This thesis presents a cross-national, comparative study of legal recognition for lesbian and gay couples, focusing on civil partnerships in the UK and marriage in Canada and the US State of California. The study investigates the impact of same-sex marriage and civil partnership from the perspectives of lesbian and gay couples and, in particular, addresses the social implications of couples’ new legal status. The thesis investigates the impact of marriage or civil partnership within couples’ family and friendship networks and in a range of less intimate social contexts, including the workplace, the neighbourhood and commercial settings. The thesis also analyses the impact of legal recognition on couples’ sense of citizenship and assesses the effects of the Proposition 8 referendum, which repealed existing same-sex marriage rights in California in 2008. Drawing on qualitative data gathered from in-depth interviews with married or civil partner same-sex couples in the UK, Canada and California, the study analyses couples’ narratives around legal recognition to identify the meanings they attach to their new legal status. In the context of the wider policy objectives of legal recognition with regard to tackling discrimination and acknowledging same-sex couples within family and other social networks, the thesis applies Erving Goffman’s analysis of stigma to this evolving policy context. The study concludes that couples broadly welcomed the legal entitlements that flowed from marriage or civil partnership, and often saw legal recognition as providing opportunities to seek social recognition from within their personal networks. However, legal recognition did not in itself guarantee social recognition, and sometimes revealed the continuing marginalisation of lesbian and gay couples within family networks and in other social settings. This highlights a distinction between legal and social recognition, and points towards a significant gap between the policy ambitions attached to marriage and civil partnership and their micro-social impact.

This study focuses in detail on instrumental chamber music produced by women in the early twentieth century, a particularly fertile and under-represented period with regard to this topic and it draws on aspects of women’s history, British music history and feminist musicology. It argues that the Cobbett competitions instigated by Walter Willson Cobbett in 1905 and the formation of the Society of Women Musicians in 1911 contributed to the explosion of instrumental music, including phantasies, written by women in this period. It highlights women’s place in British musical society leading up to and during the First World War and investigates the relationship between Cobbett, the Society of Women Musicians and women composers themselves. Chamber works for a variety of instrumental combinations by six composers, Adela Maddison (1866-1929), Ethel Smyth (1858-1944), Morfydd Owen (1891-1918), Ethel Barns (1880-1948), Alice Verne-Bredt (1868-1958) and Susan Spain-Dunk (1880-1962) (all at different stages in their compositional careers at this time) are analysed. This is undertaken particularly with reference to their formal procedures, an issue much discussed by contemporary sources. The individual composers’ reactions (or lack of them) to the debate instigated by the Society of Women Musicians on the future of women’s music is considered in relation to their lives, careers and chamber music itself. As the composers in this study were not a cohesive group, creatively or ideologically, the dissertation draws on primary sources, especially the archives of the Society of Women Musicians and Marion Scott, as well as the writings of contemporary commentators, to assess the legacy of the chamber works produced.

In 1698 Christian Kilpatrick concluded a letter to her husband, John Clerk, with the words ‘I rest your loving obedient wife’. These words, or a variation on them, were a common subscript for wives during the seventeenth century. The combination of the words loving and obedient could be used through habit or consciously for effect, yet, in most cases, without any sense of incongruity. The relationship between these terms is at the heart of my thesis. This work explores the nature of the marital relationship during the period 1650 to 1850. It investigates how power was negotiated between couples during a period when marriage was expected to be patriarchal but also to provide happiness and fulfilment for both husband and wife. Throughout, it attempts to identify if and what change occurred over the period. Judith Bennett challenged historians in 1989, and reiterated her call in 2006, to place patriarchy at the centre of women’s history. The thesis takes up that challenge. Through an exploration of power within marital relationships, this thesis highlights how patriarchy operated to confine and restrict women’s social power. It demonstrates that patriarchy was a system that was lived in. Women and men’s understanding of the world and their own identities were shaped by cultural discourses that underpinned the patriarchal system. This thesis reveals that all the operations of married life from love to managing the household to violence were shaped by patriarchal discourses. These discourses were not static but constantly renegotiated through the actions and ideas of individuals, yet throughout the period, the patriarchal system was not fundamentally undermined, but reshaped to meet these challenges. The thesis investigates the operation of this process. It is important to recognise that, as patriarchy was a lived system, it allowed a wide range of behaviours and that people’s response to patriarchy should not only be seen in terms of compliance or resistance. Patriarchy was not only conceived of in terms of male control over women, but in every interaction between the sexes regardless of its motivations. It is through recognising the pervasive nature of patriarchy that historians will no longer contrast, for example, obedience and love, but realise that both obedience and love were part of the system. This interpretation does not undermine other historians’ work in this field, but provides greater explanatory power for patriarchy’s operation and survival. Scottish couples used changing patriarchal discourses in a myriad of ways to shape and explain their experiences. They cooperated, compromised and established power relationships that did not always conform to the ideal, but allowed their marriages to function well and brought them happiness. Not all couples could agree on the balance of power within their relationship leading to arguments and even violence. Yet, while marriages could take a variety of forms, the negotiation of power between couples used a patriarchal script, restricting the language couples used, their expectations and desires and the eventual compromise reached.

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This thesis addresses how mothers and caregivers take care of sick children in rural north central Nigeria combining secondary analysis of the Nigerian Demographic Health Survey (NDHS) and ethnographic fieldwork in a village in a rural area. Theoretically, the thesis draws on concepts from epidemiology and anthropology in order to analyze and extend understanding of plural health seeking behaviour in a socially disadvantaged setting Methods: Rapid ethnographic assessment of mothers and caregivers in rural village in north central Nigeria was carried out using focus group discussions, household interviews and non participant observation over eight months. Findings: The NDHS analysis showed a social gradient generated by different level exposure to socially patterned risk and protective factors overtime in relation to illness, nutrition and living conditions. These mothers and caregivers were constrained by materialistic and neo materialistic factors shaping their circumstances within their daily lives and within Nigerian society – an example of structural violence. They express human agency in their decisions concerning caring for their children in a way that is shaped by cultural behavioural understandings of social and medical diagnostics of health and illness which is manifested in plural health seeking behaviour.

Chapter 1 comprises a review of the literature on the mental health of women prisoners. Historically, research of this kind has tended to focus on male prisoners. In recent years Government initiatives have promoted prison healthcare to be brought in line with the National Health Service. Through a review of the literature this chapter discusses the mental health of women prisoners, with an emphasis on women in the United Kingdom. Treatment needs and marginalised groups in women’s prisons receive a specific focus and recommendations for future research are considered. Chapter 2 is an empirical study, focussed on The Lived Experiences of Women in the National High Secure Healthcare Service for Women, NHSHSW. Following recent changes in the secure hospital system in the UK, the NHSHSW is now the only high secure hospital for women. The women patients in the NHSHSW are admitted from court, prison or hospital if they are assessed to require high secure conditions by virtue of their perceived dangerousness. Research shows that little is known about the experiences of women in this setting. Using an Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis approach, an idiographic methodology; the experiences of eight women in the NHSHSW are explored. The themes identified are discussed in detail and considered in light of the existing research. Recommendations for further research are discussed. Chapter 3 reflects on the research process. It considers the anxieties of a first time qualitative researcher, a woman researching the experiences of women patients in a, secure setting. Reflections on the research process and the impact on the researcher are considered.

The aim of this thesis is to explore the activities of American women's associations in the international realm. In the years immediately following the Second World War, American women saw both an opportunity and an obligation to become active in the international sphere. With obstacles and prejudices preventing their inclusion in mainstream political and diplomatic circles, many American women channelled their interest and activities in the international realm through the medium of voluntary women's organizations. These organizations participated in a number of programmes which sought to export the American way of life, and women's place within it, to overseas markets. Whilst many of these programmes were a product of American women's authentic desire to assist women in other nations, many originated with and were directed by the US government. The work of American women's organizations in international relations were an important component of two government strategies. Firstly, they were a response to the enthusiasm and encouragement of the US government for the involvement of the private sector in Cold War propaganda. Secondly, the efforts of the US government to reach and influence group identities (such as women) in the international realm was aided by the co-operation of American representatives of that group. In co-operating with their government, American women's organizations were engaged in a constant process of negotiation between their 'natural' and international role as women and their role as Americans. The task of defining and exporting the interests and identities of American women to a world audience was both the result of direct government involvement and the willingness of leaders of American women's organizations to serve national interests. Government involvement ranged from help arranging the details of overseas tours to full-scale funding for a women's organization to combat Communist propaganda. The co-operation of voluntary organizations with the government challenges traditional divisions between the private and public realm, which have in the past contributed to a historiography which has placed undue emphasis on American women's commitment to the domestic ideology of the post-war years, at the expense of an accurate assessment of their role in American foreign relations.

The under-representation of women and over-representation of men in trade unions raises questions as to why it occurs, its consequences for women and how it can be overcome. This thesis engages with these questions. It indicates the dominant ideologies and institutions which underpin the dominant male model of trade unions and discusses strategies designed to change the 'rules of the game'. The creation of UNISON on 1st July 1993 provides a research site in which to study the extent to which trade union democracy can be deliberately re-shaped so as to reflect the interests of women. UNISON represents 1.3 million workers within the public service sector, two-thirds of whom are women. It has been the express intention of UNISON to achieve gender democracy through empowering its women members to participate in its representative structures. In particular, the adoption of three key principles in the rule book: proportionality for women, fair representation at all levels and self-organisation for four disadvantaged groups, is intended to have a significant impact on the nature of women's involvement in the union. This thesis contains extensive case study material collected within UNISON over a two year period, ending November 1995. It reveals the opportunities which the three rule book commitments provide for effective representation by women in UNISON. By excluding men so that women can take the majority of representative positions, proportionality and fair representation change the predominant values and beliefs of trade union democracy. By providing opportunities for women to determine their own agenda, in the absence of men, self-organisation challenges the ideology that union strength is based on unity and common interests. However, the dominant model of trade unionism is not being re-shaped without tension or resistance. This thesis argues that ideologies and institutions remain which prevent women's access to representative structures being translated into the discussion of women's concerns in UNISON's decision making arena. VII

This thesis analyses the cultural work performed by confessional discourses. It contributes to feminist cultural theory by refining and extending the Foucauldian theory of confession through a comparison of the cultural instrumentality of the mainstream, male-authored confession and women's versions of the mode. The thesis begins by arguing that though the mainstream, male-authored confession constructs and addresses a mutable subject suited to the requirements of modern power techniques, the polyvalence of confessional discourse also registers a resistance to subjection to contemporary forms of power/knowledge. The second section of the thesis extends and refines this argument by contending that the gynocentric deployment of confession by the woman's confessional novel produces a double-voiced discourse, which mutedly resists patriarchal forms of femininity. The application of psycho-analytic literary theory to a close reading of Marilyn French's The Women's Room leads to the conclusion that this novel's deployment of confessional discourse allows for a muted venting of repressed active female desire. The third section of the thesis extends the preceding examination of the cultural work performed by gynocentric confessional discourse through an analysis of the madefor- TV-movie version of French's The Women's Room. This section argues that that though the application of a film studies and a TV studies approach to the movie appears to produce two contradictory readings of it s cultural instrumentality, this divergence results from the different emphases of film and TV theory: while film theory emphasises text at the expense of context, TV theory tends to reverse this trend. In conclusion, the thesis argues that discourse theory points the way towards a perspective which can address the relationship between textual and social subjects. This thesis examines the textual negotiation of confessional discourse by gynocentric forms; it also points towards the need for a perspective which can more adequately address the question of reception as negotiation.

The impact of severe mental illness on the individual and their family can be substantial. In addition to living with the vagaries of a condition that can be of unpredictable duration and severity, individuals and their families may also have to live with public perceptions that can be devaluing, discriminatory or indeed hostile. The purpose of this thesis is to examine the impact of severe mental illness on the individual and their key relatives using a social cognitive perspective. Chapter 1 provides a review of the mechanisms and consequences of stigma and discrimination in severe mental illness, and explores ideas for intervention that are predicated upon empirical research findings. Chapter 2 examines the pattern of desynchrony between lay representations of severe mental illness held by individuals, their carers, and a sample of the general public. It also highlights the association between aspects of perceived stigma and divergent patient-parent representations of schizophrenia. Chapter 3 adopts a self-regulation theory approach to distress in the relatives of people diagnosed with schizophrenia and concludes that aspects of the self-regulation approach, (perceptions of psychosis, coping, and primary appraisals) have some utility as a framework to understand distress in the carers of people diagnosed with schizophrenia. Finally, chapter 4 reflects on the research process and discusses the development and course of the research. It also provides some further reflections by participants on the experience of severe mental illness.