‘I'm old, but I'm not old-fashioned’: mealtimes and cooking practices among Danish widows and widowers
Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review
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‘I'm old, but I'm not old-fashioned’ : mealtimes and cooking practices among Danish widows and widowers. / Andersen, Sidse Schoubye.
In: Ageing & Society, Vol. 42, No. 6, 2022, p. 1360-1377.Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - ‘I'm old, but I'm not old-fashioned’
T2 - mealtimes and cooking practices among Danish widows and widowers
AU - Andersen, Sidse Schoubye
PY - 2022
Y1 - 2022
N2 - Existing research on how older adults handle challenges associated with domestic housework, and in particular food work, almost invariably assumes that older adults are traditionalist, and that this affects the way they adjust to widowhood. This assumption is problematic, as decades of research have emphasised increasing gender equality in food work. In this paper, I explore how older adult men and women adjust to food preparation after the loss of a spouse. Interviews with 31 Danish widows and widowers aged between 67 and 86 years old suggest that the men have made culinary progress. However, I also show that the narratives around domestic food work among the older generations remain gendered: both men and women identify widowed men's domestic food work as something meriting acknowledgement, and men and women draw on traditional masculine and feminine ways of approaching domestic food work.
AB - Existing research on how older adults handle challenges associated with domestic housework, and in particular food work, almost invariably assumes that older adults are traditionalist, and that this affects the way they adjust to widowhood. This assumption is problematic, as decades of research have emphasised increasing gender equality in food work. In this paper, I explore how older adult men and women adjust to food preparation after the loss of a spouse. Interviews with 31 Danish widows and widowers aged between 67 and 86 years old suggest that the men have made culinary progress. However, I also show that the narratives around domestic food work among the older generations remain gendered: both men and women identify widowed men's domestic food work as something meriting acknowledgement, and men and women draw on traditional masculine and feminine ways of approaching domestic food work.
U2 - 10.1017/S0144686X20001543
DO - 10.1017/S0144686X20001543
M3 - Journal article
VL - 42
SP - 1360
EP - 1377
JO - Ageing & Society
JF - Ageing & Society
SN - 0144-686X
IS - 6
ER -
ID: 251644190