Professionally qualified to run a home!

Anuradha C

Enabling a young girl with the academic knowledge required to run a home well – sounds like a good plan? A graduation degree in Home Science or Home Economics is exactly that.

During the period of 1940-1980s, young girls from many elite and middle class families would enrol into a home science graduation course as a matter of automatic choice. The career woman was a rarity in those days, with the enrolment of women in professional courses such as BE, MBBS or LLB being under 5 per cent of the class strength. However, possessing a graduation degree was considered important, both as a qualification and as a marriage pre-requisite. So what better than to study something that makes a girl better marriage material?!

However patriarchal and conservative that might sound, there is no denying the fact that a degree in home science makes a lot of difference to a woman’s ability to handle her home and community affairs with ease and confidence.

In today’s liberated times, the idea might evoke a smirking dismissal from some readers. It might even sound puzzling to a few others. But in reality, a graduation degree in Home Science or Home Economics has been a well-received qualification for decades. And continues to be a well-rounded course for women who do not aspire to professional careers. A home science graduate is often jokingly referred to as a ‘domestic goddess’, capable of dealing with anything related to home and community affairs.

Considering that less than a crore of India’s women graduates are professionally qualified and employed, women choosing to be home makers are the overwhelming majority. While we have hundreds of professional degree colleges across the country, educating a woman in domestic matters is not given the requisite importance. That’s where the field of home science education comes in.

The genesis of the Home Science degree
During the last few years of the British rule, around 1920-1940, English education was quite established in India. When the men took up professional courses, the women from well-to-do backgrounds were usually home-tutored.

Lady Irwin College, Delhi was the first to introduce homescience as a degree programme at college level in 1932. From 1938 onwards, Chennai University offered home science at the degree level. Queen Mary’s College and Women’s Christian College at Chennai started home science in 1942. Since 1950, a degree programme in home science was included at Coimbatore (Tamil Nadu), Ludhiana (Punjab), Mumbai (Maharashtra), New Delhi, Udaipur (Rajasthan) and Tirupathi (Andhra Pradesh). (Link – Information Courtesy)

In the traditional Indian household, mothers, aunts and grandmothers have been fulfilling a critical and beautiful responsibility for generations – that of acquainting young girls in the household about domestic matters. Within the secure confines of a home, a young girl gets to learn various life skills – some by explicit instruction and the rest by inspiration from the strong and wise womenfolk at home.

However, with the changing times, the joint family system slowly gave way to a nuclear family with just a single woman in charge of the home. And many a time, that woman is a working mother who has to juggle between her professional and personal responsibilities. With the lack of sufficient women influencers at home, the informal home education was replaced by formal college education. This new reality added impetus to the formal home science degree.

Home science courses offered
Though several degree colleges in tier 1/tier 2 cities in India offer the BSc home science degree course, there are some very reputed colleges where the course is immensely popular even to this date.

BSc Home Science courses in India – 4 year degree

Home science education is not limited to India. There are a few universities in countries across the world where home science courses are on offer. They are limited in number but have reasonably good patronage.

BSc Home Science courses worldwide – 4 year degree

(Information Courtesy – Link)

Subjects taught in home science course
Individual universities may vary a little on the course contents but the subjects taught can be broadly classified as follows:

Food
• Home/terrace/organic gardening
• Millets and local produce in food
• Ethnic cooking, food storage and processing methods
• Traditional recipes from various Indian cultures
• Nutrition and dietetics

Medicine and first aid
• General health and hygiene
• Home remedies for ailments
• Naturopathy and Yoga

Textiles and upholstery
• Women and children’s clothes designing
• Tailoring, dying, printing
• Bedding and upholstery
• Knitting and embroidery
• Khadi, silk and other ethnic weaves

Human development
• Resource management
• Emergency services
• Child and elderly care
• Written and oral communication
• Social entrepreneurship and community affairs
• Money management and budgeting

Art and culture
• Classical music and instrumentals
• Classical dance
• Painting, sketching and murals
• Doll making
• Religious and pooja accessories

The subjects taught cover a wide cross-section of life skills. Possessing them would empower a young woman to play the role of home maker or social entrepreneur with great confidence, efficiency and empathy.

New age relevance to home science education
Today is the age of the home entrepreneur. When a humble home maker is efficient enough to scale up and offer her expert services to the community around her, then she can turn into a successful home entrepreneur.

Awfully good at making papads? Make yummy pickles? Your patchwork quilts and pillow cases are often appreciated by guests? You design your own clothes and send your friends into a tizzy of admiration? Have a fantastic home terrace garden?

Whatever be your domestic skill, if you want to limit the skill to your personal space and family, that’s your choice. Absolutely nothing wrong with that.

However, if you are keen to explore business prospects and the potential to monetize your domestic skills, then that’s perfectly ok too. A home science degree could be of mighty help if you decide to do so. Apart from honing your individual expertise, you get to build other associated skills such as community partnerships, communication, marketing, design techniques, money management and so on.

There is also an increased appreciation for Indian ethnic food, culture and art over the past few years. City folk who are somewhat disillusioned with the western influence are turning back homeward. The Covid pandemic has also highlighted the importance of eating local and living healthy. With the aid of technology, running a business from home is a real and completely feasible career option. So there is nothing like the present to build on your home and life skills and make a fulfilling career out of it, if that’s what you choose to do.

A homescience graduation degree can also serve as a good foundation course for post graduate studies in your chosen area such as textile designing, horticulture, food processing – the options are endless.

The author is an IT industry drop-out after several years of slogging and money-making. She is now working freelance as a corporate technical trainer and content writer. She is hoping to channelize her passion for writing into a satisfying experience for herself and a joyous experience for her readers. She can be reached at anuradhac@gmail.com.