For this reason it becomes necessary to resist certain
narrownesses in certain phases of Home Economics.
One of these narrownesses is the assumption that because a thing
happens to be close to us it is therefore important. We have
heard lecturers insist that because a house contains drain-pipes
a woman should learn all about drain-pipes. But why? In most
communities drain-pipes are installed and repaired and in every
way controlled by gentlemen who are drain-pipe specialists. The
woman who lives in the house has no more real need of a knowledge
of the structural mysteries of drain-pipes than a reporter has of
a knowledge of the structural mysteries of his typewriting
machine. The office mechanic fixes all that for him, and, so far
as his efficiency as a reporter is concerned, an investigation of
his faithful keyboard's internal arrangements would be in most
cases an amiable waste of time.
Another possible narrowness is the attempt to manufacture
"cultural backgrounds" for various important but quite
safe-and-sane household tasks.
For instance, in the books and in the courses of instruction (of
college grade) on "The House" we have sometimes observed
elaborate accounts of the evolution of the human home, beginning
with the huts of the primitive Simianians.
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