Telayneh, B., (2019). Double Burden of Married Women Academician in Three Public Universities of Ethiopia. International Journal of African and Asian Studies. 56 (29)
The paper outlined that, along with its movement to reduce the sociocultural attitudes and practises that currently limit women’s participation and competitiveness, the Ethiopian government is encouraging women to pursue higher education and participate in economic development. Accordingly, the growing number of educated and employed women in various public spheres is changing their social status and gender roles, which also places them under a double burden. Telayneh assessed the academic, socio-economic, and domestic contributions and challenges of married female university professors at the academic and domestic levels. In-depth interviews, focus groups, and surveys were used as data collection techniques, in which 96 female academicians took part, and a mixed research approach has been applied to analyse the data.
It has been argued that female professors at universities and colleges are not equally distributed, have fewer advanced degrees, cluster in the lower academic ranks, and work at less prestigious institutions for lower salaries as a result of the burden of marriage. This argument has been supported by the findings of the paper, which show that even though they engaged in academic activities such as teaching, research, and community service, there are still inherent limitations, and being married and mothers of children is holding back their full involvement in academic roles in different ways.
In relation to the subject of women and development, researchers had been limited to exploring women’s double burden from different social aspects and its impact on their health and performance in their sectors. With regard to this, the author has discovered that academic women frequently manage all the domestic activities and academic work simultaneously, typically using the night to read or write papers and other academic work. And despite what is implied, this is not as simple as it sounds because they must deal with daytime fatigue and sleep disorders while teaching in the classroom or managing household responsibilities.
As the load grows heavier as the number of children rises, there are also instances where women coincidentally leave the academic field after getting married.
Although the community prefers educated women, the perception of society still prevents girls from achieving higher education and instead prioritises every public resource for boys. The lack of opportunities and support to take time for studies by minimising home-based tasks has also been found to be a problem. Finally, the author suggested that, unless the patriarchal structure of unbalanced gender roles is changed, women employees will not be successful in the workplace.
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