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Is “homework” the right translation for “dever de casa,” or should it be “housework”? I’m defining “homework” as an assignment from school for the student to do at home, and “housework” as cleaning and maintenance chores for a house, such as dusting, sweeping, mopping, laundry, etc.
I never thought of this before, how interesting. Chances are that housework would really be defined as “trabalho doméstico” so homework is limited to school assignments, dever de casa. Cool question.
My question was prompted by some elements in the dialogue:
– the wife asks the husband if he’s fed the cat, which sounds like it might be an item on the list of deveres de casa mentioned earlier, the way we think of feeding the cat as a chore. (This is a little confused by practicing piano, which sounds more like schoolwork, in this case music school.)
– the couple sound like they are in their mid-sixties. It would be unusual (though not impossible) for a man that age to be in school with homework assignments to complete.
And for the record, your dialogue was much cooler than my question!
Actually, the couple sound more like they are in their seventies, so it’s even more unusual that the man would be going to school.