This is a study of women attending a personal development course entitled Women Making Choices held at an Adult Education Department of a Higher Education Institute. This study is located within a feminist and grounded theoretical framework (Glaser and Strauss, 1976). The study argues that a complexity exists in Women Making Choices because whilst some women were making choices others were constrained in their capacity to make choices. Women Making Choices is therefore a complex paradox because barriers and tensions associated with women's choices inhibit women's actions. The study includes a background literature search which sets a social, political, demographic and educational context. The empirical work is based on a quantitative survey of fifty-eight women including qualitative analysis of interviews of thirty-two of the women.

The study of Celtic, Germanic, and Celtiberian women is an area of gender and historical focus that has only recently been addressed by academic scholars – and then only to a limited degree. The fractured understanding of this area of history is, in part, due to a shortage of relevant primary written sources and archaeological material. In part, it is also due to a language barrier, since research into this field has the potential to include more than a dozen modern and ancient European languages, as well as several regional dialects. This work probed primary historical sources (classical Greek and Roman), secondary sources (analysis by academics in various fields), archaeological, and epigraphic materials to extract pertinent information. An examination of individual women was presented. This was then combined with broader knowledge of peoples in and from these regions to create an understanding of women in Celtic, Germanic, and Celtiberian cultures during the eight centuries under consideration. Finally, this was compared and contrasted across the various regions. Research and critical analysis of this material dispelled some long-held generalizations (such as the view that Celtic women routinely participated actively in war) and revealed some little- discussed facts (such as that classical sources indicated that Celtiberian women held the most unusual roles of the women examined). Other aspects of women’s lives became clear, including ways in which they were part of trade and industry including, but not limited to, the manufacture of textiles, agriculture, mining, and medicine. This led to a discussion on the concept of identity. It became clear that Celtic, Germanic, and Celtiberian women during the period of 400 BC– AD 235 occupied both traditional and nontraditional roles, that these were recorded (at least to some degree) in Greek and Roman classical sources, and that much of this can be confirmed from what has been learned from archaeological and epigraphic material.

No description available.

This thesis considers money management within marriage from the point of view of women. It is based on a modified quota sample of 61 women who used a Health Centre in an inner city area of London. The method used was in-depth taped interviews supplemented by field notes. Most respondents received at least two visits. The interview schedule consisted of structured and semi-structured sections. Interviews were transcribed and a computer programme used for a content analysis of methods, attitudes to and feelings about financial organisation within the household. The quantitative data from the the structured sections of the schedule was coded and analysed using the SPSSx computer package. The theoretical framework used was a development of Amartya Sen's formulation of marriage as an area of co-operative conflict. The thesis suggests that married or co-habiting women reduced the number of areas of potential conflict by lowering their expectations and by avoiding aspects of financial organisation which had the greatest potential for conflict. Household money management was analysed in terms of level and source of income and of responsibility for collective domestic consumption. Expenditure was divided into a) frequently need items b) lump sums needed for bills and housing costs and c) saving At low income levels the norm was for women to be wholly responsible for all aspects of domestic collective consumption. At high income levels women who did not earn had little real responsibility while those who earned devoted a much larger share of their earnings to collective consumption than did their partners. At middle income level the two patterns met and there was a wider variety of patterns of money management. At all income levels it was very important for women to have a source of income of their own if they were to have a good chance of putting their own priorities for household consumption into practice.

This thesis considers the lived experiences that women have in urban space, with a particular focus on how the space is represented and the impact that this can have on the identity of the space and those who use the space. Lefebvre (1974, 1976 & 2003) drew attention to the tensions that exist between elite visions of space and more 'everyday' interpretations and uses, arguing that those behind the production and development of urban space have their own motivations for wanting the spaces to be represented in a particular way. Often these representations reflect gendered and classed stereotypes and wider divisions in society (Zukin 1993 & 1995; Massey 2004; Skeggs 2005; Longhurst et al 2014). This thesis will demonstrate how these representations of urban spaces can create and reflect gendered divisions that occur in wider society and how these can also intersect with class. Of particular relevance to this thesis are the notions of cultural and symbolic capital (Bourdieu 1986) and how these can be portrayed and reflected through the representations of space and spatial practices (Lefebvre 1974). The combination of these theoretical concepts is novel. Both these theorists have been used in discussions around identity, and representations and experiences within urban space. However, the amalgamation of key aspects of both theories allows for an original interpretation of women's lived experiences and perceptions of representations and identity in urban space. Liverpool, UK and the privatised development of Liverpool One (which opened in 2008) have been used as the case study for this research and a sample of twenty women who were local to Liverpool were recruited. The case study was chosen because of the recent change to the ownership of the space and the drastic changes that the space underwent. It therefore provided a unique opportunity to explore how such changes affect the cultural capital of space and those who use the space as well as the conflict between the representations of space and spatial practise that create and contribute to the symbolic capital of the space. Walking interviews alongside cognitive mapping and photograph elicitation were used to explore the everyday lived experiences of local women. Taking the standpoint that social construction is crucial in the representations associated with urban space, this thesis will argue that in the case of Liverpool, the shift from public to private ownership of the space which is now Liverpool One has contributed to social boundaries and inequality in terms of the lived experiences of those who use the space. This is highlighted through the gendered representations that become associated with the space and the juxtapositions that are felt by local women who use the space in an everyday setting.

Second-wave feminist identities need to be understood as a product of a specific historical formation. These identities were frequently formed through a rejection of, and in opposition to, 'other' femininities and were often seen as opposed to, and 'outside', popular culture. This selection of publications by Joanne Hollows shows how feminist tastes are based on a rejection of both the' easy' pleasures associated with popular culture and the people who have a taste for these popular forms. The legacy of second-wave feminist thought makes it difficult to think through alternative ways of conceptualizing the relationship between feminism and popular culture. However, there is much to be learned by analyzing how feminism, and 'the feminist', has been produced, negotiated and reproduced within the popular. To do so also involves identifying how the generational politics of feminism produce different relationships with the popular. Just as the identity of the feminist was based on a refusal of the popular, it was also predicated on an escape from 'home' and maintaining a distance from the woman associated with domestic space, 'the housewife'. Not only does this produce particular difficulties for theorizing how elements of feminism might be articulated within domestic popular culture, but it also makes it difficult to conceptualize new domestic femininities that might emerge between the feminist and the housewife. By treating domestic femininities and masculinities historically through looking at case studies of domestic cookery, it becomes possible to identify how elements of feminism have been articulated within popular domestic practices.

This thesis explores the ways in which women make sense of their experiences of household work over the life course and in the context of various relationships, with a particular focus on mother/daughter relationships. Using in-depth interviews with 24 heterosexual women (comprising 12 pairs of mothers and their adult daughters, who themselves were mothers of young children), this research investigates the role household work plays in women’s personal narratives and the construction of relational narrated selves and narrative identities. By moving away from a ‘snapshot’ approach to housework that focuses on the division of tasks within heterosexual couples, this thesis positions household work as part of our personal lives (Smart, 2007), and something that is made sense of relationally, despite dominant discourses of individualism. Similarly, conceiving of people within personal timescapes in which multiple dimensions of time intersect allows for an understanding of household work as part of our personal lives over the life course, as well as inter-generational relationships and broader historical change. Considering multiple social dimensions of gender, heterosexuality and family, allows for an understanding of how accounting for one’s household practices in relation to various discourses can be understood as doing gender, heterosexuality and family. The construction of relational narrated selves in process show how growing up as a woman is shaped particularly by discourses of emphasised femininity (in the context of normative heterosexuality) and good motherhood, and constructing narrative identities in relation to these discourses involves demonstrating acceptable femininity and maternal responsibility, which works to (re)produce gender, heterosexuality and family. By focusing on the themes of relationality, temporality and the interplay between gender, heterosexuality and family across multiple social dimensions, this thesis uses household work as a lens to draw out useful theoretical links between these key themes.

No description available.

This thesis discusses the struggle to increase women’s participation in public and political life by focusing on the activism of women within the Swedish Social Democratic Party (SAP) and the African National Congress of South Africa (ANC) from 1960 until 1994. It argues that internationalism was key to these women’s success, providing them with a source of support and funding as well as a stage to develop policies away from overwhelmingly patriarchal national settings. Creating and steering political trends and discussions in international fora, and bolstered by the approval of others in the international community, the women who feature here gained a foot in the door of power and created environments conducive to their presence, abilities and voices. To uncover the tensions generated by women’s activism, the thesis investigates the social constructions of gender and how these fluctuated over the period discussed. Women’s attempts to increase their collective representation unveil the inner workings of mass-mobilising political organisations like the ANC and SAP. The thesis also discusses the impact of ideological developments in this era on women’s activism in SAP and the ANC and the increasing popularity of ‘identity’ liberation philosophies like second-wave feminism and black power. It finds that both were concepts these left-wing organisations struggled with, as they seemed to put individuals ahead of the collective. The thesis adds strength to the argument that women have been actively removed from history while their contributions have been consciously silenced in order to portray these political organisations as cohesive and united structures without inner divisions. Nevertheless, women’s attempts to become political leaders and senior members of party, parliamentary and government structures brought conflict and frustration, with every appointment fought for and hard lessons learned along the way. By recovering this history, the thesis challenges national and organisational mythmaking, within Sweden and SAP as well as South Africa and the ANC. It argues that the narratives of these political women’s activists complicate organisational and national histories, which emerge as oversimplified constructions of progress and unity.

The thesis analyses the construction of gender in nationalist working-class West Belfast drawing mainly on anthropology and feminist theory. On the basis of the findings of the ethnographic fieldwork the thesis discusses the intersections of gender with other facets of social identification, highlighting the frequent predominance, in the participants' self-image, of class, ethnicity, and political affiliation, over gender identification. It analyses the participants' narratives of the conflict linking their interpretation of notions of strength, independence, and empowerment with their experiential and socio-cultural background. It looks at the acquisition of the mothering role during the individual's psychological development and at the association between womanhood and motherhood in local discourses to explore the issue of women's agency within the constraints imposed on them by their social environment and by mainstream discursive constructs. Finally, the thesis explores societal responses to male and female ex-prisoners highlighting the 'seductive capital' acquired by male ex-prisoners by virtue of their involvement in the armed struggle and in prison protests. In so doing, the thesis highlights the gendered nature of heroism. In line with the key tenets of feminist anthropology, the thesis makes a case for the visible presence of the researcher in her writing, and for a constant attention to issues of positionality.