Like what you've read?

On Line Opinion is the only Australian site where you get all sides of the story. We don't
charge, but we need your support. Here�s how you can help.

  • Advertise

    We have a monthly audience of 70,000 and advertising packages from $200 a month.

  • Volunteer

    We always need commissioning editors and sub-editors.

  • Contribute

    Got something to say? Submit an essay.


 The National Forum   Donate   Your Account   On Line Opinion   Forum   Blogs   Polling   About   
On Line Opinion logo ON LINE OPINION - Australia's e-journal of social and political debate

Subscribe!
Subscribe





On Line Opinion is a not-for-profit publication and relies on the generosity of its sponsors, editors and contributors. If you would like to help, contact us.
___________

Syndicate
RSS/XML


RSS 2.0

Changing the gender paradigm: it’s women’s work

By Jennifer Wilson - posted Friday, 24 June 2011


We're expecting a new childin our family shortly. While I was in the US recently, I looked for baby clothes. To my irritation, everything from newborn and up was sex specific, and so extreme that to dress an infant in clothes designed for the sex that it was not, would have to be an act of irony or willful resistance.

I approached the assistant. I don't know whether the baby is a boy or a girl, I said, don't you have something neutral? Not much, she told me. Practically everyone finds out what they're having.

This is an unnerving example of how advances in technology contribute to the construction of gender. Now that parents can discover their baby's sex before birth, gendering begins in utero. The foetus carries the burden of gender expectations before it has even started nudging its mother.

Advertisement

In the social process of gendering newborns, the imperative remains to make clear role differentiation between boys and girls. Research shows that little girls are far more likely to be praised for how they look, for example, while little boys are praised for what they accomplish. The way they both are dressed reflects this. Girls are also seen as more fragile and vulnerable than boys, and more in need of protection.

No one has yet come up with a satisfactory explanation of why in our culture sexual difference is synonymous with gender inequality. While the position that men and women are different is intuitive, why is it acceptable to use that difference to devalue women in the workplace or anywhere else?

To be different is not to be lesser than. It's still the norm in much of the working world for women to be perceived as being of less value than men, for no reason other than the gender values imposed on us because of our sex. This attitude is similar to the social construction of race that allows prejudice to be framed as "natural" superiority.

In the workplace, the reification of the myth of devaluation based on gender roles has created a situation in which so-called "feminized" skills are poorly paid and under-valued.

Workers in the social and community sector, for example, are paid little more than minimum wage, in spite of many of them holding tertiary qualifications. There is no inherent reason to value so-called women's work less than men's. Yet, work to do with caring for vulnerable others, that is largely carried out by women, does not attract equal rates of pay.

The reason for unequal pay in this sector, according to Fair Work Australia, is that the jobs are overwhelmingly held by women. This is a chicken and egg question: which comes first, the fact that the jobs are done by women, or the fact that the jobs involve physical and emotional engagement with the old, the ill, and the vulnerable, and as a society we do not value the old, the ill and the vulnerable and by extension, those who care for them?

Advertisement

Perhaps one of the problems is that we don't value caring, whether it's done by women or men?

However, women also continue to be under-represented in boardrooms, and in the exalted realms of CEO's. According to US research company Catalyst, women they interviewed believe that male stereotyping and preconceptions account for some 52% of this under-representation, while some 49% point the finger at inhospitable corporate cultures and the exclusion of women from formal networks as reasons for the dearth of talented women in top jobs. That there are talented women is indisputable, and there is evidence in this report that companies with women at the helm are at times staggeringly successful.

So what is going wrong and what can be done about it?

  1. Pages:
  2. Page 1
  3. 2
  4. All


Discuss in our Forums

See what other readers are saying about this article!

Click here to read & post comments.

49 posts so far.

Share this:
reddit this reddit thisbookmark with del.icio.us Del.icio.usdigg thisseed newsvineSeed NewsvineStumbleUpon StumbleUponsubmit to propellerkwoff it

About the Author

Dr Jennifer Wilson worked with adult survivors of child abuse for 20 years. On leaving clinical practice she returned to academia, where she taught critical theory and creative writing, and pursued her interest in human rights, popular cultural representations of death and dying, and forgiveness. Dr Wilson has presented papers on human rights and other issues at Oxford, Barcelona, and East London Universities, as well as at several international human rights conferences. Her academic work has been published in national and international journals. Her fiction has also appeared in several anthologies. She is currently working on a secular exploration of forgiveness, and a collection of essays. She blogs at http://www.noplaceforsheep.wordpress.com.

Other articles by this Author

All articles by Jennifer Wilson

Creative Commons LicenseThis work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Article Tools
Comment 49 comments
Print Printable version
Subscribe Subscribe
Email Email a friend
Advertisement

About Us Search Discuss Feedback Legals Privacy