Easy Living

ELIZABETH A. PATTON is an assistant professor of media and communication studies at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. She is the co-editor of Home Sweat Home: Perspectives on Housework and Modern Relationships.

Contents

Introduction

Part I: Where Does Work Belong?: Toward a New Conception of Home   

1          The Home and Its Function                 

2          Industry Stay Out                  

3          The Telephone and Better Living      

4          Portable Typewriters for Home Use                

Part II: Consuming Office Practices and Technology in the Postwar Suburban Middle-Class Home         

5          The Quest for Easy Livin’ in the Suburban Home    

6          The Big Business of Homemaking                

7          Junior-sized Offices               

8          An Office Away from the Office                  

Part III: The Birth of the Live-Work Lifestyle

9          Real Men Live in the City     

10        Pseudo-Bohemian Bacherlorettes        

11        Work Where You Live                      

Part IV: Neoliberal Domestic Workspaces

12        The Electronic Cottage                        

13        Adaptable Parents, Flexible Jobs and Adaptive Homes                    

14        Urban Professional Lifestyles            

Acknowledgments

Bibliography

Index