Cynthia Fuchs Epstein

An Assessment of Change and Its Limits

Reflections on the Women's Movement

Women in Law

William Josiah Goode

"In this important volume, Kate Millett, Helen Dudar, and William H. Whyte, Jr., among others, show how the continuing repression of women in America has forced women to become activists for their own cause. Whether objecting to demeaning advertising or participating in demonstrations against biased employers, women are starting to make their feelings known."--Publisher's description.

Roads to Women's Equality

The Other Half

Arne L. Kalleberg

Though there are still just twenty-four hours in a day, society's idea of who should be doing what and when has shifted. Time, the ultimate scarce resource, has become an increasingly contested battle zone in American life, with work, family, and personal obligations pulling individuals in conflicting directions. In Fighting for Time, editors Cynthia Fuchs Epstein and Arne Kalleberg bring together a team of distinguished sociologists and management analysts to examine the social construction of time and its importance in American culture. Fighting for Time opens with an exploration of changes in time spent at work—both when people are on the job and the number of hours they spend there—and the consequences of those changes for individuals and families. Contributors Jerry Jacobs and Kathleen Gerson find that the relative constancy of the average workweek in America over the last thirty years hides the fact that blue-collar workers are putting in fewer hours while more educated white-collar workers are putting in more. Rudy Fenwick and Mark Tausig look at the effect of nonstandard schedules on workers' health and family life. They find that working unconventional hours can increase family stress, but that control over one's work schedule improves family, social, and health outcomes for workers. The book then turns to an examination of how time influences the organization and control of work. The British insurance company studied by David Collinson and Margaret Collinson is an example of a culture where employees are judged on the number of hours they work rather than on their productivity. There, managers are under intense pressure not to take legally guaranteed parental leave, and clocks are banned from the office walls so that employees will work without regard to the time. In the book's final section, the contributors examine how time can have different meanings for men and women. Cynthia Fuchs Epstein points out that professional women and stay-at-home fathers face social disapproval for spending too much time on activities that do not conform to socially prescribed gender roles—men are mocked by coworkers for taking paternity leave, while working mothers are chastised for leaving their children to the care of others. Fighting for Time challenges assumptions about the relationship between time and work, revealing that time is a fluid concept that derives its importance from cultural attitudes, social psychological processes, and the exercise of power. Its insight will be of interest to sociologists, economists, social psychologists, business leaders, and anyone interested in the work-life balance.

Shifting Boundaries of Work and Social Life

Fighting For Time

Rose Laub Coser

Originally published in 1981, this book is composed of papers that describe and analyse women’s careers in government, business, and the professions. It examines women’s access to and participation in elite careers in the US, and in selected countries of western and eastern Europe – Britain, France, West Germany, Austria, Norway, Finland, Poland, and Yugoslavia – as well as in international organizations. This book was an outgrowth of a conference on ‘Women in decision-making elites in cross-national perspective,’ held at King’s College, Cambridge University, in July 1976. The countries represented were chosen because, although they were at similar stages of economic development, they exhibited differences in political structure, ideology, and tradition.

Cross-National Studies of Women and Elites

Access to Power

Bonnie Oglensky

Robert Sauté

Carroll Seron

First published in 1999. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Time Norms, Professional Life, Family and Gender

The Part-time Paradox

Cynthia Fuchs Epstein

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