Overview

How did Americans come to believe that working at home is feasible, productive, and desirable? Easy Living examines how the idea of working within the home was constructed and disseminated in popular culture and mass media during the twentieth century. Through the analysis of national magazines and newspapers, television and film, and marketing and advertising materials from the housing, telecommunications, and office technology industries, Easy Living traces changing concepts about what it meant to work in the home. These ideas reflected larger social, political-economic, and technological trends of the times. Elizabeth A. Patton reveals that the notion of the home as a space that exists solely in the private sphere is a myth, as the social meaning of the home and its market value in relation to the public sphere are intricately linked.

Full Product Details

Author:   Elizabeth A Patton
Publisher:   Rutgers University Press
Imprint:   Rutgers University Press
Dimensions:   Width: 15.20cm , Height: 2.00cm , Length: 22.90cm
Weight:   0.454kg
ISBN:  

9781978802230

ISBN 10:   1978802234
Pages:   216
Publication Date:   17 July 2020
Recommended Age:   From 18 to 99 years
Audience:   College/higher education ,  College/higher education ,  Professional and scholarly ,  Tertiary & Higher Education ,  Tertiary & Higher Education
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print  
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Table of Contents

Contents Introduction Part I: Where Does Work Belong?: Toward a New Conception of Home    1          The Home and Its Function                  2          Industry Stay Out                   3          The Telephone and Better Living       4          Portable Typewriters for Home Use                 Part II: Consuming Office Practices and Technology in the Postwar Suburban Middle-Class Home          5          The Quest for Easy Livin’ in the Suburban Home     6          The Big Business of Homemaking                 7          Junior-sized Offices                8          An Office Away from the Office                   Part III: The Birth of the Live-Work Lifestyle 9          Real Men Live in the City      10        Pseudo-Bohemian Bacherlorettes         11        Work Where You Live                       Part IV: Neoliberal Domestic Workspaces 12        The Electronic Cottage                         13        Adaptable Parents, Flexible Jobs and Adaptive Homes                     14        Urban Professional Lifestyles             Acknowledgments Bibliography Index  

Reviews

This easy to read, fun, and unique book approaches discourses on work/life in a way that no one has before. --Elizabeth Fish Hatfield editor of Communication and the Work-Life Balancing Act

Patton draws on an impressive array of archival sources to demonstrate how communication technologies and architectural design have constructed ideals about working at home. Her nuanced historical analysis importantly reveals that our contemporary struggles over work/life balance are not new. --Amy Corbin author of Cinematic Geographies and Multicultural Spectatorship in America This easy to read, fun, and unique book approaches discourses on work/life in a way that no one has before. --Elizabeth Fish Hatfield editor of Communication and the Work-Life Balancing Act

Author Information

ELIZABETH A. PATTON is an assistant professor of media and communication studies at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. She is the co-editor of Home Sweat Home: Perspectives on Housework and Modern Relationships.

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