SOC40910

Over the last century or so, gender relations have become much more egalitarian at least in Western advanced industrial societies. However, this ‘gender revolution’ has been characterised as ‘uneven and stalled’, ‘peaked’ and perhaps already in reverse gear, and anyway as ‘incomplete’. This module introduces students into the gendering of market and family work and the resulting inequalities. It provides a description of the division of labour between women and men and how it has changed using historical and cross-national data. It aims to analyse the underlying causes of the momentum and inertia of the ‘gender revolution’ through the lens of theoretical-empirical sociology. The module starts with looking at differences between men and women and whether these differences can explain the division of labour in historical and contemporary societies. It examines the relationship between ecology, technology and the gendering of work and the role of family and household formation. It traces the evolution of female labour market participation and of the vertical and horizontal pattern of segregation of men and women. Particular emphasis is put on the organisation and division of family work, an area which is considered to be particularly resistant to change with important re-percussions for the sphere of market work.