"Agnes, Alex, Mag and I": the sibling relationships of New Zealand rural women, 1870s-1930s

Abstract

Women in New Zealand's rural communities of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries lived in a world filled with family connections. Most had brothers and sisters, and their siblings were important family members for farming people. Similar in age, usually within like peer groups as children and young adults, and with blood ties that bound them together, rural women maintained strong links to their brothers and sisters throughout their lives. This thesis argues that the blood ties that bound Pakeha siblings together emotionally extended to their cooperation in farm work and leisure. As children and young adults, sibling groups negotiated work amongst themselves on the basis of gender and age. The work contributions of each sibling group member were valued equally, but elder brothers or sisters assumed leadership roles. Cooperation in work often continued after marriage or physical separation, and brothers and sisters assumed support roles in their siblings' households. After work was done for the day, farming families participated in shared leisure within their rural district. Siblings often provided rural women with their primary companions for leisure activities. Companions at informal and formal social occasions, siblings also determined young women's opportunities to establish a social network and participate in leisure outside the home. Siblings, in particular the brothers of young women, controlled each other's behaviour at social events. Shared leisure continued after marriage or separation. This study also suggests that later in life, brothers and sisters sometimes collaborated to operate farms following the division of their parents' property after their deaths. Succession and sibling relationships were bound closely together, as most parents aimed to provide for all their children through inheritance practices which encouraged loyalty to siblings and cooperation in farm operation and management.