'It's easier just to do it all myself': emotion work and domestic labour

The concept of emotion work has been used for some years in sociology. This paper outlines some of the ways in which the term has been used, and describes a study of domestic labour in families with teenage children in which domestic labour was defined as including emotion work. Findings suggest that there is significant emo-tion work for women in managing domestic labour. In some families negotiating domestic labour involved contesting ideas about the ‘mum job’. Where men did not share the emotion work of ‘teaching fairness’ in the family, women found the task so overwhelming that they said ‘It’s easier just to do it all myself’. The work of keeping everything running smoothly, keeping the household work happening and family relationships going well, is a significant part of domestic labour. It is usually done by women, and is often not talked about. Thinking of this as emotion work is one way of making it visible.