Untitled Page 12

This is the short paper for Anthropology, analyzing and describing a family
which I have visited several times:

The Krauters are a family of four. Herr Krauter, about 50, Frau Krauter, 40;
Dorothy 13, and Fritz 9. they live in a stucco finished house on the edge of
Beutelabach, about 10 years old. It has 3 bedrooms, living room, dining-sitting
room, and kitchen. They have only cold running water and no plumbing for
the toilet, only a pipe to a hole several feet below with a vakve [valve] arrangement
yo [to] close the pipe except when flushed. The house is comfortably furnished,
if simply, with furniture about like inexpensive styles in America. Most of
it is 10-15 years old. They are presently redecorating the dining-sitting room
with new wall paper and a new walnut china cabinet. They only appliances
I have seen are a gas stove, a gas oven-heater, a small refrigerator and a
radio-phonograph combination. The family has no car. Herr Krauter takes the
train to work each day.

Herr Krauter works five days a week as a bookkeeper for a Stuttgart firm
which makes leather shoe lining material. The family also owns a single
piece of Weinberg property) acreage on which to grow grapes, a very small
piece, proably about 1 acre on a hillside close by). This was inherited
by Frau Krauter on the death of her father. The family tends the plot itself,
mainly the parents, with some added help from the family of Frau Krauter's
sister, a local fulltime Weinberg family. The annual yield is about 200-250
liters (equals quarts) of wine which is said to be of good quality and whose
excess above family use is sold to one of the best local inns. A further family
economy comes from the growing of fruit and vegetables in a garden behind the
house.

The family's inter-personal relationships are, of course, difficult to assess
especially under conditions of social visits of not more than six or eight
hours. I have spent more time with Frau Krauter and know her much better.
She lived in Beutelsbach as a child, had 3 sisters who also still live here,
and a brother who was killed in Russia in the war. Her mother is still alive
and lives with one of the sisters whose husband also died in Russia. She des-
cribes as strict, at least in matters of morals (drinking, dancing, and
movies were all disapproved). yet she too favors very similar behavior for
her children though less dogmatically justified. Her main role is naturally
that of housewife and mother and she has no outside activities that I know of.
She takes pride in her cooking and baking, looks on food as a large part of
hospitality, often insists that I take "kuchen" (cake) etc with me back to the
burg. The house was not spotlessly clean on those occassions when I have dropped
in unannounced, and this does not seem to disturb her particularly. Cooking
and raising her children seem to be her main concerns. She is interested in
music and listens to concerts and operas over the radio (they rarely get to
concerts or operas in Stuttgart because of no car and the desire to be with
the children.)

Herr Krauter is difficult for me to describe since I have only spent a few
hours with him. He is more outgoing than his wife, more self-confident ap-
pearing. He speaks a little English, reads it fairly well, and is eager to
learn more. This eagerness is to me a manifestation of his need to make
friends, to be sociable, although it also has some overt use in his job.

I have made no direct observations of the division of labor. Frau Krauter says
that her husband helps her with the housework when she needs it. She cited
wiping dishes as an example. But in discussing American vs German marriage
roles, she expressed the belief that, in America, a wife is [illegible?] than
here, that in Germany a wife has a more distinct role as housewife