Abstract

SAENZ-OBREGON, Javier. The Economic Training of the Family in Central European and Colombian Texts from the 15th to the 20th Century: Housewives, Governance, Calculation, and Morality. Rev. colomb. educ. [online]. 2025, n.95, a18914.  Epub Apr 01, 2025. ISSN 0120-3916.  https://doi.org/10.17227/rce.num95-18914.

Approaching the family as a privileged mechanism of formation and governance in Western modernity, this study examines differences and commonalities in the prescriptions concerning the economic formation of individuals in texts directed at families in Europe and Colombia from the 15 th century to the second decade of the 19th century. These texts are part of three major discursive events: the birth of the modern family formation treatise in the 15th century, the christianization and civilizing of these treatises in the 16 th and 17th centuries; and the intensification of economic training for housewives and poor families from the late 18th century onwards. Notably, one of the earliest modern family formation treatises is highlighted, I libri della famiglia by the Florentine Leon Battista Alberti, written between 1434 and 1437, in a less disciplinary and dogmatic manner than later texts, addressed many of the issues that would reappear in subsequent works. Among the key findings, the study points to the association between domestic economy formation and a series of virtues to be developed in the housewife, the central figure of domestic economy, particularly regarding calculation practices and self-surveillance as well as the surveillance of others and household goods. Additionally, the identification between morality and economy among other effects, resulted in the confinement of housewives to the domestic sphere.

Keywords : economics; family; methods; morals; education.

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