“You See the Need Perhaps More Clearly Than I Have”

Abstract

Drawing on a qualitative research study conducted in Britain in the early to mid-1990s with heterosexual-couple households with dependent children, the article explores domestic responsibility for children through a discussion of two distinct and related conceptions of domestic responsibility, emotional responsibility and interhousehold responsibility. Rooted in feminist research on domestic and community life, family sociology on gender divisions of domestic labor, and a symbolic interactionist approach to human relations, the article argues for a conceptualization of domestic responsibility that is constantly negotiated, relational and interactional, intrahousehold and interhousehold, and material and “moral.” The article also details an innovative methodological contribution for collecting data on the gender division of domestic labor: the Household Portrait technique. Theoretical and empirical implications include the need for greater emphasis on the interhousehold dimensions—both material and normative—of domestic labor and the need to focus on the links among masculinities, caring, and domestic responsibility.