). At a time when universities and colleges were moving more towards

pure research that didnt involve the same principles that home economics was built on, the
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subject slowly became more devalued because of their association as nothing more than a simple

teacher-training program. In addition, the Smith-Hughes Act raised debate over how home

economics would define itself. On one hand, legislators argued that home economics should be

used as the female equivalent to manual training for future employment. On the other hand,

educators and early champions of home economics claimed that home economics should be

associated with a liberal arts education not in preparation manual labor, but for a womans life

work in academia. As a whole, the dispute sparked by the Smith-Hughes Act solidified the study

as preparation for a homemaker lifestyle similar to what we know today.

African American Experience

At this time it is important to note the Second Morrill Act which was passed in 1890 before the

Smith-Hughes Act and the Smith-Lever Act as a way of providing further endowment for

colleges, especially land-grant institutions that now make up the seventeen historically black

colleges in the United States. This piece of legislation not only paved the way for the two latter

bills, but it also addressed diversity and the impact home economics had on African American

men and women (Clemson University). The Second Morrill Act is meaningful to acknowledge

because although home economics in its beginning stages aimed to improve the lives of all

women, it was often limited to white women and included little thought for minority inclusion.

Whether it is because of the privileged, educated, and white agenda early home economics

followed, or the limited support academic institutions feared legislators would withhold from

home economic departments that supported African Americans whatsoever. The limited scope of

women that were ultimately benefiting from home economics were often bound by race and class

however, in settings unintentionally created by the Second Morrill Act, home economics

advanced the educational and economic opportunities of minority women.

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The creation of historically black colleges that received funding from the United States

government through land-granting legislation advanced home economics. This continued to

affect programs and the prospects for African American females in careers, aiding in the stability

for themselves, their family, and the wellbeing of the nation during wartime. The combination of

World War I and World War II cultivated a social climate that allowed minorities and women to

fill positions that had once been held by white men and women. New jobs in the North beckoned

African Americans to participate in black flight, alarming many white southerners. In addition to

the industrial jobs African American men received, score of women were employed as home

economic extension experts who specialized in educating communities about proper food

production and sanitation. Seen as a necessary evil, white leaders in home economic programs

reluctantly admitted black women in home extension teams to educate rural African American

populations during wartime conservation. As a way to ultimately protect white populations from

infectious disease such as the influenza epidemic of 1918, the goals of the program of eradicating

deadly diseases at a vulnerable time, meshed well with the targets of the white women in charge

of organizing extension work for the advancement of rural women.

Overall, African American women who participated as extension agents, influenced their

economic and educational mobility. However, there continued to be countless caveats that

limited growth. The African American extension program emphasized the subsistence-not

independence-which suggests that at least from the perspective of white expansion officials, the

program had limited goals, which seemed reasonable to them given their low assessment of

black aspirations (Cornell University 208). Additionally, black extension programs, although

successful, were also restricted through monetary channels that favored programs that

championed extension work in white communities. Even with the tremendous obstacles placed in
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front of minority women trying to rise up from poverty and racism in the twentieth century.

Opportunities that were advertised as generous acts of inclusion ostracized African Americans

and clandestinely pegged them for specific careers below the hierarchical prowess of their white

counterparts in the home economics field. In addition to the repeated instances of bias towards

African American females as extension agents, and hopeful minority participants in the emerging

home economics movement across the United States. Historians have noted the unintended

consequences of the Smith-Hughes Act and related laws, particularly the increased

differentiation of the curriculum and the sorting of students in schools that had previously

embraced the idea of a single common education for all (Steffes). The specialized curriculum

was often vocational training that was first used to elevate white women into new careers. It

wasnt opened to African American women until white women had already begun to make

ground in medicine, academia, and business. For fear of competition, white women in home

economics rarely discussed racial disparities, inclusion, or diversity. While both groups identified

as women, white women were reluctant in sharing the educational and economic benefits they

had initially received.

Medicine

Continuing on the same trajectory, home economics was once again influenced by the needs of

the United States during wartimes. World War II was especially instrumental in solidifying home

economics in medicine. As war rapidly changed the industrialization of the United States, a need

for disease prevention and nutrition was highly sought after to maintain stability both on the

battlefield and the home front. While women continued to use home economic training to

develop careers working in the educational system. They also found work in the private and

public sectors working in food and consumer industries, and food testing and regulations.
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During this time, the United States military also took note of the capabilities of women as

nurses, and elevated the status for female nurses in the military. This importance was reflected

through legislation passed by the United States Army in June of 1944, when it granted its nurses

officers' commissions full retirement privileges, dependents' allowances, and equal pay.

Moreover, the government also provided free education to nursing students between 1943 and

1948 (Bellafaire 3).

On top of the increased construction of new medical facilities around the United States, a boost

in middle-class clientele and more training programs encouraged nursing specializing in

dietetics. In addition to the much needed nutrition of specific patients in hospitals, dietetics

during the twentieth century created what is considered to be a standard healthy meal in order to

prepare rations for soldiers abroad. This influenced everyday civilians as well who needed a

guide to a stable healthy meal using substitute rations.

As specialists in food and cookery, home economics-trained dieticians offered American

hospitals three related areas of expertise: scientific knowledge of physiology and the chemistry

of foods, practical knowledge of food purchasing and its aesthetic preparation, and the skill

translating between the two (Cornell University 127). Before the creation of the American

Dietetic Association (ADA) in 1917, dieticians were few and far between. As home economics

increased in its presence as a study of medicine, the ADA began to grow in size as well.

In addition to the study of home economics to pursue a career as a dietician, the role of the

teaching dietician connected to the history of nursing education, hospital development, and the

growth of home economics itself. For even as Ellen Richards was wondering where to place the

rapidly increasing numbers of women educated in home economics, the demand among hospital

administrators for training was growing as well (Cornell University 129). For that reason, unlike
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the majority of home economics graduates who went into teaching. Managing dieticians went to

work at hospitals to become administrators, not to teachers. Originally perceived as a lower

professional career path, by 1920 many dieticians were interested in food administration. By

1927, hospital dieticians had showed an extensive administrative authority and continued to hold

power in higher executive positions. Therefore, as mentioned earlier, dieticians greatly promoted

themselves in administrative careers and later on in the broader realm of general nutrition

(Cornell University 127).

Business

In conjunction with the gendered nature of academia and medicine, home economists in business

found a field where their power was limited. Women struggled to gain credentialism in business,

and they were still largely excluded from the profession. In defiance, women interested in

business through the specialization of a home economist proved to be inventive and creative in

developing an alternative niche for themselves. In addition to the production of advertisements

and product development of new domestic merchandise, home economists were employed to

strengthen companys overall marketing strategies. Everything from photography, layout, and

recipe development for promotional programs, all changed the game of marketing forever.

Besides the host of other home goods that were sold included everything from vacuums and

blenders, to soap and Crisco. Although women began to stabilize a normalcy of women in

business settings, numerous men still felt uncomfortable and disapproving of integrating with

women in this setting (Cornell University 101). Despite the unwelcoming nature of men towards

women in business, home economics graduates couldnt help but be allured by the high salaries

business women made. By giving up some vulnerability for the long run, many became

successful. Some, especially those who started home economics departments and remained
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directors for several decades, earned impressive salaries exceeding those of the average

extension agent (Cornell University 293). With the prospect of further advancement in monetary

benefits, female graduates of home economics were highly incentivized to develop careers in

business. By doing so, it would put them on a track that would launch them into a new level of

opportunity and independence.

Global Impacts

As mentioned before, the connotation of home economics has made a shift from a science based

academic subject, to a portion of vocational training. Although the vocational training aspect is

often viewed as narrow and less well regarded in the United States, the possibility for home

economics in this form to shape the lives of women in developing countries around the world is

tremendous. Organizations including the Peace Corps, the Womens Microfinance Initiative, and

The World Bank specifically target women in need through microfinance loans and vocational

training. Demands for skills are widespread in most developing countries skills are not only

demanded by the modern wage sector but also by the agricultural sector and even by the informal

sector. A skilled labor force is essential for increased flexibility and worker productivity in the

labor market and the economy (Canagarajah, Dar and Nording). By training women through

Vocational Education and Training (VET) programs women who would otherwise be limited to a

life in the domestic realm of her home. Women are able to take an active stand to improve her

business venture, health, and education to elevate her family and her surrounding community.

Women struggling to maintain stable sources of economic and educational support have long had

little education in rural areas. Education in vocational home economics began to be used around

the world by entities such as the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations

(FAO). What made the organization unique is that their focus was not on the traditional
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sanitation and nutrition of their older American counterparts, but the ecological and manual labor

facets of rural life most women in developing countries experience every day. Large numbers of

rural communities are economically linked to one another. However, social and economic

relations at the local level can be disrupted by imposed or non-adapted "modem" technologies

for food production or for natural resource management (Eckman). Although these aspects are

need to improve the wellbeing and advancement of women in marginalized societies within

developing countries. These and many other aspects contributed to environmental degradation

and continued rural poverty (see fig. 1).

Figure 1

Source: adapted from UNEP, in Rodda 1991

It was up to organizations like the FAO to adapt the principles of home economics to the specific

needs of women in developing countries. The stability of the environment and the socioeconomic

welfare of these communities could not exist without the other. Hunger and malnutrition are

closely linked with both environmental unsustainability and inadequate socioeconomic

development, and are not simply problems of inadequate agricultural productivity or supply

(Eckman). By improving the potential for economic strength, sustainability will likely have a
 Romero Campbell 15

positive effect on the socioeconomic development of rural households through home economics

training.

In the twentieth-first century home economics continues to prove itself as a much needed asset in

improving the lives of women and society as a whole. In addition to creating a stepping stone to

help women advance into medicine careers in the twentieth century, home economics is still a

valuable source of knowledge to staying healthy and maintaining proper nutrition.

Back in the times when health was commonly taught in schools under the home economics

curriculum, the populations of students educated in diet, nutrition, and skills to prepare a health

meal for their family tended to be healthier (Alice H. Lichtenstein). Even though this idea might

seem quaint, in todays overweight society both men and women are struggling to maintain a

healthy lifestyle. Currently, only about 30% of adolescents are overweight or obese, a

prevalence that approaches 50% in minority populations (Alice H. Lichtenstein). Researchers

from The Journal of the American Medical Association argue that its not necessary to bring back

the stereotypical form of home economics replete with gender-specific stereotypes (Alice H.

Lichtenstein). Instead, by learning the basic principles of food prep through a home economics

based curriculum, the health of Americans as a whole will improve. Resulting in mobile and

healthy populations that are better prepared to navigate the over processed and unhealthy

foodscape we live in today.

Conclusion

Looking back at the history of home economics and the changes it has made to fit the political

and societal pressures of the United Stated and the world. Its hard to imagine the simplicity of

what is has become in our minds. Stereotypical images of girls busily sewing and cooking in

1950s classrooms, images that have led many people to view this field as fundamentally narrow,
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dull, and socially conservative (Albert R. Mann Library, Cornell University). This is not an

accurate representation of the subject. Home economics history as a study has constantly been

challenged even as the early advocates including Ellen Richards, rallied to gain support as a

serious academic discipline. Along the way, home economics has provided educational and

economic opportunities for women in academia, medicine, and business around the world. The

fact that young women were given an opportunity to find stable well-paying career paths was

beneficial in solidifying a space in a male dominated workforce. Additionally, the rise in

prospects for African American women to find achievement in economic and educational

benefits, albeit highly racially bias, elevated the black community as a whole. At a time when

both African American men and women were hard pressed to find any employment that didnt

subjected them to a certain line of work.

In the twenty-first century it is still useful to use principles core to home economics to improve

the lives of women and their communities. In developing countries, the values of home

economics are currently promoting the quality of life of women through vocational training.

Similar to the original home economics pioneers, the study of personal finance, nutrition,

sanitation, and ecology transform the tools women have to combat environments where

educational and economic opportunities are lacking. Lastly, the poor diet and nutrition of the

United States has continuously spiraled out of control. In addition to providing early careers

paths for women, home economics will be critical for the health of Americans in the twenty-first

century. Future research possibilities might include an argument for bringing home economics

back into the classroom, to regenerate a learning space where young people can be trained to be

independent and self-sufficient in life.

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