Transcript Gender Structure In Developing A More Family

Gender Structure In Developing
A More Family-Friendly
University Workplace
by:
Helen Mederer
Jessica Holden Sherwood*
Barbara Silver
* Presented 11/08/08 at the annual meeting of the
Association for Humanist Sociology
[email protected]
workplace … workforce
 The Ideal Worker: devoted to job
without interruption
(Williams 2000)
 The Ideal Family: contains a worker
 Cultural contradiction:
workplace & workforce are mismatched
Let’s change the workplace
How?
(not the workforce).
3-level model of gender structure:
Individual
Interactional
Institutional
(Risman 2004)
No level is primary; all need intervention.
Individual level
 Attitudes and behaviors
 e.g. survey Q: “Do you support…”
 this level tends not to be the source
of change, despite American ideology
Examples:
 Division of household work
 Corporate diversity policy (Kalev 2006)
 Race & racism
(Bonilla-Silva 1996)
Institutional level
Necessary (insight of sociology)
Policies are insufficient alone:
 Unequal availability/implementation
 Bias avoidance
(Drago 2007)
“The low rate of policy usage suggests that
academic parents are not being encouraged to
use them, are afraid to do so, or both.”
(ASA “Resources or Rewards?” 2006)
 They just enable the Ideal Worker.
Interactional level
 fed by “prejudice, cognitive bias, statistical
discrimination, social closure around desirable
employment opportunities, and network-based
recruitment”
(Tomaskovic-Devey and Stainback 2007)
 e.g. status expectations that lead people to
make gendered assumptions
(Ridgeway 1997)
 “second generation” discrimination: subtle,
entrenched, unnoticed in organizational
structures
(Sturm 2001)
Three-Level Model of a Caring Workplace
INTERACTIONAL
Inclusive department networks;
Acceptance of individual responsibility for
department climate;
Encouragement of using family-life-friendly
policies;
Culture of coverage among colleagues
INSTITUTIONAL
Overarching philosophy of responsibility
for well-being of workers;
Policies and programs with inclusive,
life course focus;
Overall acceptance of normalcy
of using
INDIVIDUAL
Individual support of goals of diversity
and equity;
Individual colleagues willing to engage in
supportive behaviors and mentoring
Campus Implementation:
 Climate change
 Work-Life
 Recruitment
 Institutional:
 Interactional:
funding Fellows
climate awareness/commitment
 Faculty development
 Institutional:
 Interactional:
 Individual:
awards, mentoring, networking
fosters collegiality
psychosocial/cultural teachings
 Successful
 But
 Must ascend the structural ladder
(Cancian & Oliker 2000, Tronto 2002)
What’s required:
 Stop reacting with “accommodations”
 Instead of the E.R., adopt a
preventive care model
 Redefine work & The Worker
 Caring as a de-gendered social good
 gender-neutral support:
 Offer & expect it for caring work
 Offer & expect it in workplaces
 Ethical and economic payoff