For as long back as historians care to remember, women either employed a maid, or they were one, and both roles gave a clear definition of their standing within society. Maids or servants, often lived in the home in which they worked and were responsible for a wide range of tasks, from cooking and cleaning to childcare.
Nowadays, however, it is generally only those wealthiest members of society who employ maids, leading to a decline in the availability of such roles. If we think back to just a generation ago, before housewives from the middle classes began earning their own salaries, most were helped at home by nannies, cooks, and maids. The same cannot be said today.
Maids over the centuries:
If we look back to the 19th century, when authors were writing about female protagonists such as Jane Austen and Louisa May Alcott, whatever their circumstances may have become, they would have been utterly shocked and appalled at the thought of having to sweep and clean their own floors, and doubtless wouldn’t even have known where to begin!
All middle, and upper-class families employed domestic workers at this period in history, and the workforce was cheap and in abundance. Most were unskilled and could be easily exploited, with little or no protection from their employers. The number of women employed domestically increased throughout the mid 1900’s and domestic service represented the leading occupation of women throughout the U.S.
Domestic work wasn’t appealing to native-born women due to the long hours, the lowly status and lack of freedom among many other reasons, and consequently, those domestic workers who were native to the country, came from pitifully poor and desperate backgrounds, and whom could not find work in any other vocation.
In 1881, however, domestic workers started demanding more rights and more humane treatment, as many other types of workers had previously demanded and been granted. Sadly, the rights of domestic workers were not considered to be worthy enough though, and they were denied the right to fairer treatment by both local and federal entities.
Black women as domestic workers:
In the early 20th Century, the Great Migration saw many thousands of African Americans migrate from the rural south to the urban north, and black women began to take over the majority of work in the domestic sector.
Closer to the present day:
By the time the 1970’s had approached, advances in home technology and the arrival of ready- made food had reduced not only the workload for housewives, but the rigor of it, and domestic helps soon began to be seen as a luxury for those who still felt housework to be beneath their status. In the 1980’s, maids and other domestic workers were the butt of many a joke, particularly on TV sitcoms.
Thanks to the dogged pursuit of fair and equal pay and treatment for domestic workers, by those who refused to sit back and watch them continue to be exploited, maids today can rightfully enjoy key rights and protections. However, the trend nowadays is to employ maids on an hourly basis rather than having them live-in, and while their services are still proving as useful today as they ever were, in general, domestic workers are not as common in modern households.
