Engineering gender, engineering the Jordanian State: Beyond the salvage ethnography of middle-class housewifery in the Middle East

The figure of the middle-class housewife or ‘ rabbat bayt’ emerged in late 19th-century Arabic-language public sphere amidst colonial encounter. This gendering middle-classness responded to a perceived cultural ‘lag’ yet now itself increasingly signifies backwardness relation ideals emphasizing women’s education and community service over older norms purity propriety. Today, unemployment, discrimination, lack childcare, safe reliable transportation highly suburbanized built environment catering male breadwinners, contemporary Jordanian families must navigate multiple class gender paradigms. Against tendency towards salvage ethnography that misrecognizes these constraints as manifestations deeply held ‘traditional’ values, I emphasize their historicity, arguing it is only by recognizing housewifery state project characteristic 20th century we can appreciate how state-building projects drive roles – classing roles.