In my intro psychology course the professor discussed gender and roles. This makes me wonder if women have an inclination to take up tradeskills like cooking, while men prefer to work at the forge. Let's do an informal poll.

There are probably less female blacksmiths than I have fingers so you can just post here. I know of Ragniliff and I think that's pretty much it.

EDIT: Assume a female character.

Female characters, or female players? I have no characters with cooking, but that was the first question that came to my mind. I'm assuming players. Also, forging might require a bit more investigating, due to the tendency of Knights to get their fullplate and then change trades.

Grench is another female forger. There are probably others.

You might also want to look at the number of females/males in 'creative' trades versus those in 'mechanical' trades (ie jewelry vs herbs, or forging vs poisons, or cooking vs enchantment).

I see how it is.

Aww, Casilu is my favourite forger.

Also Akui?

-only one who voted-




Also, you can't really compare guild-specific trades to the general trades. Considering the limitation of Forging to warriors, you're probably going to get a skewed comparison there.

Casilu, Akui, Tristbjorn, Grench, Kelly ( I think), Ragniliff, Aerys, Sybl are all female forgers.

I know a lot more male cooks than female.

Also, the idea that cooking is "women's work" doesn't resonate with anyone I know of our generation. Sometimes cooking is a creative expression. Sometimes it's a facet of a lifestyle choice. Sometimes it's tied up with creating social experiences. Cooking per se as a female activity just doesn't make sense in the context of anyone who grew up not knowing life without fast food and supermarket delis. At best, some of the reasons people cook lean more towards female than male roles, especially the holiday or party social cooking.

Kelly is, yes.

I think Esano's proposal could be potentially more interesting.

Last I checked, Malicia was a forger as well.