It’s undetermined if there’s a strong emphasis on the unloveability of women who don’t douche with common housecleaning products.
I meant to post on this when Echidne wrote about it, but it passed my mind. Thanks to Jessica for reminding me of it. The Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary is taking great strides against the unfortunate modern tendency of educating women by creating a bachelor program—only open to women—to get a degree in homemaking.
Coursework will include seven hours of nutrition and meal preparation, seven hours of textile design and “clothing construction,” three hours of general homemaking, three hours on “the value of a child,” and three hours on the “biblical model for the home and family.”
Men apparently never need those skills, since it’s assumed they will always have a woman holding down the fort. If the current wife dies or leaves you, of course, just get a replacement model ASAP. Maybe you can cruise graduation and pick you up one there?
As you can imagine, some folks are skeptical that you really need to create a bachelor’s program to teach skills that, while useful, are mostly not college-level challenging. Maybe seminary resources would be better put towards actually educating people?
Yet the program is raising eyebrows among some Southern Baptists, who say a degree concentration in how to be a Christian housewife is not useful, and a waste of seminary resources.
The school’s reply to critics makes it clear that it’s not really about education, though. In fact, they’re sort of seeing the value in uneducation, as it were.
“We are moving against the tide in order to establish family and gender roles as described in God’s word for the home and the family,” Patterson said at the denomination’s annual meeting in June. “If we do not do something to salvage the future of the home, both our denomination and our nation will be destroyed.”
You do have to admire the honesty here. When I first read this, I expected it to be a bunch of insulting nonsense about how learning to wash the dishes is so just as hard as nuclear physics, but no. They’ve basically said—as a school—that they think that keeping women on the farm is a higher priority than their educational mission.
The best part is that while there are some things they teach that could, in theory, be challenging courses (such as interior design and some child development and of course cooking), my suspicion is that these courses aren’t going to be what you’d describe as cutting edge in any sense. I’m thinking coursework is probably along these lines:
- Child Development: Spank Until Your Hands Are Raw
- Interior Design: Can You Have Too Many Embroideries of Bible Verses In One Kitchen?
- Cooking: 5 Different Fruits You Can Put In A Jello Mold
- Cleaning: When A String Mop Means “I Love You”
66 Responses to “Dusting the family Bible 101”
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There’s more time required for “textile design” than child care.
‘Cause the only thing you need to know about kidz is to smack them harder with plumbing line if they bug you too much.
I’m wondering if this “degree” is a response to the type of outrage that faced the Duggars when they claimed to be saving money for their sons’ college educations and were totally confused when questioned about their daughters’ educations.
Now they have some place to send them! Capitalism at its best!
This makes a certain amount of sense, in a twisted way. Wasn’t home ec a degree alternative for “coeds” in the 1950s? Since these folks mostly want to send us back to the ’50s, what better way?
Waste of seminary resources? What about the waste of those women’s tutions?
A degree in Christian Housewifery? What sort of paying job is that going to get someone in the real world? How are they going to pay off their student loans? What sort of exam would a young woman for a scholarship?
I had a good laugh when I heard about this. There really is a sucker born every minute – and a disproportionate number of them are convincing their daughters that ‘homemaking’ classes are a useful way to spend college.
Coursework will include seven hours of nutrition and meal preparation, seven hours of textile design and “clothing construction,” three hours of general homemaking, three hours on “the value of a child,” and three hours on the “biblical model for the home and family.”
Except for the Bible study part, isn’t that pretty much identical to a home economics degree that you can get from any public university for probably half the cost (if not less)?
I smell rip-off.
Dammit, Caryn, I thought of the Duggars when I read about this too- scooped again.
Guess my backup smartass quip of comparing this to the 1960’s game “Mother’s Helper” will have to do. (sulk)
Except for the Bible study part, isn’t that pretty much identical to a home economics degree that you can get from any public university for probably half the cost (if not less)?
I smell rip-off.
I had to spend hundreds of hours in class to get my major. Certificates beyond that took an additional few hundred hours of my life. I’d imagine women entering this program will take a full competent of electives in addition to their homemaking courses, but I count only 23 hours of class time on their major area study.
I’d spent more time than that writing an essay for one class.
I don’t find the idea of a homemaking degree bad in itself. If, for example, the university included real, accredited certifications in small appliance repair, child development, infant CPR, conflict management, and accounting in that degree program, I’d be all for it.
The program as it is, however, just looks like an effort to rip people off while making fundie girls dumber.
God damn it! I already got married up to a woman with one of them thinkin’ degrees! Why, oh why must I be so evenly yoked?
Devil’s Advocate,
In (undeserved) fairness, I think that “hours” refers to credit hours, not actual hours. However, it’s much more hilarious your way.
My grandmother would have laughed herself silly at this. Mind you she had a degree in Home Economics. Hers included full on Nutrition, Household Chemistry (she knew more practical chemistry than most Chem. majors), Accounting, enough on sewing and knitting for her to keep a household of nine in well-made, well-fitting clothing (she sewed all her own clothes until she died), Practical Physics, and a shitload of other stuff.
In short, she had a real degree that required some serious study and that actually engaged her brain, and would have fitted her out for half-a-dozen real life jobs, had she not gotten married.
D’oh! Competent = complement! LOL
In (undeserved) fairness, I think that “hours” refers to credit hours, not actual hours.
A single course – and by that, I mean time in class – time takes up more than 20-odd hours.
I swear, this is like the fundie catchphrase for what will happen if anything they don’t like is allowed to exist. I have yet to see an elaboration on how, exactly, the nation (and western civilisation) will be destroyed. Perhaps men will be forced to cook, do the dishes, and feel guilty if anyone is not happy with them! The enemy will attack! The men will be too busy cooking, doing the dishes, and looking after the kids to defend the country!
Ahh, yes. This brings to mind the MST3K short film form the late 1940s early 1950s on getting your Home Ec degree. Of course even then there was some mention of possibly having a career outside the home. Well at least until you found the right man in case your particular college/affiliated all boys school was lacking.
He’s got radioactive blood! Oh yeah, here comes the Spiderman!
Rob, except for the girls who learn to smoke thin cigarettes and reject the Triune God.
I’m pretty sure the HomeEc one was where “Look! Look! Look-At-My-Crotch!”–a standard catchphrase in our household–comes from.
In truth, this made me laugh for all the wrong reasons.
I have a friend who is a fifty-something lesbian who got a Home Ec degree in the early 1970s. She has been a diabetes educator for 27 years and her job is going around our rural state telling poor people how to use their food stamps and commodities to make meals that won’t kill their diabetic kids and elders.
Not what the Baptists have in mind, I’m guessing…
DA: When I was in college (granted that was a while back) a “3 hour” course met for approximately 3-4 hours per week for an entire semester. I’ve got no idea why they count it that way. If I remember correctly a “full load” was considered 15-20 credit hours a semester.
It still doesn’t seem like it would stack up to a full bachelor’s program, but maybe they have a lot of required elective hours? Or required religious courses?
A college-degree in homemaking? Shit, a high school diploma is overdoing it! An 8th grade education is all a woman really needs. The Lord never intended women to learn algebra or biology. That’s too much knowledge for their pretty little heads. If they know more than that they might get fancy ideas about the world, and the world ain’t that complicated. Listen to a man, whose words come directly from the Lord. That’s all they need to know.
It’s so hard to find a good woman these days.
I love your ideas for coursework, Amanda. How about:
“Coping with a Gay Child: Rules for Disownment in All 50 States”
“Marital Relations: Putting His Needs Ahead of Your Own, You Selfish Cow”
“Human Sexuality: The Myth of the Female Orgasm”
There is a branch of fundamentalism that seriously believes that the U.S. is headed directly for a Sodom and Gomorrah-style smiting complete with pillars of salt. Except for those that believe that we are lurching rapidly towards the end times.
Great. Now I’m having visions of some poor college graduate with a Home Ec degree saying “But I majored in “Pleasing Your Man”! How come the only place I can get a job is McDonald’s?”
Oh come on. Don’t you know the only proper degree for a woman to get in college is an M.R.S. degree? /snark
But then when I was in high school in the early ’80’s I had a guidance counselor who recommended college for all of the girls because it would be a good place to meet our future husbands.
Statistically, the military would have been a better option to meet men, since the 80’s was when women started to outnumber men on college campuses.
phinky,
PLUS, the military is a great place for a woman to practice her divinely-ordained role as a wife*, since she has an excellent chance of being raped by someone who is presumably “on her team,” and having no one give a damn.
* Or, hell, even just “woman” more generally.
Given that these women are supposed to be homeschooling their kids to protect them from the evils of the secular school system, I’m surprised that their female degree isn’t in Education with an orientation towards homeschooling.
There’s no reason that a university couldn’t create a modern home ec degree that would be useful, challenging, and applicable outside the four walls of your house. But the priority here is to make the women dependent on men for support — either their father, or their husband — so that they can’t just opt out of the fundamentalist lifestyle.
you are Correct, Tricia. that is indeed how it works. and no, it doesn’t make much sense.
I believe the standard form is at 12 hours you are fully enrolled as a full time student for purposes of Financial aid and such. 15 credit hour semesters are the norm, however, as the standard course load for undergraduate assumes you pass all your classes at 15 hours a semester for 8 semesters.
In retrospect, I feel kinda bad for dissing people with Home Economics degrees. They usually go on to do really useful things in the world since they’re taught actual skills.
Of course, that means that this “degree” is even more of a rip-off since these poor women won’t learn half of what a real Home Ec major does.
So if she’s preparing for an unpaid job inside the home, how is she supposed to pay back her college loans?
And the course reading would be incomplete without “His Needs, Her Needs” by Dr. Willard E. Hartley.
Table of Contents
How Affair-proof Is Your Marriage?
Why Your Love Bank Never Closes
The First Thing She Can’t Do Without - Affection
The First Thing He Can’t Do Without - Sexual Fulfillment
She Needs Him to Talk to Her - Conversation
He Needs Her to Be His Playmate - Recreational Companionship
She Needs to Trust Him Totally - Honesty and Openness
He Needs a Good-looking Wife - An Attractive Spouse
She Needs Enough Money to Live Comfortably
He needs Peace and Quite - Domestic Support
She Needs Him to Be a Good Father - Family Support
He Needs Her to Be Proud of Him - Admiration
How to Survive an Affair
From Incompatible to Irresistible
Appendix: Analysis of Emotional Needs Questionnaires
You know, if they’d chunk up and pay housewives a salary equivalent to the value of their labor, I wouldn’t have a problem with this degree program. Somehow, I don’t see that happening, though.
““We are moving against the tide in order to establish family and gender roles as described in God’s word for the home and the family,” Patterson said at the denomination’s annual meeting in June. “If we do not do something to salvage the future of the home, both our denomination and our nation will be destroyed.””
That’s an interesting case of empirical groping in the dark. I use the same sentence structure (”If we don’t do something…”) when I’m aware there is a problem but I don’t yet know the solution. I’m sure I’ve said something like that at work, just this last month: “If we don’t do something about our web server, it will eventually melt under rising traffic.” Due to budget constraints, there may not be anything obvious to do about the web server.
What this guy is saying, essentially, is “America is less overtly Christian than it was a hundred years ago. This is a problem and we are not sure how to fix it. Our program for women may not be the best possible solution, but we’ve got to try something. If we do not do something to salvage the future of the home, and the way children are raised, then America will continue to become even less overtly Christian than it is now.”
Surprised the Bush administration doesnt hire these fine young women to oversee the Justice Department.
Why don’t they just skip to the lobotomy? The lobotomies would be performed by televangelist Benny Hinn, the curer of all evils by magical touch who purrs, “You have been healed!” as he strikes you down. Essentially, the sermons look like fainting goats: http://youtube.com/watch?v=f_3Utmj4RPU
Don’t believe me? Then check out the first 30 seconds of this:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=5lvU-DislkI
What happened to my comment? I guess YouTube links are a no-no? Damn it.
Oh, well. There is this brilliant article in Harper’s about the paranoid culture of American politics, which ties into Christian fundamentalism and its dehumanization and demonization of women and girls (and The Gays):
“The paranoid spokesman sees the fate of conspiracy in apocalyptic terms — he traffics in the birth and death of whole worlds, whole political orders, whole systems of human values. He is always manning the barricades of civilization… he does not see social conflict as something to be mediated and compromised, in the manner of the working politician. Since what is at stake is always a conflict between absolute good and absolute evil, what is necessary is not compromise but the will to fight things out to a finish.”
http://harpers.org/archive/2007/08/hbc-90000908
It’s not.
Ah, but the Bible study is crucial!
Bingo, phinky!
Put the question “Isn’t this a scam” in that context; the point is, the women would be paying premium tuition for their MRS with the “right” sort of husband.
Of course in a proper patriarchy, it would be her father that pays, and/or future hubby, by paying her student loans. She wouldn’t have any call to be handling money at all, except for grocery and household shopping.
In our degenerate and hellbound society, there isn’t any way to legally enforce the latter, though; student loans are attached, with a death-grip, to the actual student, not their heirs or assigns. And, I think though I may be wrong about this, not even their spouses are legally obliged to pay.
In California though, “half of his is hers and half of hers is his,” meaning that if she defaults on her loans she can’t plead hardship if half his income would be adequate for payments, even if he doesn’t actually let her have the money for that or any other purpose. Because she’s legally entitled, but I’m sure these traditional types have all kinds of ways of preventing their wives from actually getting control of their half.
And of course in a proper patriarchy, the wimmins would be trained in all this and nothing else at home, by their mothers and other female relatives, and marriages would be arranged anyway.
And so:
Ah, that’s the 19th century argument for womens’ education–that part of their mission as Angels of the Hearth is to raise up the next generation of (male) citizens, therefore they should go to school.
From which we can conclude that the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary has got the Wayback Machine set not for the 1950s, or even the 1850s, but the 1750s or earlier.
Oh, I’m sure it refers to credit hours. But a hundred hours in learning Jello molds sounds even more hellish.
man, this is my nightmare come true. luckily, my mother is extremely non-traditional for “Johnson County, KS” mother. I mean: nobody wanted to be “in Holly’s group”, when it came time for “Foods I” class, freshman year (class dominated by males, by the way”. I fucked up every project. (that was 16 years ago)
Luckily, my boyfriend sort of likes to cook- and does it all of the time. Oh, and I cannot thread a sewing machine, either. (thought I was going to fail sewing- but the instructor adored me) Which, kind of sucks, as all of my friends with their fancy degrees in “textiles” from the Kansas City Art Institute and KU, make me really wish I could make my own fancy frocks. But, hey: I save so much time just buying clothing off of friends, and selfishly buying all of my stuff from stores.
More time to fuck off with friends in the coffee shops, and ignore my MSW readings, I say.
I guess I should clarify the obvious: the Foods I and sewing class (whatever that was called), were in high school. Yep. still inept. My 81-year-old aunt has said to me in the past two years: But, Holly: “if you don’t cook, who’s going to marry you?”
I’m surprised that they’re not calling it a “Bachelorette of the Arts” degree.
Holly R. — KU or UMKC? And where are you doing your practicum? (semi-recently graduated from UMKC here, and nice to see a neighbor on Pandagon).
Could someone link to the Home Ec MST3K video? I can’t find it. But the “Are You Ready for Marriage” one is good too.
This so-called degree is absurd. And I think personal finance, cooking and nutrition, basic sewing and household repairs should all be required alongside sex ed in public school. Everybody can use those skills.
Ahh, my great great aunt had one of those. She graduated in 1903.
I recall that they did have home ec degrees even as late as the early 70s in many reputable colleges. The idea was something of a scam, partly to convince middle-class women that homemaking was as challenging as medicine or whatever. Also it was frequently used as a scam by young women to get their patriarchal parents to let them go to college.
Of course the latter scam won’t work at a podunk bible school with no real majors. The former probably won’t work either.
Hmmm…
Mathematics 101: Arithmetic, Flower Petals, and You
Mathematics 102: Don’t Worry Your Pretty Little Head
Science 101: Genesis and Beyond
Science 102: Evolution, Darwin, and the Devil: A Study in Pure Evil
if they’re (un)lucky it could evolve into something like this which started out as a home ec program.
My mother got a Home Ec degree at Cornell University - it is a state school (now it’s Human Ecology) and therefore she could afford to attend.
And it was a REAL degree. She studied Child Development, and became a social worker. She’s the tops.
Jello mold class wouldn’t be so bad if you could use these —
http://www.prankplace.com/brainmold.htm — especially with vodka involved.
But somehow I think that would be a fast track to expulsion.
It’s on the “Shorts” videotape (dunno if it’s on DVD–wasn’t when I was looking for it). It’s a recruiting film for Iowa State’s College of Home Economics (now, the College of Family and Consumer Sciences) from the 1940s. I actually use it in my Gender class.
Here’s the Home Economics Story, without MSTing.
Where do you get 7 hours of textile design? All the courses I took for my textiles degree were 3 hours each. Maybe one has a lab hour.
ah, forgot to close my tag. Bad on me.
Hmmm. No mention of accounting, business or personal finance course work in there, even though handling family finances is one of the most important and challenging parts of homemaking.
But, no, of course not. Hubby will handle all the money and give her an allowance. She won’t have to worry her pretty little head. At least not until the IRS auditors show up because her husband has been cheating on his taxes for 20 years, and she’s liable, too, because she’s been blindly signing the returns all along.
Ah, good times.
So did I read that article wrong or is it saying that the professors who will be teaching courses for this major will all be men? Somehow that’s even more messed up:
“In 2003, when Patterson left his post as president of North Carolina’s Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary to serve as Southwestern’s president, he was asked whether women would teach in the seminary’s theology school under his leadership.
“The New Testament is crystal clear that pastors are to be men,” he said.”
BZZZZT. I’m sorry, that college at Iowa State has been Borg’d with the Education College into the “College of Human Sciences”.
Considering our discussion of the topic, where these young Christian ladies should be studying some edumakation so they can home school the youngins, the fact that these two colleges merged gives me the heebies.
From the proposal PDF: “it will become the fourth largest college in the university, providing an opportunity for greater influence over university policy, planning, and decision-making. Three of the ten largest undergraduate programs and the largest graduate program will be
part of the college; external funding is expected to exceed $26 million annually; and key centers and institutes will continue to support groundbreaking interdisciplinary research within the new college.”
Tapetum-
Your gran sounds like a cool lady. I’m in grad school for polymer chemistry/engineering, and I would like to have learned that stuff, or would like to learn it now. Not only for its own coolness, but yeah. If I end up with a family, someone should know that sort of thing. It feels like a lot of people are running around retarded and just don’t know enough about how basic daily things work.
IIRC, SWBTS doesn’t do undergrad degrees. If I’m right, then boys and girls this is graduate level home economics.
ick.
How about a course on “Stability 203: How not to go insane when trapped inside your house with only children to talk to”
odanu-
b.s. psych and soc/ women’s studies concentrations undergrad at KU, MSW now at UMKC. I’ll be doing my practicum (starting tomorrow) at Korte elementary. last year my practicum was at Comprehensive Mental Health.
Hey, neighbor!
I feel like that Big Black “Kerosene”: “Lived here my whole life” (KC area)
of course, now that I have rtfa, I see it says BA. sigh. Is this course then for those wives of the married seminarians who don’t have to support their husbands during their religious studies?
My mother got a B.S. in home ec and nutrition back in the early 70s. Finished a 4-yr program in 3 yrs. She actually had to take chemistry classes though, which as I’ve heard were killer. And she also had to pass the same number of gen ed classes as every other student. She went on to be a fantastic teacher, seamstress and yes, homemaker, when she could afford to stay home, in addition to working a number of other jobs and now has a master’s degree in education.
This sort of degree *could* be done right. Lots of women do want to stay home and take care of families as their only full-time job. But seeing this program offered by a Baptist seminary…. ooh, icky.
You know, if they’d chunk up and pay housewives a salary equivalent to the value of their labor, I wouldn’t have a problem with this degree program. Somehow, I don’t see that happening, though.
Go and take a look at the stuff Marilyn Waring has written on the topic. She’s a brilliant person, both in print and in person.
I had to spend hundreds of hours in class to get my major.
I’m not sure if this was already answered above, but southern universities often use the term “hour” where northern ones use “credit”. It’s usually not meant to translate directly to time spent in the classroom.
For instance, my college major had a total requirement of 24 credits in my major. Since most courses offered in my school were worth 3 credits apiece, that meant that I had to take 8 different courses.
Technically, the number of credits awarded per class corresponded to the number of hours per week we were to meet. So a 3-credit course would meet for three hours a week, for a 18-week semester, i.e. 54 hours.
I would guess that the Southern Baptist Seminary means “credits”, not literal hours.
My criticism is mainly, why on earth would any sane person do this? If you want to study textile design, major in that. If you want to study nutrition, major in that. If you don’t plan on ever pursuing a career outside the home, don’t go to college at all (or shit, go for something you really like and don’t worry about the money aspect).
I got my BS in Family & Consumer Sciences. http://www.fcs.txstate.edu/
My major was Consumer Sciences, so most of my classes were Consumer Law, Consumer Finance, Family Policy, etc. However, we were required to take at least one elective in each of the other areas. By far, my favorite was the Family & Child Development course of “Nontraditional Families” (that’s not scare quotes, that’s just what the class was called).
Fashion Merchandising and Interior Design nearly bored me to tears though!
It’s a shame their program can’t be more like the one that I went through. I’ve been out of college for 3 years, and I still refer back to the classes I took (much to my boyfriend’s chagrin!).
Oh, and my 2 cents on a helpful course:
Family Relationships 101: In-laws - can’t live with ‘em, can’t shoot ‘em. How to deal without ending up in prison.
The MST3K Home Ec short is one of the best ever. If you like that one, see “Why Study Industrial Arts?”, which is kind of the companion piece. I know an older guy who said his school actually separated all the boys out and had them watch it. I guess the girls were getting “the talk” at the time.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=u7SGkcf4pbc
deep6, your mom took a program on home ec AND NUTRITION as well as general ed classes. This kind of degree isn’t something anyone needs to be able to stay home with their kids and run a household; it’s the SoBaps’ way of keeping the ladies occupied while they get their MRS degree.
As I understand it, a lot of these programs were started in the early 20th century because there was a whole trend toward rationalizing systems to make them more efficient and effective. Colleges were graduating women engineers and etc but those women were not generally considered suitable for “masculine” pursuits like, well, engineering or Taylorizing factory processes or what have you. In response women turned their eyes toward rationalizing the spheres that they could occupy. Hence home economics, family science, and social work, among other fields. But they were plenty rigorous then. Interesting that this particular (lame) program seems to be designed by men. It seems to be an enshrinement of the “what? It’s only housework” approach.
From Sarah in Chicago: How about a course on “Stability 203: How not to go insane when trapped inside your house with only children to talk to”
Oh- I understand and share your pain!! 7 days to go. If next summer is like this one, they will visit me on weekends at a home for the criminally insane by July.
I had to take something like 24 credit hours in my major - but I had to have well over a hundred credit hours at the college to qualify for graduation. This article doesn’t make it at all clear whether these women will be taking a full degree. Will they be participating in other classes? Or do they need to be segregated off so they don’t distract the menfolk?
Also, this quote had me reeling:
I’m sorry, what year is this again?