Women Assemble

Women Workers and the New Industries in Inter-War Britain

Miriam Glucksmann

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2022
• Topic: History
• eBook ISBN:
  9781000633092
• Subtopic: World History
• Index: History

Why did working-class women become the central labour force on assembly lines in the new consumer goods' industries of the inter-war period? What was the long-term significance of this for the pattern of women's work, both in paid employment and in the home?

Originally published in 1990, Women Assemble fills a major gap in the history of women and work, and develops a theory of women's class relations, and of course gender and class more generally, by means of an original case-study. Taken from a wide variety of sources, it uses a multidisciplinary approach and is brought to life by interviews with people who worked in assembly-line industries during the inter-war period.

This extremely readable study is important to feminists, historians, and sociologists, as well as to all those concerned with issues of gender, class, and the labour process.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Original Title Page
• Original Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of tables
• List of figures
• Acknowledgements
• List of abbreviations
• 1 Introduction
• 2 The changing pattern of women’s employment
• 3 The restructuring of industrial capitalism
• 4 Five factories
• 5 Women assembling: work, wages and assemblyline production
• 6 Women assembled: gender and the division of labour
• 7 Homeward bound: changes in domestic production and consumption
• 8 Women and the total social organization of labour
• Appendix: List of main people interviewed
• Notes
• References
• Index