The boudoir, the desk & the couch : Histories, practices and speculations on labour

3. Looks like harmonizing growth and desire is gonna be a tricky business

From 1960’s utopian re-imaginings of the house of the future, to Wages Against Housework, this chapter explores the versatile and invisible character of female labour. We depart from the boudoir as a space to allow oneself “to feel", to find inner peace, away from the emotional, social and sexual labour required from the 17th century aristocratic woman. Through explorations of ejaculatory prayers, hedonistic luxury, lesbianism and prostitution as refusal to work and Marx’s economic vampires, we will dive into the domestic, the familial, the conjugal as well as the labour to remain desirable while emotionally and sexually available.

Image reference: “The Studio” by Sophie Gengembre Anderson

 

References:

00’00” Beyoncé  ft The Weeknd  “6 Inch”

01’50”  Quoted from Silvia Federici, Wages Against Housework,  p.11

02’00”  Clip from The Jetsons – Episode 1 Season 1 “Rosey the Robot“

03’44”  Clip from 1957 Monsanto House of the Future

05’12”  Clip from 1999 House of Tomorrow

06’26”  Clip from 1999 House of Tomorrow

07’23”  Norma Rae, 1979

09’02”  Vanessa Williams  “Work To Do”

09’10”  Mierle Laderman Ukeles, “Manifesto for Maintenance Art”, 1969  read by Jo Willoughby

10’55”  Quoted from Silvia Federici, Wages Against Housework,  p.9

11’30”  Prince  “Let’s Work”

11’45”  Quoted from Walter Benjamin, Reflections, p. 54

13’15”  Ne-Yo “Put In Work”

15’43” Quoted from Paul Preciado, Gender, Sexuality, and the Biopolitics of Architecture, p.123

16’27”  Justin Bieber  “U smile”

16’36”  Saint François de Sales, “Chapitre XII, Des Aspirations, oraisons jaculatoires et bonnes pensées”,  Introduction á la vie dévote  read by Manon Bachelier

19’24”  Donna Summer  “She Works Hard For The Money”

19’26”  Voltaire, “Gertrude oú L’Éducation d’une fille”, Œuvres complètes de Voltaire, tome 10, p. 26-29

21’16”  Cardi B  “Money”

21’26”  Silvia Federici, Wages Against Housework read by Carmen José

24’50”  J. Sheridan LeFanu,  Carmilla  read by Allison Henriquez

29’28”  Karl Marx, “Chapter Ten: The Working-Day”, Capital,  Volume One

29’30”  Britney Spears  “Work B**ch”

 

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