[ 3] Hiller, N. The Hoosier Cabinet in Kitchen History. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2009.

interactions
[ 4] Chavan, A., Gorney,
D., Prabhu, B., and
Arora, S. “The Washing
Machine that Ate My
Sari: Mistakes in Cross-
cultural Design.” inter-
actions 16, 1 (2009):
26–31.

The Hoosier is an interesting example of a
design that participated in the changing ecology
of the American kitchen in that era. As a result
of the rise of industrialism, household servants
left domestic service to work in factories, leaving
well-to-do families to tackle domestic chores on
their own. The rationale behind the design of the
Hoosier was to increase homemakers’ efficiency
to make up for the loss of household servants.
The cabinet was a success. The problem is that
rather than liberating women from household
work, it instead completely identified them with
it. In one of the pieces of vintage promotional
literature featured in the book, we see a picture
of a woman holding Abraham Lincoln’s portrait
in front of her Hoosier cabinet; the tagline of the
advertisement reads, “I too have abolished slav-
ery.” Ironically, the homemaker, once the mistress
in the former kitchen ecology, has become a ser-
vant in the new one.