Identity, meaning and measurement of housewives

Abstract

Nearly one in five women in Spain is dedicated exclusively to unpaid household work. Data from two different methodologies used in the identification and measurement of this activity allows us to observe the ideological loading of the term "housewife": first, the data obtained by the Labour Force Survey, with an etic identification approach; second, a survey of more than eleven thousand adults (5,986 of which were women) with an emic self-identification approach. The study explores the controversial use of the term "housewife" in social research, as well as its relevance and limits as an identifier of a social group.