Architecturally Isolating “Feminine” Emotional Displays

I recently moved to upstate New York.  So, there’s a lot more Victorian-style architecture in my neighborhood.  I’ve posted on the interesting ways that Victorian architecture gender segregates activity within the domestic space before (here and here).  One room I’ve been interested in lately is a room with a few different names and a history that’s not entirely known.  It’s sometimes referred to as a “roofwalk.”  But, it’s more commonly called either a “widow’s walk,” “widow’s perch,” or a “widow’s watch.”  When I first learned about it, it was written about as a widow’s watch.  And there’s a bit of cultural mythology that surrounds these rooms in homes.  Here are two houses in my neighborhood with the room (right and left).

The story that I’ve always heard about this room is that it was designed for the wives of sailors to watch and wait for their husbands to return.  Women whose husbands died at sea–so I was told–would sit in these rooms, pining for their long-lost lovers.  As it happens, there’s not a great deal of evidence that this was, in fact, the original purpose of the room, nor that this is how these rooms were actually used.  They did initially appear during the period when the sailing industry produced international trade on a level previously unimaginable and during which naval warfare dominated (~1500’s through the mid 1800s).  But the rooms could have equally been intended for (and used by) mariners themselves (rather than their wives) to look out for ships due back in port.  Indeed, in some communities, these rooms are referred to as “captain’s walks.”

And it’s also true that a great deal of these rooms were initially built around the chimneys of homes to provide quick and easy access to the chimney both in case it needed repair, and for a quick way to put out chimney fires–a constant dilemma in early American architecture.  This was the reason people had their chimneys “swept” every so often.  The accumulated ash and soot, if not regularly removed, could ignite.  Sweeping chimneys was serious–and extremely dangerous–business.  Children were often used because of their size, but it was a job often given to orphaned children.  It’s also a powerful illustration of historical understandings of children and childhood.  Despite being illegal, it would be unthinkable to ask a child to do something this dangerous today.  Chimney fires were serious business.  So, having quick access to pour sand down might have saved your home.

Yet many of these rooms today are not around chimneys, and if they were intended for either men or women, they were a room gendered by design.  And if intended for women, then they continued a tradition within Victorian architecture of designing rooms specifically intended to segregate (and/or isolate) certain emotional displays of women, keeping them out of sight.

On the Significance of Digitally Documenting Zoo Visits

I posted a while ago about our last trip to a zoo (The Denver Zoo, actually—during our trip out for last year’s ASA conference).  Today, we visited the Buffalo Zoo, which is actually one of the oldest zoos in the country.  Zoos are fascinating places.  They still have the stink of empire and colonization to me.  But, I’ve been sociologically interested in zoos ever since seeing Marjorie DeVault present on some of her research concerning zoo visits and family life.  Zoos are an extraordinary example of how families learn to look at the world in similar ways.  Parents teach children how to position themselves to look at something, to be mindful of others (or not), what to look at, what is “important” (animals) and what should be ignored (fences, cages, and plant life), etc.  It is through small practices like this that intimate groups (like families) collectively reaffirm themselves.

For instance, most visitors passed right by a rhinoceros lying down in a pool to cool off.  The rhino was mostly concealed beneath the water.  But, rhinos are my son’s favorite animal of late.  So, while a half-hidden rhino doing nothing but shaking her ears is something many people chose to walk by, our family stopped because it’s significant to Ciaran.  And in stopping, we collaborated in producing a small family ritual—one of those insignificant moments that is part of what makes us “Us.”

A great deal about zoos has changed since I was young.  I remember being able to ride elephants and camels.  I remember exhibits constructed in such a way that animals could not hide from view.  Not today.  Habitats today are more expansive, often permitting animals the ability to put themselves “on display” or out of sight.  Perhaps our understandings of the psychological consequences of captivity on (some) animals have changed.  Or perhaps our collective beliefs about animals themselves have changed.  Either way, exhibits are dramatically different than I remember as a child.

Beyond the spaces themselves, technology has dramatically altered the ways in which people interact with the exhibits.  Witnessing the exhibit often felt secondary to digitally documenting the visit.  So, unable to turn off my inner sociologist, I started documenting the documenters.  I watched a family of four come up to a habitat, each with digital cameras of their own.  They all took pictures, glancing briefly at the pictures each person took, took a few more, and moved on to the next exhibit.  Sometimes, someone took pictures of the signs, too.  Perhaps this was to remember a few facts about the animals they were so busy photographing.  Capturing the animal in an interesting pose (like this shot of my son looking at the otters) was prized.  But, getting the shot was a must.  Groups often didn’t move on until everyone with a camera got a satisfactory shot.

So what?