Embedded Files
Pizza Rolls and Gender Roles
Pizza Rolls and Gender Roles
The invention of the microwave and how it changed the way Americans eat, and the way working mothers are viewed
The invention of the microwave and how it changed the way Americans eat, and the way working mothers are viewed
American media throughout the twentieth century showcases the kitchen as the heart of the home. Mothers cooking dinner, families enjoying meals together, there are many mundane events that take place in this room that carry a lot of emotional significance. In typical mid 20th century media, a doting wife will cook a homemade meal for her family and serve it at the table for the family to have together. This reality was not always possible but came with changing times and household roles. The invention of new household appliances changed this typical family dynamic through a change in the makeup of the kitchen itself. The one appliance that contributed the most to this change was the microwave oven. The microwave, though not originally intended for cooking or household use, changed the ways families operated once they were used across the country and now it is rare to find a home without one. The appliance cooks food at fast speeds and has completely changed the way Americans cook and eat. The invention of the microwave oven lessened quality family time in America and women, specifically working mothers, took the blame.
The Smithsonian Institution. September 4, 2017. NPR. https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2017/09/04/546734768/3-2-1-beeeep-your-microwaves-50th-anniversary-is-ready.
Public domain photo: modern microwave
Cooking has changed drastically throughout American history. In Colonial America meals were prepared out of whatever was available and cooked over the hearth in the main room of the house. This food was then reheated and eaten for different meals until it was entirely gone. Other food related tasks included milking cows, butchering livestock, harvesting food, and churning butter; these tasks were completed by all parts of the family in order to get all of the work done. This trend continued as American families needed to work together to function, until the industrial revolution changed the household. Men were expected to leave the home and earn wages while women stayed home and took care of the house, a daunting task for a single person. The job was so time consuming that the market for live-in help was booming, anyone above the working class had a staff of workers in the home to help with the different facets of the home. Once this practice was proven to not be sustainable due to working conditions and wages, women were expected to run their homes alone and therefore had to downsize (Brooke Blower, March 30, 2023).
Once kitchens were designed to be used by one person instead of managed by servants in the early 20th century, the job was designated to women. Women had a new expectation, to be the perfect housewife. They were expected to take care of the children, cook, clean, and run the household while doing the brunt of the emotional work as well. This norm was portrayed on television shows and movies throughout the 1950s and glorified. One of the biggest challenges women who were attempting to be the perfect housewife faced was the inability to be what they were expected to be. Women were expected to do the same work over and over for little to no recognition, it was not fulfilling. This attitude came to light in The Feminine Mystique which exposed the truth many American women felt (1). Even after Betty Friedan exposed the plight of educated women being banished to the role of housewife, the main reason why women decided to join the workforce in the mid 20th century was for financial reasons. It was getting increasingly more difficult to survive off a single income so women left the home to work, however, they were still expected to be the ones keeping the house. Women worked out of the home only to come home to hours of housework, all the while the perfect housewife still stood as the model American woman. Women could not escape the gender roles that had been forced on them; even though men and women were both working outside of the house, the home was still a wife's responsibility.
With the overwhelming amount of work to be done in the home, especially the kitchen, came the boom of new appliances. Appliances were introduced and marketed to women who were overwhelmed with housework and wanted to buy machines to make things easier for them. One of these appliances, the microwave oven, came as a surprise to Americans due to how quickly it worked but it was not originally intended to be a kitchen aid and took households a few decades to fully lean into. Through careful marketing, creative cooking ideas, and ready made meals the popularity of the microwave skyrocketed and became a staple in American homes.
"Stroganoff in a Jiffy: Microwave Cooking." Chicago Tribune (1963-1996), Feb 10, 1977, https://ezproxy.bu.edu/login?qurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.proquest.com%2Fhistorical-newspapers%2Fstroganoff-jiffy%2Fdocview%2F169505039%2Fse-2%3Faccountid%3D9676
The microwave oven was first invented in 1945-46 by Percy Spencer while conducting electrical engineering work (2). Before this experimentation and invention there was no thought to have an appliance that used radiation in this way, but then companies spent over a decade perfecting the microwave for home use. The first microwaves were put on the market in the 50s but their cost and the fact that the device had to be mounted on the wall led to a small market for the product (3). It was not until another decade later in the 1960s that the microwave was introduced in a table top form that was less expensive and therefore more accessible for households to purchase (4). In the 1970s more companies produced microwaves and advertised them to American families as a necessary appliance that would advance the kitchen. The 1970s was the decade that the microwave truly gained popularity and began its upward trend in sales. According to a spokesperson for the company Amana, the number of homes with microwaves went from 10 per cent in 1977 to nearly 90 per cent in 1997 (5).
Early advertisement for microwaves
Microwave commercial once they were normalized
Attitudes towards the microwave were hesitant at first, but quickly that was overcome. The use of radiation in this equipment frightened many Americans as they did not entirely understand what that meant. It was so beyond the realm of what was normal that companies had to spend upwards of a year educating retailers and wholesalers before fully launching the product (6). Once the microwave was known for its abilities they were trusted by consumers and households across the country purchased them. Consumers found the technology useful and said it made tasks much easier to complete and sped up the cooking process. The appliance was used for defrosting, softening, and even cooking entire meals.
Beside cooking normal food in the microwave, frozen meals also became even more of a staple in American households. Frozen meals were first sold in 1949 and they were immensely popular, in 1954 the popular brand Swanson joined in with their own version of the frozen dinner called the TV Dinner (7). These products have a very similar timeline to that of the microwave oven, however, the frozen meals took off much quicker and were designed to be heated in an oven. With the popularity of the microwave booming in the 1970s, frozen meals became designed for microwaves as well and took even less time to prepare. Dinners varied in details but mostly consisted of meat, starch, and vegetables. The demand for frozen meals also came from the way they were advertised, people saw them on TV and wanted to try them which led to normalization of the frozen meal in households. This marked the beginning of what seemed to be an age of innovation and progress for the American family, but it also altered what had become the foundation of family dinners.
Television commercial for one of the original microwave dinners.
Television commercial over 20 years later, showing the change in marketing.
Cahn, Lauren. April 21, 2022. Eat This Not That. https://www.eatthis.com/classic-tv-dinners/.
Family dinners are a staple for the classic nuclear family, and the introduction of frozen meals and microwavable foods created a decline in this practice. Since food is so much easier to make, any member of the family can fix themselves something to eat at any time, and there is less of a need to all eat at once. This ease coupled with the increasingly busy family leads to less of an emphasis on eating together in evenings. As for the look of the average dinner currently, food experts state that only about 30% of all dinners are the traditional homemade kind (8). It is also presumed that the decrease of traditional family dinner comes from the ability to graze instead of having food only available at specific meal times (9). This type of meal is also heavily marketed towards children. Microwaves are so easy even a child can operate one, which led to the creation of TV Dinners directed at children including beloved characters and fun shapes. This new demographic was first explored in the 1980s and in 1990 it was discovered that this was a $250 million demographic (10). With this change comes the separation of adults eating and children, sometimes they eat at different times and have totally different meals. There is no longer a time every day where families gather together to eat and make conversation. This comes with the increase of options for cooking, but a lot of the blame shifts to certain family members as well, specifically mothers.
Frozen meals eventually switched from receiving praise for ingenuity and advancement, to being ridiculed for not living up to the same standards as home cooked meals. Criticism for taking advantage of these easy options were scattered throughout newspapers and magazines and most of the complaints were that the foods were unhealthy and the ease of frozen meals took away from the classic American dinner experience (11). Women are so ingrained in the American kitchen that it seems obvious to most that mothers must be at fault, even though they were still doing most of the work (12).
Mothers who decide to pursue a career are most blamed for this change in the American family dynamic. Many women were tasked with cooking dinner every night for the entire family, this job takes hours of work, planning, shopping, cooking, and cleaning. When women decided to keep careers while raising children, men often did not step up to help with the housework, so women had to look elsewhere for relief. The frozen dinner was an easy alternative that kept everyone in the family fed with little to no preparation. Children's frozen meals were not only marketed towards children with flashy packaging, but mothers with the promise of happy children (13). Though this was the case often it led to mom shaming and blaming for distancing families from mid century ideals, most of which were already inherently misogynistic.
As previously mentioned, most mothers joined the workforce out of necessity when it made more sense financially to have two incomes, but this later evolved into women wanting to have careers and work to make a life for themselves outside of the home. It was a choice that was not accepted by all, and these women were often still picking up the slack of husbands who did not take up half of the housework (14). The narrative that women were meant to do the housework prevailed and were expected to do it all. In some cases, this meant relying on microwaved meals or meals with less preparation involved, however, working mothers were not the only people relying on microwavable meals. Single people often find it much more convenient to cook a small portion for themselves and men also seek the same ease and simplicity of pressing a few buttons to make dinner. The reason why working mothers are blamed for the decrease in family time and decrease of homemade meals is rooted in misogyny; society still believes that the home, and by extension the kitchen, is a woman's responsibility and is quick to point out any possible shortcuts- for example the microwave.
United States. Bureau of Labor Statistics. U.S. Working Women: A Databook : Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 1977 , 1977, https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/title/242
Change in women in the workforce separaeted by child status
Change in women in the workforce separaeted by child status
In American history, women are often the ones doing the most work but also receiving the most blame; or worse, completely forgotten about. When women began to join the workforce in the mid 20th century, the gap in the gender equality of housework shone brightly. Women had to do their homework in addition to outside work, and therefore they had to get creative. The easiest thing to cut time on would be cooking, and the microwave made that exceedingly easy. The microwave cut cooking time drastically and with the invention of microwave meals, the ease of dinner saved time. This clashed with the belief that meals should be a time to spend with family, bonding over a home cooked meal, now there was less meaning behind the dinner as it was not cooked in a “traditional” way. If housework and cooking were split in a more egalitarian way between couples, this would not be the same case, but women are expected to be in charge of this aspect of living. While the invention of the microwave proved to be a time saver for all Americans, and a popular appliance to shorten the length of tasks, it did have a negative effect on the reputation of working mothers.
Friedan, Betty. The Feminine Mystique. New York: W.W. Norton, 1963.
J. M. Osepchuk, "The history of the microwave oven: A critical review," 2009 IEEE MTT-S International Microwave Symposium Digest, Boston, MA, USA, 2009, pp. 1397-1400, doi: 10.1109/MWSYM.2009.5165967.
J. M. Osepchuk, "The history of the microwave oven: A critical review," 2009 IEEE MTT-S International Microwave Symposium Digest, Boston, MA, USA, 2009, pp. 1397-1400, doi: 10.1109/MWSYM.2009.5165967.
J. M. Osepchuk, "The history of the microwave oven: A critical review," 2009 IEEE MTT-S International Microwave Symposium Digest, Boston, MA, USA, 2009, pp. 1397-1400, doi: 10.1109/MWSYM.2009.5165967.
Contraption to convenience; microwave marks 30 years in the home: [FINAL edition]. 1997. Edmonton Journal, Aug 29, 1997. https://ezproxy.bu.edu/login?qurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.proquest.com%2Fnewspapers%2Fcontraption-convenience-microwave-marks-30-years%2Fdocview%2F252494460%2Fse-2%3Faccountid%3D9676.
Contraption to convenience; microwave marks 30 years in the home: [FINAL edition]. 1997. Edmonton Journal, Aug 29, 1997. https://ezproxy.bu.edu/login?qurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.proquest.com%2Fnewspapers%2Fcontraption-convenience-microwave-marks-30-years%2Fdocview%2F252494460%2Fse-2%3Faccountid%3D9676.
Who "invented" the TV dinner? The Library of Congress. (2019, November 19). https://www.loc.gov/everyday-mysteries/food-and-nutrition/item/who-invented-the-tv-dinner/#:~:text=The%20concept%20really%20took%20hold,meals%20into%20a%20cultural%20icon
REUTER. "Family dining may be doomed to extinction." Toronto Star, The (Ontario, Canada), August 28, 1985: D4. NewsBank: Access World News – Historical and Current. https://infoweb-newsbank-com.ezproxy.bu.edu/apps/news/document-view?p=WORLDNEWS&docref=news/147EFC35F36DAE10.
REUTER. "Family dining may be doomed to extinction." Toronto Star, The (Ontario, Canada), August 28, 1985: D4. NewsBank: Access World News – Historical and Current. https://infoweb-newsbank-com.ezproxy.bu.edu/apps/news/document-view?p=WORLDNEWS&docref=news/147EFC35F36DAE10.
Microwave meals for children: [final edition]. 1990. Edmonton Journal, Jan 17, 1990. https://ezproxy.bu.edu/login?qurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.proquest.com%2Fnewspapers%2Fmicrowave-meals-children%2Fdocview%2F251554123%2Fse-2%3Faccountid%3D9676
"March 18, 2011 (Page B4a)." The Los Angeles Times (2008-), Mar 18, 2011, Record Edition, https://ezproxy.bu.edu/login?qurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.proquest.com%2Fnewspapers%2Fmarch-18-2011-page-b4a%2Fdocview%2F1967406988%2Fse-2%3Faccountid%3D9676
Inness, Sherrie A. Kitchen Culture in America : Popular Representations of Food, Gender, and Race. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001.
Visser, Margaret. "Family Goals, Values and Rituals Eroded by Changes in the Way we Eat: Culture: Nothing could More Perfectly Symbolize the Aims as Well as the Stresses of Modernity than the Vast Proliferation of Fast Foods." Los Angeles Times (1923-1995), Apr 05, 1990, https://ezproxy.bu.edu/login?qurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.proquest.com%2Fhistorical-newspapers%2Ffamily-goals-values-rituals-eroded-changes-way-we%2Fdocview%2F1458283557%2Fse-2%3Faccountid%3D9676
Jones, Bernie D. Women Who Opt out the Debate over Working Mothers and Work-family Balance. New York: New York University Press, 2012.
About the Author
About the Author
Katelyn spends her favorite days getting lost in her own thoughts and reading anything that excites her- which is almost everything. To her surprise she has spent most of her life in her native Massachusetts (though it can be a wonderful place) and often wonders if her ambitions will lead her elsewhere. She dreams of one day figuring out what she wants to do with the rest of her life, and just hopes that it's something that fulfills her.
Page updated
Report abuse