Page 20 - ROHANA_Journal_No_11-2019-ok

Research Journal of the University of Ruhuna, Sri Lanka- Rohana 11, 2019

Box 03. Case -02, a 40-year-old woman in Rejjipura

“It is true these men take hot drinks by the evening. It is also difficult to find

men who do not drink alcohol. Even our man is the same. We do not talk to
him at that time. These may erupt shouting. Therefore, I do our cooking

alone. If I call the Boy (son) for a little help he would utter the words, these
are women’s tasks - get them done by sisters. I happened to fall ill during

last few days and stayed at Karapitiya hospital. They had taken food from
the boutique during that time. This is how the life going all these here”.

Source: Field Study, 2014/2016.

Gender relationship at the cleaning of household and the compound

It was decided to study separately on homestead and the compound apart from

kitchen tasks owing to the basic data that depicted a considerable difference between

those two places. Here the cleaning of house and the compound can be divided into
two parts: as a daily routine and as monthly or fortnightly clearing work.

a) Daily sweeping work to be done at the household and in the compound

premises.

b) Removing of spider webs, weeding compound premises (removing grass,

cleaning ground pruning, and cutting grass) planting seeds, maintaining
homestead, making minor repairs to home etc. once or twice a month.

Out of these tasks, the first kind of work is identified as the duties belonging to

women. Second category of work is done mainly by the men. This clarified that the
gender relation on affairs shown in box 03 are dominated by the males of family

units of both these villages. Drawing room front corridor and the compound of the
home considered to be under the authoritative dominant of the males. Although the

daily routine work of husband’s domain was done by women those places were not

13