Additional Information

This course offers a historical perspective on women and gender as part of the changing contours of United States capitalism in the 19th and 20th centuries. We will examine, among other issues, the relationship between family and market economies; the role of the public and private sectors in enhancing and limiting choices for women as paid and unpaid laborers; the ways that women¿individually and collectively¿influenced and were influenced by the nature of capitalism. Course goals include learning to approach contemporary debates about gender and work with a historical lens; thinking about gender, work, family, and capitalism as fluid concepts that are shaped by changing social, economic, political, and cultural forces; and recognizing the fluidity between the public and private spheres by studying women¿s experiences.childbirth, childrearing, and unpaid domestic chores. Readings will focus on the experiences of individual women workers, the ways that sex-segregated labor has been socially and economically undervalued, and the norms affecting occupational boundaries.