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"Couch Potatoes and Super-Women": Gender, Migration, and the Emerging Discourse on Housework among Asian Indian Immigrants
VIBHA BHALLA
IN APRIL 1991 a letter written by Ms. Subbi Mathur and titled "Couch Potatoes and Super-Women" appeared in India Abroad, the first newspaper of the expatriate Indian community in the United States.1 A quasi-humorous piece of writing, the letter focused on the household division of labor within Indian immigrant families in the U.S. and particularly noted Indian immigrant wives' increasing workload as a consequence of migration. The letter portrayed Indian women's transformation into "super-women," who were continuously juggling increasing work at home along with their paid work. In sharp contrast, the letter labeled Indian immigrant husbands as "couch potatoes," or indolent men, who seemed oblivious to their wives' increasing household responsibilities, remained glued to their couches, and did not participate in household chores. The letter stated:
Indian husbands rule the household from their couches (any resemblance to a couch potato is entirely incidental) through most of their married and child-rearing years, without much ado about anything ... Indian women living abroad inherit duties of both worlds. Most hold decent jobs....
After putting in a "man(!)day's" work, Indian women muster fresh energy to perform the menial tasks without which a house stops being a home.... In spite of the multitude of gadgets, the workload of Indian wives here is more demanding than that of their counterparts in India who have less amenities but more household help.... Not having the immediate family's support, raising children becomes a lonely job filled with daily anguish and self-doubt. An Indian husband watches his wife with a condescending and philosophical air while she struggles with the daily trials and tribulations of "their" offspring.... While they are trying their best not to fly away in a super-women costume, the ever patient Indian husband waits for his dinner, relaxing on a couch, while enriching his mind with news around the world on all television channels.2
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This characterization of Indian immigrant husbands as couch potatoes was rather surprising, since men in India, husbands or not, rarely participated in everyday domestic tasks; the strict separation of spheres dictated by Indian cultural norms deemed domesticity as woman's domain and economic responsibilities as the male realm. Despite its drollness, the critical undertones toward Indian immigrant husbands reflected a new desire, at least in this letter's author, for male assistance in household chores, a remarkable development since it was contrary to Indian cultural practices. What was amazing was that this letter was not unique in displaying changing expectations towards male participation in domestic tasks; it was, in fact, part of the fourth round of an exchange occurring since 1978 among the expatriate Indian men and women in the "Letters to the Editor" pages of India Abroad. Indian immigrant wives in the U.S. were increasingly voicing their complaints about their escalating domestic responsibilities and displaying new expectations for their spouses to ease their growing domestic chores. Implicit in their complaints and their simple wish for male participation in household tasks lay the seeds of overturning age-old Indian family norms as they applied to male and female responsibilities and, ultimately, determined their gendered identities. |
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