Feb. 12, 2025
By Isabella Bartlett
Managing Editor
Spend some time on Instagram or TikTok, and you will soon come across videos of women with perfectly pin-curled hair cooking homemade meals in pristine kitchens. These videos are not scenes from the 1950s but glimpses into the lives of modern tradwives.
According to Dictionary.com, the term tradwife, short for traditional wife, was first used in 2015 to describe women who choose to be homemakers and adhere to traditional female gender roles, often associated with conservative political values.
Their prominence is raising concerns about the implications of reinstating stereotypes that confine women to domestic tasks.
History teacher Ms. Schiraldi said by promoting stereotypical gender roles, young women feel their achievements should be limited to caring for their home and family.
“Although there is nothing wrong with wanting to be at home with your children, pushing the idea [that a] woman can only become a wife and a mother can be hurtful to those who decide they want to do something else,” Schiraldi said.
She said influencers who use their platforms to romanticize outdated social norms disregard the benefits of being employed.
“Everyone is on a different path, and there is no right or wrong way of living.”
“They do not show [the advantages of] having financial freedom and hardships of being reliant on your significant other for money,” Schiraldi said. “It can also be harder to remove yourself from a relationship you [financially depend] on.”
Schiraldi said promoting traditional, domestic roles for women has various consequences.
“Saying that women can choose to live whatever life they want is empowering. However, when it becomes ‘you should or shouldn’t be doing something,’ that is where it becomes toxic,” Schiraldi said. “Everyone is on a different path, and there is no right or wrong way of living.”
Junior Jaelle Alvarado said she enjoys watching videos posted by tradwife influencer Nara Smith, a mother and wife who cooks her family’s meals from scratch.
“I really enjoy her content because it is unlike other content I normally see,” Alvarado said.
She said the tradwife lifestyle is unattainable for many women because the influencers who promote it usually have wealthy families. However, she said the videos are worth watching because they are entertaining.
“Social media creates false personas, deceiving others [and causing] others to feel inferior. [However, tradwife videos] shouldn’t affect a woman’s self-esteem if they have conviction in their values,” Alvarado said.
Like Alvarado, sophomore Sheyanna Urgiles said she watches tradwife videos, including those posted by Smith.
She said tradwife content is not inherently problematic.
“It can show how they go through [challenges] and guide themselves through life,” Urgiles said. “There are always going to be people hating on [others,] and that might make one seem like they cannot express themselves. If you don’t like it, then you don’t have to follow it.”
Urgiles said tradwife videos allow women to gain exposure to an alternate lifestyle they may want to adopt.
“It shows women’s possibilities and how some can be tradwives, others can be astronauts. There’s such a variety of what women can do,” said Urgiles.
