#Tradwives, the real housewives of the internet, have gone viral

HOW LONG does it take to make a grilled-cheese sandwich? The answer, for most, is about ten minutes. But for Hannah Neeleman, a housewife-turned-social-media-star, the process can take days. Ms Neeleman (pictured) makes everything from scratch: milling her own flour and milking cows. Then she performs a fiddly routine of stirring and simmering. Finally, exhausted, she stuffs homemade cheese into freshly baked bread and tells her eight children to tuck in.

When she is not busy making sandwiches, Ms Neeleman posts videos of them on TikTok, a social-media app (her grilled-cheese recipe has more than 50m views). She is part of a cohort of “traditional” housewives who show women how to look after their homes and husbands, make wild blueberry compotes, wear floral frocks and use words like “fresh” and “frolicking”. The hashtag #tradwife has been viewed more than 600m times on TikTok.

For all its perfume, not everyone will find the content intoxicating. Recent #tradwife posts include “four ways to honour your husband”, “reminder: masculine men like feminine women” and “feminism is not freedom”. Religion is often used to support such assertions. Last December Jasmine Dinis, an Australian housewife, told her followers on X to “remember this Christmas that Jesus was…unvaxed”.

People do not seem put off, however. Fans belong to a generation of young women who are better educated and more liberal than their male peers, and who have fewer barriers to successful careers than women before them. Yet they gush over pristine kitchens and “heavenly” afternoon snacks. “My dream life,” one commented under a video of sourdough bread.

The trend is partly born from a covid-era fascination with elaborate recipes and cleaning regimes. But the idealisation of domesticity has a long history, notes Maggie Andrews, an emeritus professor at the University of Worcester. Matrons have been offering advice for more than 100 years. Think of Fanny Cradock, a British television cook who rose to fame in the 1950s. Or Marion Harland, an American writer who penned bestselling domestic manuals in the 1890s (the “secret of a happy home”, she wrote, is “family music”, “family religion” and “the family purse”).

Housewifery can sell. Ms Harland was the face of early advertisements for Jell-O, suggesting even women “who cannot cook” would be fine if “supplied with Jell-O and common sense”. Today’s marketing is more elaborate: Ms Neeleman sells tables similar to those seen in her kitchen. Housewives have also long sold staunchly conservative beliefs. In the autobiography she wrote with her husband, Ms Cradock called herself an “anti-feminist”: “Down with equality, we say.” Phyllis Schlafly—an American housewife, lawyer and conservative campaigner—claimed in the 1970s that traditional gender roles were liberating.

Women still do most of the housework and child care in every country. Those searching for fresh recipes or cleaning advice may enjoy venturing inside the homes of TikTok’s #tradwives. They should leave their shoes—but not their scepticism—at the door. ■

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