Gender and Power in the Workplace

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Gender and Power in the Workplace

This essay is an analysis of contemporary issues associated with gender and power in the workplace; which will specifically include a discussion of gender relations, stereotyping, women’s identity, the structuring of formal and informal power, sources of inequality, and sexual harassment.

The concept of gender in relation to the division of labor in the workplace, and in relation to issues of power and control is an unfortunate, groundless stereotype. Suzanne Tallichet notes that the gendered division of workplace labor is rooted in flawed ideology of innate sex differences in traits and abilities, and operates through various control mechanisms. (Tallichet 1995: 698) These control mechanisms are primarily exercised by men over women and serve to exaggerate differences between the sexes, especially surrounding women’s presumed incapability for doing male identified work.

Tallichet notes that most forms of workplace control take the form of harassment, sexual bribery, gender based jokes and comments, and profanity which passively but concisely makes gender differences an aspect of work relations. (Tallichet 1995: 698-699) Jan Grant and Paige Porter (1994: 150) add the ideology of ‘the gendered logic of accumulation” to the discussion of gender in the workplace, which notes that men in Western societies have traditionally acquired and maintained the bulk of wealth in society.

These traditional roles and consequently women’s identities have been formed and maintained by the workplace, therefore understanding any gender differences in labor requires an examination in this light. Grant and Porter remind the researcher that the concepts of male and female are not independent relationships of the workplace, but have been strongly influenced and determined by the relationships of male and female in society at large.

Unfortunately the gendered division of labor has maintained its origins in the home, while copying its structure in the workplace. This can be seen inside families through the sharp distinctions between paid work and non work, paid and unpaid productivity, and even the separation of the private and public spheres where women are perceived as attached to the private and men to the public domains. (Grant & Porter 1994: 153) This is an important issue because while home and work may be physically separate...

... middle of paper ...

...9-73.

Grant, Jan; Porter, Paige. 1994. “Women Managers: The Construction of Gender in the

Workplace.” Australian & New Zealand Journal of Sociology. Vol. 30, 2:

149-164.

Loe, Meika. 1996. “Working for Men - At the Intersection of Power, Gender, and

Sexuality.” Sociological Inquiry. Vol. 66, 4: 399-421.

Pringle, Rosemary. 1993. “Rethinking Gender and Work.” Gender and History. Vol. 5,

2: 295-301.

Roos, Patricia A. 1992. “Women in Engineering: Gender, Power and Workplace

Culture.” Contemporary Sociology - A Journal of Reviews. Vol. 21, 5: 573-576.

Rospenda, Kathleen M; Richman, Judith A; Nawyn, Stephanie J. 1998. “Doing Power:

The Confluence of Gender, Race, and Class in Contrapower Sexual Harassment.

Gender and Society. Vol. 12, 1: 40-60.

Smith, Deborah. 1995. “Sexual Harassment in the Workplace: The Silent Oppression.”

The Social Worker. Vol. 63, 2: 85-88.

Tallichet, Suzanne E. 1995. “Gendered Relations in the Mines and the Division of

Labour Underground.” Gender and Society. Vol. 9, 6: 697-711.

Whalley, Peter. 1992. “Women in Engineering: Gender, Power and Workplace Culture.”

American Journal of Sociology. Vol. 98, 3: 679-681.

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