Abstract
This study, which took place between 2020 and 2022, sought to understand the perspectives and experiences of eight heterosexual couples comprised of Coloured working-class women and men. The study's goal was to learn about the beliefs these women and men had about gender roles and the division of household responsibilities in cohabiting situations. The intersections of the working class, race, gendered norms, household distribution of labour and heteronormativity, which are connected and intertwined. Previous studies examined how gender organises couples' behaviours, interactions, identities, and expectations in ways that uphold gender norms and male power privilege in the context of housework. The majority of these studies concentrate solely on the outcomes of gendered powers. Studies frequently apply these concepts to married couples. My study espouses the process of determining the gendered roles and division of household labour through the individuals’ feelings about their arrangements, by investigating Coloured working-class women and men’s constructions and negotiations through their paid and unpaid work, implying fluidity and a requirement for analysis that goes beyond crude conceptions of romance.
The study’s aims were met through qualitative methodology. In-depth interviews were conducted with eight heterosexual Coloured women and men from the South of Johannesburg in the Eldorado Park community. The study found that gender ideologies did not shape the traditional gender roles and responsibilities in their cohabiting setting, as they were in fact egalitarian in their negotiations. It demonstrated that the process was not too strict or too rigid for these women and men. Partner-specific duty distribution did not apply to the respondents who took part in this study. The study revealed that some cohabiting women and men are ‘spiritual but not religious’, as cohabiting individuals alter establishing roles and customs and establish their own rules and regulations. The study also revealed that participants viewed their cohabiting relationship as a temporary phase that will lead to marriage. This dissertation added to the growing collection of academic work that sought to reconsider how heterosexuality is experienced in society.