Almost all the research into the gender pay gap has looked at its causes, but I want to look at its consequences. The correlation between low pay and unequal pay is unclear – I believe deliberately so: policy makers quite simply don’t want to face up to the fact that poverty is a women’s issue; easier by far to blame the education system, or the way in which benefits are distributed, than to redress the imbalance of power that impoverishes women.
Category: General
Forgotten Heroes
Why do some women receive publicity and public recognition of their achievements and others remain completely ignored? This is the case of Ellen Wilkinson MP, discussed in an earlier blog, and also her friends the birth control pioneers. There was an…
Saving Women’s History : The Employment Tribunal Archive – Pt 2
How a strategic approach to discrimination claims has shaped what is in the Employment Tribunal Archive Most early cases of sex discrimination involved recruitment or access to promotion. Recruitment cases were comparatively straightforward: was the claimant better qualified than the other candidates;…
Saving Women’s History : The Employment Tribunal Archive – Pt 1
Derby has much to do to set up the Archive in a way which enables its richness to be fully explored but it will be worth it. On some matters it may be possible to set information from the Archive alongside contemporaneous research and to discover, for example, whether early case decisions back up research findings that women who experienced sexual harassment tended to be those who were about to break into a male preserve – in other words, the harassment was not about sex, it was about power.
Cultures of Exclusion: Illicit worlds of Indian dance – Pt 2
In today’s India, classical performers are counted amongst the respectable middle classes, and usually belong to upper castes. However, before modern reforms, being married and performing in public or in front of men were entirely mutually exclusive social roles…
UNFALTERING – Strength, Courage and the Grimsby VADs
Due to the likelihood of war and the possibility of invasion of Britain by Germany, the Territorial Army was created in 1908 by the Secretary of State for War, Richard Haldane. Its original purpose was home defence. In 1909 it…
Afghanistan: Violence Against Women on the Rise
Back in 2009, the Afghan government approved an Elimination of Violence against Women (EVAW) Law that criminalises child marriage, forced marriage, the selling and buying of women under the pretext of marriage, giving females away to settle disputes, forced self-immolation and various other acts of violence against women. However, Ingibjorg Gisladottir, director of UN Women in Afghanistan, expressed concern that only a small percentage of cases under the law involved violence against women. Most such cases were neither registered nor investigated.
International Alliance of Women (IAW) … Herstory in the Making: Pt 2
The Congress was held in the main hall and environs, surrounded by portraits of ‘very important men’ – judges, barristers, queen’s and king’s counsel … As these portraited men looked down upon the women gathered beneath then, voicing uproar and outrage at the ravages wrought by warring in Syria, denial of rights to children born but not formally registered so running the risk of being ‘seen’ as non-existent, the oppression, damage and destruction lying at the base of child marriage, the importantce of ecological balance and taking action to undo the damage of climate change … what would these men have thought?
The History of Hemlines
After the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the Great Depression brought hemlines crashing back down to the floor with its grim psychological effect on the public. The lack of money and merriment meant the debauchery and risk taking of the ‘20s disappeared and was replaced by a return to a level of modesty – both economically and fashionably. The 1930s also saw the dawn of Hollywood’s Golden Age. Whilst many other businesses collapsed, the film industry grew in popularity. Films offered a temporary escape from the harshness of reality. Hollywood made stars out of women such as Great Garbo, Jean Harlow and Bette Davis.