"Our life is the farm and farming is our life": Home-work coordination in organic farm families

Paper in proceeding, 2014

We present a qualitative study of 13 farm families who intentionally merge their home and work lives. This is in contrast to most families studied in CSCW, who are urban/ suburban, white-collar and often dual-income, where the goal is to balance separate home and work spheres. We analyze the farm families' coordination practices along three dimensions - space, time, and roles - and contrast their experiences to what is known in CSCW about family coordination practices. Through this, we reveal blind spots in CSCW's study of and support for family coordination toward building better tools to support such activities. We emphasize considering colocation rather than assuming geographic distribution across life spheres, the value of natural rhythms in understanding and supporting family life, and how taking on simultaneous roles can be viewed as a life goal rather than a source of conflict.