Most thinkers who have reflected upon human fulfillment, on the finding of meaning in life have told us that “work”, particularly creative, intellectual, world-shaping activity is integral to that. For centuries, while expected, as wives, helpers, housekeepers, muses, to produce and reproduce the materials and the conditions for meaningful work, women were locked out of much of what was recognized as “meaningful” work. The responsibility for the production and care of children, for household maintenance, for the cultivation of family networks, for the provision of daily sustenance fell on women pretty much everywhere, and in less developed societies that included the burden of agriculture and the hauling of fuel and water. The meaningful, “important” stuff -- science, government, academia, the arts -- was jealously guarded as the realm of men, who made sure that females were kept from birth from access to the education or self-definition necessary to carry out any such work. What useful, necessary work they did carry out – such as cooking and child-rearing -- was systematically viewed as less valuable. In upper-class and even middle-class households it was relegated to servants, emphasizing its lower status. In developed nations, some of that has changed – but only incrementally and only in very recent decades. Now, in this shattering historical moment in which all the world’s economies are severely battered by a pandemic, the negative consequences bear down upon those at the bottom of the power pyramid: the poorest suffer most, and women are more affected than men. Women have lost their jobs at higher rates, while often continuing to have double duty at home as they manage households, childcare, taking on the burden of the educational system, and of course trying to carry on their own careers should they be fortunate enough to have one.
Labor / Women and Work
Labor / Women and Work
Labor / Women and Work
Most thinkers who have reflected upon human fulfillment, on the finding of meaning in life have told us that “work”, particularly creative, intellectual, world-shaping activity is integral to that. For centuries, while expected, as wives, helpers, housekeepers, muses, to produce and reproduce the materials and the conditions for meaningful work, women were locked out of much of what was recognized as “meaningful” work. The responsibility for the production and care of children, for household maintenance, for the cultivation of family networks, for the provision of daily sustenance fell on women pretty much everywhere, and in less developed societies that included the burden of agriculture and the hauling of fuel and water. The meaningful, “important” stuff -- science, government, academia, the arts -- was jealously guarded as the realm of men, who made sure that females were kept from birth from access to the education or self-definition necessary to carry out any such work. What useful, necessary work they did carry out – such as cooking and child-rearing -- was systematically viewed as less valuable. In upper-class and even middle-class households it was relegated to servants, emphasizing its lower status. In developed nations, some of that has changed – but only incrementally and only in very recent decades. Now, in this shattering historical moment in which all the world’s economies are severely battered by a pandemic, the negative consequences bear down upon those at the bottom of the power pyramid: the poorest suffer most, and women are more affected than men. Women have lost their jobs at higher rates, while often continuing to have double duty at home as they manage households, childcare, taking on the burden of the educational system, and of course trying to carry on their own careers should they be fortunate enough to have one.