Examining gender roles in family leisure food provisions: a longitudinal photographic analysis

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to investigate how gender roles around family leisure food provisions have changed over time. To do this, family photographs depicting a variety of family leisure food provisions in New Zealand over the last 100 years were analyzed. Photographs are a useful lens for addressing such issues. They document aspects of lives that we may be unable to see easily via other sources. The photographs utilized in this study came from a combination of archival family photograph albums and more recent albums sourced privately through advertising and snowball sampling. They were analyzed using qualitative visual thematic analysis. The findings are categorized based on different leisure settings and show the nature of changes in gender in each setting over time. We found that despite social changes contributing to the empowerment of women, they still carry the main responsibility for the facilitation of food-related chores in the leisure experience. While men take the ‘frontstage glory’ of food preparation during family leisure occasions, women are shown either in the kitchen alone or looking after small children doing the ‘backstage work’.