Household Hub

I can honestly aver that the fridge is not the moral center of my house; that would be the computer. I suspect that is true for a lot of young childless families in which all of the adults have grown up with computers; I do wonder, however, if the presence of children would cause this to change.

One would assume that the functional equivalent of the refrigerator before the refigerator was the fireplace (i.e., the “hearth” of “hearth and home” fame).

In many houses today, the holiday cards are placed on the mantle on top of the fireplace, rather than magneted to the fridge, as are favored artworks of the sculptural (rather than pictoral) variety.

The historical speculation will be on the post-War shift from “a culture trying to keep warm” to a “culture trying to keep cool” and all the associated metaphors and economic ramifications. Also discussed will be the shift from the horizontal (mantle) to the vertical (fridge door) surface

Why do people always hang out in the kitchen during parties? Because that’s where the booze is!

Why do people stick things to their fridges? Because that’s where the magnets are.

Can you eat in your kitchen? If “yes” then the kitchen will likely be the site of a lot of life’s little activities (stick a TV in there too and you’ll hardly ever use your living room). Perhaps we don’t cook as much as we would like to, but American refrigerators are usually well-stocked anyway – especially with whatever beverages and snacks the household consumes. Put a table near the fridge (and toss in a useable door to the outside for maximum effect) and you’ll read your mail/newspaper/bus schedule right there while drinking your coffee/tea/bottled water/sodapop. This postcard/article/notice, you’ll say, is important/interesting/fun; I’d better leave it where someone/I will see/remember it…

Having lived in a series of apartments with kitchens that had no room for even a stool, much less a meal, the refrigerator remained bare of all but a magnetic churchkey. However, having just moved (last week!) to a place with ample room for a kitchen table, I expect we’ll finally use that magnetic poetry kit some thoughtful, if unobservant soul gave us years ago. And our back door – from the driveway – enters the kitchen. Moral center or cluttered kitchen? Only a sociologist can tell.

Actually I am put in mind of the work done on the social changes in the American South due to the air conditioner by Raymond Arsenault and others. A social history of the refrigerator would be fascinating. If this “open source” thing doesn’t pan out…

Good luck with your move, Mr H! Two academics means a lot, a lot, a lot of boxes of books, so take it easy and always lift with your legs.

Surely, our sociologist friend would have been happier with a hearth and a roaring log fire in it. These days, of course, central heating has rather yaken over – a poor alternative from the great man’s perspective. The fridge is OK but it has a door. Admittedly ours is covered with the eponymous attracting objets (mostly of the Simpson family, whatever that means). Doors generally are so exclusive, denying, divisive. No, the moral centre of the household should reflect open-heartedness and Durkheimian unity and stability. It has to be the sofa where they cuddle up to talk about any old thing, to watch telly, to eat (too often) and read (not enough). Yep, shove up so I can sit down.

The above comment belongs to the post below…

Don Norman has written about this in
“Turn Signals are the Facial Expressions of Automobiles” http://www.jnd.org/TurnSignals/TS-TOC.html
Unfortunately that chapter is not online, but it’s well worth reading.

One online essay of his that I enjoyed is here:
http://www.jnd.org/dn.mss/ToiletPaperAlgorithms.html

At last, Dan, a truly Durkheimian comment.

What was the functional substitute for the fridge in Victorian households?)

I know of three: the larder, the root cellar, and the icebox. The larder (British) and the root cellar (American) were special rooms in the basement that were earth-sheltered and thus cooler than the surrounding air. The icebox contained (duh) ice, which was delivered regularly by the iceman. Many New England villages made money in the wintertime by sawing ice out of frozen ponds and rivers, packing it in sawdust, and shipping it to hotter climes.

The icebox survived well into the 20th century. My 72-year-old father remembers a square card that you put in the window; the top side indicated whether you needed no ice, 10 pounds, and so on. When you wanted to cool a drink, you chipped ice off the block with an icepick.

And, of course, you didn’t store perishables for weeks on end. My mother-in-law lived in an apartment in Paris in the ’60s that didn’t have any refrigeration at all; it was assumed that you marketed every day. There was one wire cage in the window that you could use to keep eggs and milk cool for a day, two at most.

I just want to announce that I am really annoyed to see that there appears to be no space between the periods and the next sentence in your comments. I believe this should be corrected as soon as possible before the Punctuation Police start taking people away.

We recently moved into a house which has one of those fancy refrigerators whose doors are made to look like the cabinets, i.e. they’re wood. I had quite a collection of refrigerator magnets and cool pictures and cartoons and things on the fridge in our old house. I was disappointed. Not to weep however, the market has solved my problem. You can now buy metal bulletin boards. One of which, designed to use both pins and magnets, now hangs over the hall desk.

MKK

Adriana: So those who do not describe themselves as Libertarians in your posse, what monikers do they use?