Are You an Ent or an Entwife?

[Galadriel55]

Originally Posted by Galadriel

Haha, I never thought of gardens and fields as pertaining to or having a particular gender Why do you say gardens are ladylike?

I don't know. It's kinda like, while men work far off in the fields women weed the vegetable patch. Men also tended gardens, sure, but usually if the man had other work the garden/patch fell on the woman's shoulders.

Or at least that's how I see it.

In different places in ME it would be different. In the Shire there's enough food so that men tend to the gardens. In Gondor - men are needed to fight, so it's the women's job. In places like Rivendell we don't even know where the food comes from.

It all depends.

I might view it a certain way because I have a very confused / mixed-cultured understanding of all this. Someone else, who read slightly different books or spoke to different people, might see it as the opposite.

[Galadriel]

[QUOTE]

Originally Posted by Galadriel55

I don't know. It's kinda like, while men work far off in the fields women weed the vegetable patch. Men also tended gardens, sure, but usually if the man had other work the garden/patch fell on the woman's shoulders.

Ahh. If I had to view a garden as ladylike, I would do so because of all the pretty flowers

In places like Rivendell we don't even know where the food comes from.

*Peers* You're right! I never thought of that before. They can't be living on fruits and cheese!

I might view it a certain way because I have a very confused / mixed-cultured understanding of all this. Someone else, who read slightly different books or spoke to different people, might see it as the opposite.

Indeed, I know quite a few places where farming is both a woman's and a man's job and where gardening is completely a man's job

[Galadriel55]

Originally Posted by Galadriel

Ahh. If I had to view a garden as ladylike, I would do so because of all the pretty flowers

I was talking more about the fruit-producing gardens, but this works too.

Originally Posted by Galadriel

Indeed, I know quite a few places where farming is both a woman's and a man's job and where gardening is completely a man's job

The difference of cultures...

Though still, it's hard for me to imagine a rural area with women ploughing the fields while the men di up turnips in the back yard.

(Of course during harsh times like war women would work in the fields - because the men were in the army. But in times of peace.........)