INST 205 – Review Sheet - Section Five: Work
Learning Objectives
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To recognize the ways in which gender, in combination with race and class, operates to
constrain people’s opportunities in the work force.
To understand how the institution of work limits women’s access to power and financial
resources.
To be aware of the factors that contribute to inequality between the sexes in occupational
prestige and compensation.
To recognize how people are rewarded and punished in the workplace according to their
ability to live up to prescribed roles for their races and genders.
Section Summary
Labor continues to be segregated by gender, race, and class. Paid work is an important institution
because it carries power and influences much of our lives, including relationships and how we
see the world. Occupational segregation leads to inequalities between the sexes and racial/ethnic
groups.
 Differences in work opportunities mean differences in lifestyles and life choices. The
reverse is also true: people’s life situations and their gender, racial, and class statuses
affect their opportunities for work.
 People’s race, gender, nationality, etc. affect the structural opportunities open to them and
their interpretations of these experiences.
 Women’s opportunities are constrained because of their gender, but women’s experiences
in the labor force vary by ethnicity, race, age, and class.
 Racial inequality, especially in the workplace, has often been perpetuated through
gendered beliefs.
Reading 19: Christine E. Bose and Rachel Bridges Whaley, “Sex Segregation in the U.S.
Labor Force”
The workplace is highly segregated by sex, which promotes gender inequalities. Structural and
social barriers largely explain sex segregation in the workplace.
 Most men and women work in occupations that are segregated by sex; while some
progress has been made since the 1970’s, 53% of women workers would have to change
occupations in order to desegregate the workforce.
 White-collar and clerical industries have segregation within them that places women in
lower-paid and less rewarding occupations.
 The domination of men in blue-collar positions and women in pink-collar occupations
demonstrates how work that is considered “women’s” work is less valued than work that
is considered men’s work.
 Differences in gendered social expectations for men and women can explain historical
sex segregation in the workforce. Structural barriers in the workplace better explain sex
segregation than do human capital explanations.
 Sex segregation has serious consequences such as pay disparities between men and
women, mistreatment of women workers, and women’s unhappiness with their work.
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While some occupations have become more integrated, others have become resegregated.
The result is that as some occupations have become open to large numbers of women, the
attractiveness of the job has declined.
Boxed Insert: Irene Padavic and Barbara Reskin, “Median Annual Earnings of Full-Time,
Year Round Workers by Education, Race, and Hispanic Origin”
This box presents some of the most recent statistics on earnings of men and women from the
U.S. Census Bureau. At the same level of education, not only do men earn significantly more
than women, but whites earn much more than blacks and Hispanics.
 White women and minority women earn less money then men of all racial categories with
the same educational level.
 On average, minorities earn less money than whites of the same gender and educational
level.
 As educational level rises, the disparity between men’s and women’s (of all races)
incomes rises. However, the opposite about race: as educational level rises, the inequality
between whites’ and minorities’ income diminishes.
Reading 20: Eileen Boris, ““You Wouldn’t Want One of ‘Em Dancing With Your Wife:”
Racialized Bodies on the Job in World War II”
Boris discusses the way race and gender intermingled during the WWII workforce in American
to keep blacks from achieving equality. While the war effort opened up many job opportunities
for black men and women, gendered stereotypes of blacks and white fears of various types of
intimacy with blacks maintained racial discrimination in the American workplace
 Pres. F.D. Roosevelt instituted the Fair Employment Commission to aid the war effort by
expanding work to racial/ethnic minorities, though not to women and thus increasing the
workforce and production capacity. This FEPC was opposed by many and had very little
ability to end discrimination it found.
 The workplace opportunities for African Americans that opened up because of the war
threatened the power of whites and southern sensibilities about the proper place of nonwhites. Many Americans also believes that racial separation in the workplace was
efficient as well as socially “necessary.”
 Many whites thought that various attempts to incorporate blacks in the workforce placed
black men in “too” close physical proximity to white women and would lead to sexual
intimacy between the races. This fueled fears of the “black rapist” and intermarriage
(miscegenation).
 Often whites protested working closely with blacks because they believed that blacks
were dirty and they focused on “differences” in the black body. Particularly, ideas of
white women’s purity were behind discriminatory acts that insisted on separate facilities
for whites and blacks.
 Although many whites were in close physical proximity to black domestics who took
care of their needs, this closeness reinforced gender and racial hierarchies that would be
undermined unless workplace segregation was maintained
Reading 21: Miliann Kang, “The Managed Hand: The Commercialization of Bodies and
Emotions in Korean Immigrant-Owned Nail Salons”
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In this case study, Kang demonstrates how bodily contact and emotions are managed by Korean
immigrants in New York City nail salons. “Body labor” describes this gendered body-related
service sector wage work that involves the management of emotions. The body labor varies by
the ethnicity and class of the clientele, and Kang divides these experiences into three types: high
service, expressive, and routinized.
 Kang interviewed 62 workers, owners and clients at four New York City nail salons
where she also observed interactions.
 Body labor includes:
1. Physical labor of attending to the bodily appearance of customers
2. Emotional labor of displaying certain feelings that promote good feelings in the
customers about themselves and their own bodies
3. Variations in the labor performed that are involved in the intersection of gender
with race and class
 Nail work is highly gendered work. Women are both the majority of customers and
workers in nail salons. This work is part of the beauty industry, and the labor is provided
in feminized semiprivate spaces. Nail work involves gendered emotional labor.
 Korean women have to perform high service body labor on white middle- and uppermiddle class women customers during a pampering experience. When these women
receive nail treatments they expect to have a pleasurable sensory experience similar to a
spa treatment including massages, the best equipment, and much emotional and
conversational attention from technicians. Workers at these nail salons rely heavily on
tips they receive from this extra work.
 Lower-middle- and working-class African American and Caribbean women receive nail
treatments that involve expressive body labor. Korean salons servicing this clientele have
to demonstrate their support of the African American community in order to show the
respect that these women expect. In addition, this clientele values artistic and technically
difficult nail work in order to demonstrate their individuality.
 Many women from all racial backgrounds who are lower-middle and middle-class prefer
nail salons that are routinized: quick, inexpensive, courteous. The workers in these salons
provide standardized and predictable physical and limited emotional labor. The women
clients enhance their gendered self-presentation at work with these cheap and easy
manicures.
Boxed Insert: Barbara Reskin, “The Realities of Affirmative Action in Employment”
Affirmative action policies have been controversial because many whites and men believe that
reverse discrimination occurs when these policies are instituted. However, Reskin points out that
these fears are largely unfounded.
 Very few whites believe they have experienced reverse discrimination, while much
higher percentages of minorities believe they have been discriminated against in the
workforce.
 Few cases have been filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
charging reverse discrimination, and fewer still have any merit.
 Many whites and men have a hard time letting go of their racial or gender privilege, and
they assume they are more qualified than minorities or females. This leads them to
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charge reverse discrimination when minorities or females receive something they had
expected to receive.
Affirmative action policies have not brought less qualified people into occupations, but
they have opened doors to minorities and women that often aid underserved
communities.
Reading 22: Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo, “Maid in L.A.”
Domestic workers in the United States are a racialized workforce of Central American women.
These women prefer housecleaning jobs to live-out nanny or housecleaning work, and live-out
domestic work is preferable to live-in domestic work.
 Live-in Latina nannies and housecleaners are rarely afforded respect, privacy, or
adequate food or pay. This work is often isolating because they are kept away from their
families and friends and few employers recognize them as human beings.
 Live-out nannies and housecleaners are paid more for their services and have more time
for family and social life because they are not on call all day the way live-in workers are.
These workers often took great pride in their childcare work, but they often criticized
their employers for their child-rearing practices.
 Housecleaners usually work for many employers and are paid much better for their
services than are either live-in or live-out household workers. This work provides greater
autonomy than the other domestic work these women perform.
 Live-in jobs are often the first jobs recent immigrant women obtain.
 With more time in the United States, they develop skills and awareness that allows them
to work as live-out housecleaners, nannies, or housekeepers that allow them to better
manage family obligations and marriage.
 Central-American immigrant women are more likely than other immigrant women to be
domestic workers, because they are less likely to have social networks that could help
them acquire other forms of support. They do not have the access to services that refugee
woman are granted.
 Americans prefer to hire Central-American women for racial reasons, and Latina women
also use racial stereotypes to describe the preferences of their employers.
Boxed Insert: Eileen Boris, “The Living Wage as a Women’s Issue”
Boris describes how women would benefit from receiving a living wage. In so doing, she argues
that the fight to receive a living wage is crucial to women’s fight for equality.
 A living wage would provide enough income to cover the needs of the worker and their
family or dependants.
 Women are the largest group of low-income workers, and most women support
themselves and their families at some point. Thus, the largest group of workers whose
incomes would benefit from living wage is women.
 Although recent welfare reforms have taken away the safety net of welfare, many people
who work need welfare benefits to survive. Living wages would stabilize and increase the
earnings of all workers so that workers do not need the benefits of welfare.
 Living wage ordinances might keep employers like cities from bypassing unionization
which has raised women’s wages and supported women’s efforts to balance work and
family.
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Many of those who do paid carework are women who earn less than a living wage, By
providing a living wage, care work will reward this traditional “women’s” work and
benefit all society.
Discussion Questions
Reading 19: Christine E. Bose and Rachel Bridges Whaley, “Sex Segregation in the U.S.
Labor Force”
1.
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3.
How do women become segregated into different occupations than men? What keeps
people from attaining jobs outside those that are traditionally assigned to their sex?
What types of jobs tend to be dominated by women? by men? What are the differences
between “men’s work” and “women’s work”?
Discuss the patterns of sex segregation in white-, pink-, and blue-collar occupations as well
as in clerical work.
Boxed Insert: Irene Padavic and Barbara Reskin, “Median Annual Earnings of Full-Time,
Year Round Workers by Education, Race, and Hispanic Origin”
4.
5.
What are the differences in annual earnings for men and women at the same educational
level? How does race affect these earnings?
Why do you think women earn less than men of the same race and educational level? Using
what you learned in Reading 19 (Christine E. Bose and Rachel Bridges Whaley, “Sex
Segregation in the U.S. Labor Force”), how might you explain these earning discrepancies?
Reading 20: Eileen Boris, ““You Wouldn’t Want One of ‘Em Dancing With Your Wife:”
Racialized Bodies on the Job in World War II”
6.
7.
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9.
Why did white workers oppose racial integration of the workplace during the WWII
homefront effort? Were their fears legitimate?
Why did whites oppose sharing toilet or shower facilities with blacks? How did this affect
the workplace?
What does this reading tell us about the ways that gender and race are interrelated? How
were the fears based on stereotypes not only of race, but also of gender?
Thinking about this reading, in what ways has the American workplace changed since
WWII? In what ways is it similar?
Reading 21: Miliann Kang, “The Managed Hand: The Commercialization of Bodies and
Emotions in Korean Immigrant-Owned Nail Salons”
10. What is body labor? What does it include? How is this labor different from emotion work
according to Kang?
11. What are the differences between the body labor provided by each of the salons? Why does
the body labor provided at the nail salons differ?
12. What other jobs might require emotional labor? Body labor? How might this labor vary
according to who is providing the service and who receives the service?
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13. How is the work at the nail salons gendered? How does race or class matter in this work?
Boxed Insert: Barbara Reskin, “The Realities of Affirmative Action in Employment”
14. What are the positives and negatives of affirmative action policies?
15. How does Reskin demonstrate the indefensibility of whites’ and men’s fears of reverse
discrimination?
Reading 22: Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo, “Maid in L.A.”
16. How are the three types of domestic work described by Hondagneu-Sotelo different from
each other? How are they similar?
17. Describe the progression of domestic workers jobs while in the United States.
18. Why do the majority of domestic workers in the United States today come from Central
America? Why might they be female as opposed to male immigrants?
19. What racial stereotypes do employers have about these workers? What stereotypes do the
workers have about employers?
Boxed Insert: Eileen Boris, “The Living Wage as a Women’s Issue”
20. What is a living wage? What makes it different from traditional wages?
21. What are the benefits of this wage? What may be the problems with workers offering a
living wage?
22. Answer Boris’s first question: “Why is the living wage a women’s issue?” In what ways
would a living wage benefit women?
Web Links
Affirmative Action
Many Americans oppose affirmative action based on myths about affirmative action. The
Understanding Prejudice project seeks to clarify the key points of affirmative action.
http://www.UnderstandingPrejudice.org/readroom/articles/affirm.htm
Center for Women and Work at Rutgers University
Section provides a lot of data on the earnings and segregation of working women. This website
links students to additional data and information on the status of working women in America.
http://www.cww.rutgers.edu/
Department of Labor Women’s Bureau
The U.S. Department of Labor has information about employment-related initiatives specific to
women workers and business owners by the U.S. Federal government. How are these different
from what may be offered to all workers?
http://www.dol.gov/wb/
EEOC
Boris described how the FEPC established during WWII did not extend protections to women
workers. Today the U.S. Federal government does have an organization that works to secure the
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rights of minority and women workers. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission of the
federal government provides information on legal standards for workplace equity.
http://www.eeoc.gov/
Employer-Supported Childcare
How are workplaces responding to the childcare needs of working mothers? How can
workplaces become more child- and parent-friendly? This website explores the need for
workplace childcare arrangements and strategies for institutionalizing them.
http://daycare.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.workfamily.com
%2Fopen%2FFAQ_Childcare.asp
The Feminist Majority
The Feminist Majority, one of the nation’s leading feminist organizations, provides information
on sexual harassment—as well as on many other topics of interest to women.
http://www.now.org/issues/
LGBT Rights in the Workplace
Lesbian, gay, bi, and trans people often face special challenges in their places of employment.
The Human Rights Campaign Foundation, a national LGBT-rights organization, tracks
legislation (positive and negative) affecting lesbian, gay, and trans people and their ability to
enjoy the same work-related benefits as their heterosexual colleagues.
http://www.hrc.org/Template.cfm?Section=Work_Life
Living Wage Campaign
Eileen Boris describes how the issue of a living wage is a women’s issue. Explore this website to
learn more about the living wage campaign.
http://www.livingwagecampaign.org/
National Association of Working Women
Working women from a wide variety of professions seek information and support from the
National Association of Working Women and its local chapters. This website outlines the
services and resources the organization provides.
http://www.9to5.org/
NOW
The National Organization for Women is a longstanding feminist organization in the United
States that prioritizes women’s workplace concerns. On this webpage you can find additional
information on topics affecting women workers like family leave, sexual harassment and
affirmative action.
http://www.now.org/issues/
Women in Non-traditional Careers: Myths and Realities
This website provides facts clarifying common misconceptions about women who work in maledominated, nontraditional jobs.
http://www.iseek.org/sv/10126.jsp
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