<< Looking back it is easy to see that cohousing fits into a long tradition of women’s dreams and practice. Evelyne Sullerot, grande dame of French feminist research, once asked career-oriented women students what kind of housing they would prefer. Much to her surprise many of them mentioned the kibbutz. This was in the 1960s, and the kibbutz was probably the only form of “cohousing” they had heard of.  Sullerot […] maintains that communal solutions are more favourable to women as a group than more individualistic ones >>

Inga-Lisa Sangregorio, author, feminist, Sweden (uit: ‘Collaborative Housing from a Woman’s Perspective’, in ‘Living together – Cohousing Ideas and Realities Around the World’, Proceedings from the international collaborative housing conference in Stockholm, edited by Dick Urban Vestbro, 2010)

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<< The underlying ethos of a matriarchal society is one that prioritizes care-taking and peacemaking within a context that respects and values the innate capabilities and inherent worth of its members and its environment; balancing the realities of different genders and generations as it does so. […] This type of multigenerational co-parenting social structure allows for […] balanced economic reciprocity based on the circulation of gifts and egalitarian societies of consensus. […]

Households that choose to live in cohousing communities commit themselves to social, economic, political, & spiritual structures similar to those of a textbook matriarchy; just without the biological link to all of their neighbors. Children raised in cohousing are co-parented by the adults in the community […]. Adults care for each other and nurture each other throughout life’s cycles. […] The vast majority of cohousing communities govern via consensus decision-making models. [We just] may not use Matriarchy Studies vocabulary to define the community we choose to live in together. >>

Kate M. Brunner, writer, healer, resident of Heartwood Cohousing, US (in: ‘Cohousing as Modern Matriarchy?’, blog feminismandreligion, 2016)

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<< Door echtscheiding, werkloosheid of andere omstandigheden kunnen vrouwen soms plots niet meer voorzien in de basisbehoeften voor zichzelf en hun gezin. Co-housing kan dan een oplossing zijn. Met een beetje hulp van de overheid kan deze vorm van ‘samen wonen’ zelfs een vangnet worden voor heel wat vrouwen. […]

Geeft co-housing vrouwen een tikkeltje meer? Bij deze woonvorm nemen vrouwen alvast zelf de touwtjes van hun bestaan in handen en hoeven ze geen beroep te doen op organisaties en instituten die hen in een slachtofferrol duwen. Ze beslissen ook autonoom wanneer en door wie ze geholpen willen worden.

En tenslotte kunnen vrouwen met kinderen eindelijk nog eens de deur uit. Gewoon even kijken op de lijst wie er morgenavond op de kinderen kan passen. Dat niemand dààr eerder aan gedacht heeft! >>
Veerle Magits (in: Divazine, 2001)

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<< Emancipation, autonomy and civic consciousness are the three very important dimensions or characteristics of the cohousing idea today. […] the first dimension is that of emancipation […] Earlier in modern society it was women’s emancipation from patriarchy, and this still holds […].

Today there is a wish to get more men to accept living in cohousing units. In Sweden many women also have a dream of being relieved of the heavy burden of combining work and competition on the labour market with the running of family and home, caring for old parents, commuting, and so on.

In such a situation, cohousing can be seen as a more functional and sociable way of life. The married woman and the dependence of the family household on her has been the focus of the historical debate on cohousing, but we may find that this way of living is also of great value for others, such as small households with single mothers, or women and men living alone. >>

Eva Sandstedt, Professor of Sociology, Institute of Housing and Urban Research, Uppsala University, Sweden (uit: ‘Why Do We Discuss Cohousing in Sweden in 2010?’, in ‘Living together – Cohousing Ideas and Realities Around the World’, Proceedings from the international collaborative housing conference in Stockholm, edited by Dick Urban Vestbro, 2010)

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<< A feminist approach to planning for everyday life seems to be a promising solution. Since the 1960s feminist movements and grass-root initiatives in many European countries have started to criticize planning practice with a view to changing the living conditions of women. The intention is to improve the quality of infrastructure and housing to make everyday life and domestic chores easier […].

For cohousing, Jarvis has demonstrated in detail how such projects are providing and managing ‘integrated infrastructures of daily life’ by ‘saving space and sharing time’ within the cohousing community […]. Cohousing projects […] have provided concrete implementation of the visions of a fair distribution of care tasks.

Research by Vestbro and Horelli […] demonstrate […] that most of the different types of cohousing support a gender-fair distribution of care work among all residents.

Heidrun Wankiewicz, Stadt-, Regions-, Gender Analyse und Planung, EU-Projektbegleitung, AU (in: ‘The potential of cohousing for rural Austria‘, 2015)

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<< La Maison des Babayagas […] fait le pari que les personnes peuvent elles-mêmes individuellement et collectivement­ prendre en charge leur vie, solidairement, dans un espace totalement ouvert sur la ville et la société. […]

Cette aventure trouve son fondement dans le combat porté par les Babayagas sur la question du vieillissement et sur les dynamiques sociales à l’oeuvre. Il s’agit pour le collectif de faire vivre un lieu dans la ville et pour la ville, largement destiné aux femmes. De cette double volonté un lieu de vie et un espace de rencontre et de militance est né un programme architectural qui associe logements et espaces collectifs. La maison des Babayagas se compose d’un immeuble comportant 25 logements sociaux, 21 pour les Babayagas et 4 pour des jeunes de moins de 30 ans. Elle dispose de locaux communs et d’une salle (municipale) réservée aux activités collectives ainsi que de trois jardins. >>

Habitantes de ‘La Maison des Babayagas’, habitat groupé, social, féministe et autogéré à Montreuil, F (sur leur site internet, 2017)

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<< Mrs Trentmann, a senior at Harbour, observes how the six-week cycle of group cooking and cleaning duties produces a particular rhythm to her life which is less linear than she previously experienced as a mother when cooking every night for a nuclear family. She claims to be energised by the weeks that she cooks and cleans for the whole group, and she is also more appreciative of receiving meals prepared by others.

This resonates with the 1960s feminist ideology of cooperative `self-work’, which emphasized that liberation from domestic drudgery could be achieved by making everyday chores more enjoyable through collective activity rather than by outsourcing them to other women as a function of `rational life’ efficiency and convenience >>

Helen Jarvis, Sociologe, School of Geography, Politics and Sociology, Newcastle University, UK (in: ‘Saving space, sharing time: integrated infrastructures of daily life in cohousing’, Environment and Planning, 2011)

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<< La crise du logement, qui sévit dans notre capitale depuis plus de 20 ans, touche plus particulièrement les femmes. Confrontées à de multiples formes de violences (discrimination à l’embauche, violences administratives, ressources financières faibles, responsabilité monoparentale, …), un nombre croissant de femmes se retrouve sans-abri ou très mal logé, avec souvent des enfants à leur charge. Dans ces conditions, il leur est très difficile d’intégrer un logement décent où il ferait bon vivre ! […]

Aujourd’hui, force est de constater que les habitats solidaires se multiplient, tant à l’initiative de citoyens que d’organisations. Les motivations en sont diverses : avantages financiers, renforcements des liens sociaux, solidarités face à l’isolement ou la précarité, projets de vie de grande envergure, etc. >>

Habitat Solidaire Lemmens, Anderlecht, B (dans leur dépliant, 2013)

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<< My story of intentional community is partly the story of having a child on my own. […] Having used a clinic with an anonymous donor to become pregnant, I joined Terra Firma [cohousing] when I was four months pregnant. […] While pregnant and on my own, sometimes a challenging and isolated venture, I could walk my dog around the block and have my neighbors ask me how I was feeling, or if I had felt the baby move. I received spontaneous dinner invitations or just had nice daily conversations that made me feel more connected. And I also had other people to nurture – to me one of the life ecperiences that makes me feel connected and happy. I had people to shuttle to or from the airport. I had plants to water or people for whom to hem curtains. After I’d had my baby, Terra Firma members collected and got me a generous gift certificate, and most importantly, they were eager to meet my baby. […] I’m so grateful to be part of Terra Firma. >>

Shoshana Magnet, associate professor at the Institute of Feminist and Gender Studies at the University of Ottawa, resident of Terra Firma Cohousing, CA (in: ‘Terra Firma: A Single Mother Discovers Community’, Communities Magazine, 2017)

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Beginenhof Köln

<< Die modernen Beginen sind eine heterogene Gemeinschaft aller Altersgruppen, die sich aus unterschiedlichen Gründen zum gemeinsamen Leben zusammengeschlossen hat, etwa aus emanzipatorisch-feministischer, spiritueller oder karitativer Motivation. >>

Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger (in: ‘Beginenhof Heimat und Arbeit für Single-Frauen’, 2012)

Beginenhof Dortmund

<< Religion spielt auf dem Dortmunder Beginenhof keine Rolle. Hier leben Frauen vieler Glaubensrichtungen zwischen Ende 30 und 80. Sie sind verwitwet, geschieden und ledig, heterosexuell und lesbisch. Manche sind berufstätig, andere suchen Arbeit, etliche sind Rentnerinnen. “Wir sind sehr weltlich”, sagt Rosemarie Ring dazu. […] Vielmehr geht es hier um Autonomie und die Sicherheit, ein Zuhause zu haben. >>

Westfälische Rundschau (in: ‘Auf dem Beginenhof wohnen und leben 31 Frauen zusammen’, 2017)

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<< Parents […] struggle. It is a lonely, isolating and exhausting business, especially for mothers, who still typically do the bulk of childcare. They pay a huge price for it. Not only do many forsake career opportunities and income, but they also are subject to societal idealisation of motherhood and then shamed and blamed for any perceived failings, most often by their own children.

With all that, can we raise children better? Yes. Rather than leave childrearing solely in the hands of one or two people, it would help everyone if we approached it more along the lines of the old African proverb: ‘It takes a village to raise a child.’ We should take alloparenting [co-parenting] to the next level: quality and trained caregiving that is shared, continuous and, most important, mandatory. >>

Vicki Larson , journalist and co-author of ‘The New I Do: Reshaping Marriage for Skeptics, Realists and Rebels’, US (in: ‘There is a better way to parent than the nuclear family’, 2016)

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<< CoAbode [single mothers house sharing] is a contemporary vision of a lifespace for single mothers. Cohousing is another rather recent innovation that many single parents find appealing. Significant numbers of today’s single parents choose to do what others have done for generations, which is to live with their own parents or grandparents in a multigenerational household, or with other relatives in an extended-family household. Other single parents have lived in shared households that may or may not include other single-parent families. >>

Bella DePaulo, social scientist, researcher, writer (in: ‘How we live now – redefining home and family in the 21st century’, 2015)