This study describes changes in dining practices and provider perspectives on meal-related challenges due to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic. An online survey was disseminated between July and September 2020 through stakeholder networks and social media with 1,036 respondents. Altered dining practices included residents eating in rooms (54.3%), spacing residents in common areas for meals (69.3%), and disposable dish use (44.9%). The most common mealtime challenges were reduced socializing opportunities at meals (29.3%), inadequate staffing (22.8%), reduced family/volunteer help (16.7%), and assisting residents to eat (10.5%). Many participants (72.2%) felt conflict balancing safety and relationship-centred care. Geographic region, home size, building age, respondent’s job title, pre-pandemic relationship-centred practices, and mealtime satisfaction, and some pandemic-initiated practices were associated with mealtime challenges and feeling conflicted in binary logistic regression analyses. Considering trade-offs between safety and relational aspects of mealtimes during the pandemic is crucial.
The eighteenth and nineteenth centuries saw many women pursue an interest in the natural sciences, particularly disciplines such as botany which were deemed suitable for their ‘delicate minds’. However most women were not given the opportunity to practice their science as anything more than a feminine accomplishment. As a result women often remained amateurs, with the public sphere of professional science out of their reach.
This article focuses on two women who attempted to pursue scientific careers as illustrators, but who also actively engaged with scientific research and made new and exciting discoveries. Exploring the lives and works of Maria Sibylla Merian (1647–1717) and Beatrix Potter (1866–1943) it is clear that they strived to work outside of their prescribed domain: the private sphere of the home.
Through assessing the degree to which these women were confined by the ideals of domesticity and the practicalities of working within the private sphere, this article considers the effect of such constraints on their scientific practice and to what extent the domestic setting is reflected in their work. In fact it can even be argued that the domestic and decorative nature of their illustrations brought them greater success in the public sphere than their scientific endeavours and consequently secured them lasting popularity and esteem.
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