THE HOUSE AS SUPPORT OF GENDER RELATIONS

Abstract

The article examines the relationship home – gender, using a fieldwork carried out between 2009 and 2011 in the Romanian village of Marginea, a rural community strongly affected by the international migration. I show that migrants from Marginea, even by changing the configuration of their homes, still continue to preserve some old practices related to gender relations such as the responsibility of the man and his family to build the new house or the newlyweds’ settlement in the boy’s house. While home furnishing and decoration are supposed to be performed largely by women, the construction process is related to men. However, today, with the feminization of international labor migration, women are taking a more active role in both house design and construction process.

Keywords

• Marginea village
• gender relations
• migration
• new houses
• old practices