Mothers on the third shift during the corona virus epidemic

The paper explores the gendered realities of work-life balance in Iceland during the Covid-19 pandemic, in particular how these societal changes reflect and affect the gendered division of unpaid labour, such as childcare, household chores, and mental load. The study draws on written, open ended rea...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Hjálmsdóttir, Andrea, Bjarnadóttir, Valgerður S.
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:Icelandic
Published: School of Social Sciences 2023
Subjects:
Online Access:https://ojs.hi.is/index.php/tf/article/view/3875
Description
Summary:The paper explores the gendered realities of work-life balance in Iceland during the Covid-19 pandemic, in particular how these societal changes reflect and affect the gendered division of unpaid labour, such as childcare, household chores, and mental load. The study draws on written, open ended real-time diary entries, collected daily for two weeks during the peak of the first wave of the pandemic, in March and April 2020. The entries represent the voices of 37 mothers in heterosexual relationships. The findings show how burdened the mothers were in their everyday life during the first wave of the pandemic, juggling time between work and childcare. Their words reflected a reality in which they shouldered more of the housework and childcare than their partners and took on intense emotional labour as they tried to keep everyone calm and safe. Furthermore, the mothers described how the mental load, which involves the division of tasks at home, lay on their shoulders, as well as difficult decision making, causing them stress and frustration. Ljóst er að kórónaveirufaraldurinn sem herjað hefur á heimsbyggðina frá því í ársbyrjun 2020 hefur haft ófyrirsjáanleg og margþætt samfélagsleg áhrif. Barnafjölskyldur eru þar ekki undanskildar, en á tímum harðari samkomutakmarkana en flestir hafa upplifað í samtímanum hefur líf barna og foreldra þeirra raskast mikið. Í þessari grein er sjónum sérstaklega beint að upplifun mæðra í gagnkynja parasamböndum og hvernig þær sinntu tilfinningavinnu og hugrænni byrði í daglegu lífi í kjölfar hertra samkomutakmarkana í fyrstu bylgju faraldursins. Rannsóknin byggir á persónulegum, opnum dagbókarfærslum tæplega fjörutíu mæðra yfir tveggja vikna tímabil í mars og apríl vorið 2020. Niðurstöður rannsóknarinnar eru kynntar undir tveimur meginþemum. Fyrra þemað varpar ljósi á birtingarmyndir tilfinningavinnunnar sem mæðurnar lýstu endurtekið í hugleiðingum sínum. Seinna þemað endurspeglar þá miklu hugrænu byrði sem þær upplifðu, sem kristallaðist meðal annars í ábyrgð þeirra á að ...