In the 1950s heated views were sometimes expressed about the alleged social results of married women going out to work. Originally published in 1962 Married Women Working attempts to examine the question objectively. It is based on two studies undertaken over a period of nearly five years in a solidly working-class London district – one, a detailed study in the factory of a well-known firm of biscuit makers (Peek Freans) relying mainly on married women workers; the other, a more general one, in the surrounding borough as a whole. How effective was the married woman as an employee? How did the firm cope with their new type of labour and with what results? What was the effect on the woman herself, and on her family, of her attempt to fill the dual role of home-maker and paid worker? These are some of the questions examined in this book, which also gives a very fascinating picture of how people lived at the time, against the background of earlier generations.
New Foreword to the Reissue John Goodwin. Tables in Text. Tables in Appendix. 1. Work and Family 2. Perspectives and Methods 3. Bermondsey’s Past 4. Bermondsey Today 5. The Peek Frean Factory 6. Married Women as Employees at Peek Frean’s 7. The Bermondsey Wives Who Worked 8. Home Making 9. The Children 10. Conclusions. Appendices: I. Method. II. Tables. Index.
Biography
Pearl Jephcott (1900-1980) was based at the London School of Economics at the time of writing.
From the New Foreword: "Jephcott’s Married Women Working (1962) is a ground-breaking study of gender and work and … of married women’s employment."
