Gender Roles in Single Mother House Holds

            Gender Roles are both cultural and personal. They determine how males and females should think, speak, dress, and interact within the context of society. Most two parent homes raise their children in the manner of the child’s gender or how society would expect them to. I know being raised by a single mother it was not exactly like that, and gender roles from the 1800 had a lot to do with my upbringing well at least for the girls. I was raised as the only child until I was about nine then my little cousin came to live with us. Now I bet you are thinking this is just a story of sibling jealousy, but I tell you now that it is far from it. Well maybe not that far but still. When my little cousin came to live with us I was excited, I was finally having a younger sibling. But as months went by my excitement dwindled, because I started to notice a difference my mother was making between us. I was the one cleaning the house, cooking, and washing clothes. I took care of the house hold, but my little brother was taking out the garbage, raking leafs from our five inch front yard, and no more chores for him. At the time I was like whatever, I thought nothing of it all. Until we got older and my mom was still making my brother’s plate for dinner and the only thing he knew how to cook was Ramon noodles in the microwave. See my mother was babying him while I was being groomed to be a strong, black, independed house wife. As a single mother she had no man in the house hold to truly love in a husband and wife manner, so what many single mothers do is they put their missing love into their sons and are hard on their daughters. The daughter cleans and cook. The son get cooked for and catered to because he is going to grow up and be the man of the house, but how is that possible when he is showed no skills? Single mothers and their sons are a tad like Norma Bates and Norman Bates except their not as creepy. I was raised to play my gender role but my brother was raised to be anything he wanted to be. Do not get me wrong here, my mother always said I could do anything I put my mind to. Though my mother showed me the ropes of house wife she always made sure I could hustle. Which again in society hustling is the man’s job. My mother had me doing odd jobs at 14. I did yard work for some of her friends, washed cars, I can work on cars, fix a TV, screw in a door handle, and when my mom and her friend had an after school program I was a tutor. So I have many different skills under my belt and I owe it all to my mom, but she gave me both gender roles. She spoiled my brother and made me tough. If I am single for the rest of my life I could take care of myself but my brother on the other will need a wife. The gender stereotypes played a role in my own upbringing but not so much for my brother.

http://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/mfr/4919087.0015.103/--gender-space-and-objects-in-divorced-families?rgn=main;view=fulltext

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3270818/