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Time, the life course and work in women's lives: Reflections from Newfoundland
Abstract
Bringing together the preliminary results of two pilot studies carried out in two fishing towns in Newfoundland, this paper examines some of the questions raised by the studies. In particular, it demonstrates that women interpret their experience of work in different ways than men do, and differently from that expected by the conventional economic interpretations. This, in part, explains women's perennially poor position in the labor market. However, and more important, the paper shows how women's interpretations of the value of their paid and unpaid work in the context of the overall “family project” allows them to see their contributions as positive, essential, and certainly equal to those of men.
... Research on women and gender is not new in the study of fisheries. It has been around for at least four decades with the first studies conducted on women [10][11][12] and later gender. Over time, feminists, and gender researchers, as well as researchers from other disciplines, became interested in the gender niche and have provided significant contributions to the studies in this area [13][14][15][16]. ...
... Unfortunately, research on gender/women in fishery and aquaculture contexts is often hampered by limited data [14,18], predominantly because fisheries research has been slower than others to recognize the importance of gender within their purview. Few cultural and social researchers (example, ethnologists, anthropologists, and sociologists) were studying sexual or gender division of labour within fisheries, even though research on households and communities highlighted women's presence in fisheries, as important workers for the fishing boat, in processing plants and the household [11,12]. In the fisheries sector, it is understood that men and women engaged in distinct and often complementary activities that are strongly influenced by the social, cultural, and economic contexts they live in. ...
... Research on women and gender is not new in the study of fisheries. It has been around for at least four decades with the first studies conducted on women (e.g., Gerrard 1975Gerrard , 1983Gerrard , 1986Holtedahl 1986;Porter 1991) and later on gender. Over time, feminists and gender researchers, as well as researchers from other disciplines, became interested in the gender niche and have provided significant contributions to the studies in this area (e.g., Bennett 2005;Kleiber et al. 2014;Frangoudes and Keromnes 2008;Frangoudes 2013a;Yodanis 2000;Williams 2008). ...
... Unfortunately, research on gender/women in fishery and aquaculture contexts is often hampered by limited data (e.g., Harper et al. 2017;Kleiber et al. 2014;Frangoudes 2011), predominantly because fisheries research has been slower than others to recognize the importance of gender within their purview. Few cultural and social researchers (for example, ethnologists, anthropologists, and sociologists) were studying sexual or gender division of labor within fisheries, even though research on households and communities highlighted women's presence in fisheries, as important workers for the fishing boat, in processing plants and the household (e.g., Gerrard 1975Gerrard , 1986Porter 1991). Natural sciences have always been the main domain that drove fisheries research, making stock assessment and fisheries resource management the core issues examined for many years. ...
... Research related to women's participation and contribution to the development of the fisheries sector is not new [1]. Since the first studies conducted on women in fisheries [e.g., 2,3], several studies have focused on gender [4][5][6][7][8] and more recently attempts have been made to uncover gender dynamics in fisheries communities, businesses, and families [9]. However, the contributions of women to fisheries value chains are still vastly underrepresented in official statistics [1,[10][11][12][13]. ...
Several authors have noted that there is an under-representation of gender approaches in fisheries policy and research. While fisheries are widely considered a male-dominated industry, women play a significant and vital role in the survival of small-scale family-run fisheries and are frequently the driving force of innovation, diversification, and the development of new markets. However, these roles are often unseen – with the male fishers being the registered beneficiary and performer of more visible tasks. Although several fisheries studies have focused on gender, no study has yet considered or contextualized the impact of Fisheries Local Action Groups (FLAGs) on both the visibility and empowerment of women. Drawing on a quantitative survey of 113 FLAGs and the qualitative case study of three EU fisheries areas, this paper explores these factors. While the results show that FLAGs are active in supporting women in diversification activities, the findings highlight that their impact on women’s empowerment is complex, varies between areas, and that interventional programs play an important role in identifying gender issues in fisheries areas and how they impact their transformation and survival.
... This trend follows the increased acknowledgement of women's role in fisheries, but also the increasing attention in small-scale fisheries in general [1]. Though the first studies on women in fisheries appeared approximately four decades ago (e.g., [2][3][4]), it wasn't until the last two decades that their role was further investigated (e.g., [1,[5][6][7][8][9]). Over time, researchers from various disciplines became interested in the gender niche and have provided significant contributions to the studies in this area (e.g., [10][11][12][13]). ...
Small-scale fisheries account for 94% of the Greek fishing fleet. The sector consists mainly of family-owned vessels and highly depends on family labor. While the role of women as crew members is of particular interest, there is little evidence of their actual employment status, labor situation, and contribution in the fishing activity. This paper focuses on women in small-scale fisheries in order to investigate their role in the sector and reveal their contribution to fishing enterprises. In addition, it implements a comparative analysis to investigate the differences in various socio-economic indicators in small-scale vessels with and without female crew members. The results indicate that the presence of women has a positive outcome on several social and economic indicators that reflect the wealth of both fishing households and employees. In terms of employment, several differences in the structural characteristics appeared regarding the onshore employment, the share of unpaid labor, and the total hours worked. The majority of female crew members can be characterized as “fisherwomen,” since fishing is their main occupation. Further in-depth research to investigate the family relations among crew members and how they affect the fishing enterprise can supplement the existing research.
... Women's contribution within the fishing household has been and continues to be invisible and like all forms of labor varies over time and space. In fisheries contexts, as with other labor contexts, women's tasks including caring for and socializing children, producing and maintaining the fisher's clothing, cooking food for the family and the vessel deckhands, and responsibility for the administrative running of the fisheries enterprise (Gerrard 1983;Porter, 1991;Thiessen et al. 1992;Frangoudes 2011) are within this framing; these tasks are taken for granted and not valorized. Neilson et al. (2019) point out that women in fisheries with the least visibility are the unpaid collaborating spouses. ...
The need to uncover, interrogate, and integrate women’s contributions to fisheries in research and development has never been clearer. As coastal and fisheries management continues to look to the Sustainable Development Goals and the Voluntary Guidelines for Securing Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries in the context of Food Security and Poverty Eradication, as frameworks and mandates, gender equity and equality have become a central concern. To fill the still existing gap of documentation and theoretical engagement, in this thematic collection, we gather together voices from researchers and practitioners from around the world, with one overarching common approach of using a gender lens to examine the relationship between humans and aquatic resources. Drawing on Donna Haraway’s classic feminist concept of situated knowledges, we examine the many and varied approaches researchers are using to engage with the intersection of gender and fisheries. Beginning and ending with two reviews that examine where gender and fisheries has come from, and where it is going, this thematic issue includes case studies from 10 countries, engaging in the topic at various scales (individual, household, national, institutional etc.), and using multiple methodological approaches. Taken together, these pieces explore the mechanism by which women’s contribution to fisheries are overlooked and provide direct evidence to contest the persistent invisibility of women in fishing, fisheries labor, and fisheries decision-making. Going beyond the evidence of women’s contributions, the authors go further to examine different coastal contexts, intersectional identities such as age, and explore gender transformative approaches to fisheries development.
... Sharon pays $1100 per month for outside-of-the-home childcare. Also, her mother and mother-in-law are very involved in helping raise her children, a common trend in traditional Newfoundland and Labrador (Davis, 1993;Porter, 1991;Thompson, 1985). Sharon has done the math: now that she is on maternity leave, she does not pay for childcare because she takes care of her children throughout the day. ...
This article focuses on the importance of gender research in the intangible cultural heritage of fisheries (including shellfish and seaweed farming) as a means to better preserve coastal and maritime cultural heritage. Fishing activities are based on knowledge, the “know-how”, accumulated through experience over time and transmitted to new generations. As written sources have tended, historically, to be written by men, fisheries, shellfish and seaweed farming are usually viewed today as male activities from which women are excluded. However, participant observation and qualitative interviewing of fisheries’ cultures show us this is often not the case. Therefore, this article fills a gap by describing two maritime cultural heritage case studies that provide researchers and practitioners with alternative sources of information, such as oral history and qualitative interviewing. Moreover, policies to conserve maritime intangible cultural heritage require a better understanding of gender-differentiated practices as well as of ways of knowledge acquisition and gender inequalities in such heritage.
There is an emerging call for social scientists to pay greater attention to the social and cultural contexts of fishing and fishers. A resulting literature is evolving which focuses on individual life experiences, particularly relating to entering the fishing occupation, and what these might mean for the future sustainability of the fishing industry. However, the ways in which these lives are linked and intergenerationally connected remains somewhat of a blindspot. This paper considers the potential of a lifecourse approach to help us better understand how fishers accumulate, utilise and share capital(s) in getting onto and moving along the ‘fishing ladder'. Drawing on in-depth qualitative research with fishing families on the Llŷn peninsula small-scale fishery in north Wales (UK) the paper explores how there are multiple social contexts from which ‘prospective fishers' can begin their fishing career and which differentially (re)shape how they can accumulate capital over time. Later on in the lifecourse, fishers (re)negotiate their fishing identities in relation to the lives of others, within transitions such as parenthood as well as with older age. The paper's findings offer a much-needed temporal dimension to our understanding of fishing lives and what it means to be a ‘good fisher'.
Both of us have long histories in both women’s studies and the feminist movement, and we felt that trying to answer too many questions would make our contribution superficial and without value. Instead we selected few starting points. So in the following piece we try to focus less on what we have done and more on what our thinking has been, and how that thinking has changed over time. Because one of us (MP) is an immigrant to Canada, we took the opportunity to compare what was happening in Britain and Canada at the same time.
Based on data from in-depth interviews and field work in rural fishing communities, this article examines how the process of gender construction works to keep women from being fisher[men]. A number of common explanations for occupational sex segregation are considered to explain why women do not fish, including biology, gender role socialization, cultural traditions, and discrimination. The article then presents a complementary explanation, the social construction of gender. In fishing communities, where man is defined as a fisherman, women maintain boundaries between themselves and fishing as they construct gender. They define their work as “not fishing,” even when they work on fishing boats. The consequence is that women do not aim to work or succeed in one of the few and most lucrative industries in a rural community. When examined from this perspective, occupational segregation appears to be more difficult to eliminate than prevailing explanations suggest.
The location pattern of advanced professional business services is a matter of interest among scholars in economic geography and neighbouring disciplines. This article considers location factors in the context of a conceptual discussion as well as a Swedish case- study. The conclusions suggest that there are reasons to reevaluate the relative importance of dif- ferent location factors. Although the factor of proximity to clients (the market) is important and tends to dominate the discussion in much research in geography, it offers only a partial explanation of the location of professional business services firms. This article produces arguments for the importance of several other location factors: professional labour, localization and urbanization economies, and the circumstances surrounding the establishment of firms as well as their subsequent history.
When domestic production enters the market it is assumed payment will be individuated and correspond to the division of labour. However, the sparse and often ambiguous evidence about payment for women's domestic production shows that payment is not necessarily made to the producer. Payees for farm butter supplied to a dairy in North Norway were in some cases the women who made the butter, and in others men, but there were no clear differences between households which explained why. The act of payment is more than simply a material transaction, it also has symbolic significance as a ritual marking status. Variations in practice reflect different interpretations of its meaning. When a woman is payee, either butter production is seen as a sideline, or the payment is given a different ritual significance. Market transactions do not inevitably displace previous status relations, but add new means of constructing public statuses and maintaining inequalities.
Time is an important underlying concept in life course research and in the use of the “life-line method” an approach that has gained interest among researchers examining women's lives more processually. Notwithstanding, the author argues that time itself is not sufficiently problematised in this context. In the first part of the paper, the question is posed: What do we mean by time? It is argued that the Newtonian mechanical view of time, which is used in social science research and is the basis for the life-line method, limits our ability to capture the complexity of individuals' and especially women's everyday lives. A discussion of theories of time leads to an examination of methodological problems that are inherent in doing and presenting life histories.
Abstract Over the 1980–1990 period, employment in producer services industries in the nonmetropolitan United States increased substantially. This growth resulted in the development of nonmetropolitan growth nodes in producer services industries. A growth node refers to a nonmetropolitan area that contains a greater than average concentration of employment in a particular industry sector relative to other nonmetropolitan areas. Moreover, this industry concentration not only increases over time, but also represents an important source of employment growth within the area. With nonmetropolitan counties as the spatial unit of analysis, 317 growth nodes in producer services industries are identified for the 1980–1990 period. Access to workers with clerical and administrative support skills, access to highly educated workers, higher earnings per employed worker, access to recreational amenities, and proximity to metropolitan areas were associated with the development of nonmetropolitan growth nodes in producer services industries during this period.
Even small increases in the frequency of thrombotic disease in users of OCs have general health impact because of their widespread use, which is currently expanding to potential risk groups. The present investigations were launched to study the effects of OCs containing 20-40 micrograms of EE combined with the latest developed gonane progestogens on biochemical risk markers within metabolic systems involved in the development of arterial thrombotic disease. The studies included evaluation of carbohydrate and lipid metabolism as well as the haemostatic system and were performed in non-diabetic women and in women with IDDM, who are prone to the development of arterial thrombosis. In the evaluation of the carbohydrate metabolism in non-diabetic women, we found no effect on fasting glucose or insulin and no effect on the insulin response to oral glucose in women using monophasic OCs containing EE combined with DSG or GST. This contrasts the evaluation of triphasic OCs containing EE combined with GST or NGT, which increased fasting insulin and reduced insulin sensitivity without affecting the glucose-effectiveness or the beta-cell function. Impaired glucose tolerance developed in 10% of the women after 6 months. These finding suggest that OCs are able to induce a state of insulin resistance, which should be considered in the prescription for women with potential disturbed insulin sensitivity or reduced beta-cell secretory capacity e.g. women with ovarian hyperandrogenism, obesity, previous GDM or perimenopausal women. We found no change in glycaemic control in 22 women with well-regulated IDDM treated with a monophasic combination of EE and GST for one year and none of the women developed microalbuminuria during treatment. In the women with diabetes we observed an increase in fasting levels of triglycerides, a decrease in LDL-cholesterol, and unchanged concentrations of total cholesterol and HDL-cholesterol during treatment. In non-diabetic women treated with the same compound or an OC containing EE and DSG we found similar changes in triglycerides and total cholesterol, but increased levels of HDL-cholesterol and unchanged LDL-cholesterol concentrations. In the women with IDDM there was a negative correlation between daily insulin requirement and HDL-cholesterol before and during treatment, but no other statistically significant correlation between estimates of glycaemic control and lipids and lipoproteins were observed. In the non-diabetic women, changes in the haemostatic system included an increase in the procoagulant factors fibrinogen and Factor VIIc; the concentration of active t-PA increased, mainly because of decreased inhibition by PAI-1. The ratio between molecular markers of the activity of the coagulation system and the efficacy of fibrinolysis was unchanged. This was also found in the women with IDDM, who showed evidence of increased fibrin formation and an attenuated fibrinolytic response during treatment. The regulation of the t-PA/PAI system was studied in non-diabetic women in order to elucidate if the effects of OCs are caused by a direct effect on synthesis or clearance of these variables or if they are secondary to changed insulin sensitivity, as described in individuals with atherosclerosis. We found no indications that insulin resistance is involved in the regulation of t-PA and PAI-1 antigen levels, neither before nor during intake of OCs. We showed, however, that the decreased t-PA antigen concentration observed in OC users is caused by reduced synthesis outside the splanchnic circulation. The studies indicate that low-dose OCs containing newer gonane progestogens are able to induce insulin resistance and to impair glucose tolerance. Lipoproteins were not adversely influenced by the OCs neither in the diabetic nor the non-diabetic women; on the contrary, there was a tendency towards increased plasma levels of HDL-cholesterol and decreased LDL-cholesterol which are associated with a decreased risk of atherosclerosis. The changes observed within the haemostatic system were in accordance with a maintained balance between coagulation and fibrinolysis although the rate of fibrin formation may be increased in the women with IDDM. Irrespective of OC use, the interrelationships between metabolic systems in young non-diabetic women are different from those reported in individuals with atherosclerosis or insulin resistance. The effects of OCs on the t-PA/PAI system seem to be mediated by a direct effect on the vessel wall and not by changes in the hepatic clearance. The present findings were obtained in diabetic women without vascular complications, so the conclusion that women with IDDM can use OCs without metabolic alterations of known clinical significance is therefore restricted to those without evidence of diseased vessels. When evaluating the results obtained in the non-diabetic women, it should be remembered that women with recognised risk factors were excluded. The results may therefore be of limited value when evaluating the risk of arterial thrombosis in predisposed populations. In healthy individuals, the present integrated evaluation of biochemical markers does not indicate an increased risk of arterial thrombosis during use of low-dose OCs containing newer gonane progestogens; thus, the findings are in accordance with the recent epidemiological studies on these compounds. The application of relevant biochemical markers facilitate the understanding of the non-reproductive effects of sex steroids which have increasing importance because of their expanding use, not only as contraceptives, but also in the treatment of benign gynaecological disorders, as hormone replacement therapy and as prophylactic agents against specific degenerative conditions. Moreover, they may prove to be helpful in the future identification of women, who have increased susceptibility to the metabolic effects of sex steroids due to genetic predisposition.
The topic of this chapter is support, aid and assistance, of both practical and material kinds, between adult kin in contemporary British society. My concern is not so much with documenting the actual support which passes between kin, but to explore concepts of ‘obligation’ and ‘responsibility’ to assist one’s relatives, the circumstances in which these come into play, and the processes whereby they get translated into actions. A particular focus is upon how much processes operate over time, using the concept of the life course as a means for illuminating this aspect.
It is only by tracing individual lives that connections can be documented between the development of personality and the social economy. Only when the role of intermediary institutions is precisely established can a soundly-based theoretical integration be achieved. Historians need a theoretically truer, and substantively better-grounded, sociology through building theory step-by-step with the discovery of facts. The life history method is a vital tool in this task.-after AuthorSociology Dept., University of Essex, U.K.
Grand Bank is a small fishing town on the southwest coast of Newfoundland, Canada. The oral history project, on which this paper is based, focussed on the “life stories” of women in three, four and sometimes five, different generations of families. My aim was twofold. First, I wanted to build a picture of the way to the economy, and the sexual division of labour has changed in the period 1890–present. Second, I wanted to see how, by focussing several accounts of the same family experience, I could break apart the ideological construction of the past. I could also use contrasting accounts of mothers and daughters to re-examine the role of “work” in the family and the construction of a sexual division of labour.This paper explores how women situate and construct both their past and present experience, and what the different accounts given by mothers and daughters and grandaughters tell us both about female family relationships and about the interaction of gender with economic, social and technological change. The paper also suggests why this particular oral history approach, using different generations of women in the same family, is especially relevant to feminist concerns.
It is commonplace that the years between 1300 and 1650 saw within the intellectual culture of Western Europe important changes in the apprehension of time.1 In the Canterbury Tales the cock still figures in his immemorial role as nature’s time-piece: Chauntecleer—
Caste up his eyen to the brighte sonne,
That in the signe of Taurus hadde yronne
Twenty degrees and oon, and somwhat moore,
He knew by kynde, and by noon oother loore
That it was pryme, and crew with blisful stevene….
But although “By nature knew he ech ascensioun/Of the equynoxial in thilke toun”, the contrast between “nature’s” time and clock time is pointed in the image—
Wel sikerer was his crowyng in his logge
Than is a clokke, or an abbey orlogge.
This is a very early clock: Chaucer (unlike Chauntecleer) was a Londoner, and was aware of the times of Court, of urban organization, and of that “merchant’s time” which Jacques Le Goff, in a suggestive article in Annales, has opposed to the time of the medieval church.2
Women and the life cycle Biogmphy and society
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Women and the Economy in Newfoundland: A case study in Catalina, final m-port. St. John's, Halifax: Department of Career De+ velopment
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Towards a reha-bilitation of data Pmctice and progress: British Sociology
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Hidden rhythms: Hidden powers. Women and time in working class culture
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Towards a rehabilitation of data
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Women and old boats: The sexual division of labour in a Newfoundland outpost
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Gender, the labour market and restructuring of economic strategies in rural Newfoundland
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