Cult of domesticity

The cult of domesticity, also known as the cult of true womanhood, is an ideology about the roles proper for white women in the 1800s. This way of thinking promoted the ideal that wealthy white women should stay at home and should not do any work outside of the home.^[1] This ideology promoted an ideal of separate spheres, in which women remained in the home and men led out in the world.^[2] Four ideals were held up for women to aspire to:

Be more religious than men (piety)
Be pure in heart, mind, and body (purity)
Be deferential to their husbands (submissiveness)
Act as keepers of home and hearth, concerned chiefly with household duties (domesticity)

The idea of this domesticity was practiced in 1820. However, the ideology was not recognized and truly followed until the 1840s and 1850. Some think that this domesticity came to an end only when the Civil War had ended (in 1865) due to some changes in beliefs about women's roles.

This ideology strongly discouraged women from obtaining an education. This ideology was thought to elevate the moral status of women and benefit them in ways such as living lives of higher material comfort. It made the roles of wife and mother important in society.

References

↑ Keister, Lisa A. & Southgate, Darby E. 2011. Inequality: a contemporary approach to race, class, and gender. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 228. ISBN 978-0-521-68002-8
↑ MacKethan, Lucinda (28 Oct 2009). "The Cult of Domesticity: An Online Professional Development Seminar" (PDF). National Humanities Center. Retrieved 31 Jan 2021.

2. https://study.com/academy/lesson/cult-of-domesticity-definition-significance.html

3. https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/117679/Bonventre.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

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[1] Keister, Lisa A. & Southgate, Darby E. 2011. Inequality: a contemporary approach to race, class, and gender. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 228. ISBN 978-0-521-68002-8

[2] MacKethan, Lucinda (28 Oct 2009). "The Cult of Domesticity: An Online Professional Development Seminar" (PDF). National Humanities Center. Retrieved 31 Jan 2021.

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