The position and opportunities of young mothers - Progress or retrogression. (A study of the difficulties confronting young mothers in the contemporary family based on a comparative study of working class and middle class families)

This thesis is an examination of the problems confronting the young mother with small children today. The first section is concerned with methodology. It explains how the choice of subject was made; it describes how the study was designed, and it records how the sample was selected for the survey. The second section provides a historical background by discussing the various changes affecting the position of women in this country, during the last one hundred and fifty years. From the point of view of this survey, three major consequences are noted. 1. The status of women, in relation to men, has risen considerably. 2. The number of roles which women can perform, in society, have increased and become more varied. 3. Women have experienced an extension in the freedom of choice as to which roles they wish to perform.The third section is a discussion of the results of the interviews. These were conducted with forty eight middle class mothers and forty eight working class mothers. All the mothers in the survey were aged thirty or younger, and had at least one child under five. The most important facts to emerge are: 1. Some of the mothers, more particularly the working class mothers, felt themselves to be leading rather isolated lives. 2. At the time of the interview all the mothers saw their childrenas the central focus of their lives; the role of mother took precedence over all other roles. 3. At the same time the majority did not feel entirely at home in this role. Mothers, both working class and middle class, found themselves unprepared for the responsibilities of motherhood, and for the restrictions it imposed on their lives. 4. Both the middle class and the working class mothers had enlisted the support of their husbands in facing their problems. The middle class husband gave his support by co-operating with his wife in extending her interests outside the home and the children. The working class husband gave his support by devoting his leisure to sharing his wife's roles within the home, and participating regularly in all the household activities. 5. Ninety percent of the total sample was planning to work when the children were older. The significant factor here was thatthis return to work seemed an automatic process, the special decision was to remain at home. The wives in both samples were aware of the conflicts between the role of mother and the role of worker. On the other hand the great majority did not feel that a conflict existed between the role of wife and the role of worker.The concluding section considers the findings of the survey against the wider background of the position of women in this country today. It is suggested that mothers with young children have aspecial problem. There is a conflict of interests between the role of motherhood and the many other roles which women can perform today. The inability to resolve this conflict has meant that many mothers find themselves isolated, in a cul-de-sac, cut off from the central activities of society. In conclusion several methods of improving the situation are proposed: 1. A re-analysis of the education of girls. This would take as its starting point the fact that girls will be performing many different roles at different stages in their life. 'Home' or 'Work' should not be posed as mutually exclusive alternatives. The educational process itself should be divided into three stages. 1) School. 2) Further education or training. 3) Re-training for re-entry to work after a period of absence. 2. A re-examination of the roles and capacities of women as workers. In particular retraining schemes would have to be allied closely to work opportunities. Employers too would have to be educated in: 1) the real nature of women's capabilities, 2) the special problems that married women may encounter owing to their domestic responsibilities. 3. The re-direction of mothers and young children, back into the main stream of society. This could be done: 1) by the promotion of organisations parallel to the Parent Teacher Association, which give mothers the opportunity to relate to each other, to their local community, and to society at large. 2) by the general improvement in the facilities which society provides for young children. 3) by encouraging the community to include young children in a whole range of situations, from which, at present, they are excluded. The aim of all these proposals would be to enable mothers with small children to perform their traditional roles as mothers in ways that complemented rather than curtailed their other contemporary roles.<p

Patterns of change and stability in the gender division of household labour in Australia, 1986-1997

Recent research in Australia and overseas has suggested that we are witnessing a convergence of men's and women's time on domestic labour activities. But there is disagreement about whether this is due to women reducing their time on housework or men increasing their time on housework. This article addresses these issues using national survey data collected in Australia in 1986, 1993 and 1997. The results show some changes in the proportional responsibilities of men and women in the home with men reporting a greater share of traditional indoor activities. But overall both men and women are spending less time on housework. In particular, women's time on housework has declined by six hours per week since 1986. Hence, while the gender gap between men's and women's involvement in the home is getting smaller, it is not the result of men increasing their share of the load, but is due to the large decline in women's time spent on domestic labour. There is also evidence of change in the relationship. between paid and unpaid work for women. Women's hours of,paid labour had a greater impact on their involvement in domestic labour in 1997 compared to a decade earlier. The article concludes that women's increased labour force involvement in combination with changing patterns and styles, of consumption is leading to some changes in the gender-division:of household labour, but not in the direction anticipated by earlier commentators on the domestic division of labour

Isolated housewives and complex maternal worlds: the significance of social contacts between women with young children in industrial societies.

This article reconsiders the picture of the mother of young children in industrialised societies as the 'isolated housewife', suggesting this notion is by no means straightforward. We suggest there is considerable evidence for the existence of mothers' social contacts and their significance both as 'work' and 'friendship' in industrial societies. A pre-occupation with the notion of the 'isolation' of 'housewives' has led social researchers to neglect sustained examination of the social relationships within which many/most mothers are involved on a day-to-day basis. Complexities of interpretation, for example what 'isolation' can actually mean, need to be drawn out from the existing literature. Evidence presented from two recent ethnographic studies shows patterned opportunities/constraints occurring in relation to mothers' social contacts within localised settings, whether through organised groups or other personal ties. The complex nature of individual women's social contacts is thus brought out. Some key questions are raised for the importance to sociology, anthropology and social policy of these apparently insignificant or invisible women's networks