英文原版对话1000个:955 Gender Roles in Estonia

Todd: So, Kadi, you are from Estonia. Can you talk about gender¹ roles for the new generation compared to the older generation?

Kadi: Yes, in Estonia, we have this kind of Western type of family, a woman doesn't have to be a housewife². She can work. She can do whatever she likes. Even maybe the tendency right now is that women are becoming more masculine³. Often it happens that women make more money than men do and they're the ones who bring the bread in the house. Yeah, compared to Eastern society where usually women are considered as housewives⁴, they just have to clean and cook and raise the kids, and in my country ... no ... there's not such a thing and I think it always has been like that. I'm not quite sure but...

Todd: Who does the chores like cooking and cleaning?

Kadi: Yeah, I think we all do it. We don't have that kind of rule that women only have to clean and cook. Of course in some families, it is like that because women are better cleaning especially, rather than men are, but yeah, men are quite good cooks.

Todd: What do people do for childcare? Like who takes care of the children?

Kadi: Nannies. Yeah. We have nannies for working mothers, they usually like hire people to watch over their children and just they play with them and also like kindergarten, like children start going to kindergarten in Estonia when they're really, really young, maybe from three months I think even, yeah, you can go to work when your child is like half-a-year old. Just go to work. Take a child there, and people are going to care about her.

Todd: Is the nanny expected to cook and clean as well?

Kadi: It depends of on the contract⁵. It depends on the contract. Yeah, if you hire a person who that you say you're gonna pay him or her, usually her, like for cleaning, cooking, taking care of the children, whatever, it depends on the contract.

 

1 gender   

n.（生理上的）性，（名词、代词等的）性

参考例句：

• French differs from English in having gender for all nouns.法语不同于英语，所有的名词都有性。
• Women are sometimes denied opportunities solely because of their gender.妇女有时仅仅因为性别而无法获得种种机会。

2 housewife   

n.主妇，家庭主妇

参考例句：

• The cleverest housewife can't cook a meal without rice.巧妇难为无米之炊。
• She was a housewife of experience.她是一个有经验的主妇。

3 masculine   

adj.男性的，男子的，男子气的

参考例句：

• She has a rather masculine voice.她的声音有点男性化。
• The ceremony is exclusively masculine.典礼上清一色的全是男人。

4 housewives   

n.家庭主妇；家庭主妇( housewife的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• This advertisement is calculated to attract the attention of housewives. 这个广告旨在吸引家庭主妇们的注意力。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• This factory was started around 1980 by housewives. 这家工厂是在1980年由一些家庭妇女搞起来的。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

5 contract   

n.合同，契约，婚约；v.使缩短，感染，订约

参考例句：

• The terms of the contract are acceptable to us.我们认为这个合同的条件可以接受。
• I'm under contract to teach here for one year.我按照聘约要在这里教一年书。