Gender and the Use of Time

by Olwen H. Hufton (Editor)

This volume presents the findings of a year-long forum held at the European University Institute in 1994-5, which focused on the complex issues arising from the differences in time-use between the sexes at the end of the 20th century. It addresses critical questions such how far does gender play a vital role in determining how much time is spent in paid work in the market and how much in unpaid caring work in the home?; as a consequence, who has rights to pensions and benefits?; how much time can either sex devote to leisure or to political activities?; what are the consequences of the distribution of time and how much change can one see in traditional patterns over the past two decades?; and how far have recent economic developments relating to unemployment, part-time or intermittent work and reductions in welfare services had gender-specific consequences contributing to a "feminization" of poverty? Among the contributors to this study are demographers, sociologists and social policy experts, philosophers and jurists, each employing different approaches and drawing upon a wide variety of evidence.

560 pages, Hardcover

Published November 18, 1998

About the author

Olwen Hufton DBE is one of the foremost historians of early modern Europe and a pioneer of social history and of women's history. She is an expert on Early Modern, western European comparative socio-cultural history with special emphasis on gender, poverty, social relations, religion and work. In 2006 she joined Royal Holloway as a part-time Professorial Research Fellow in the History Department.

Olwen Hufton is a Fellow of the British Academy (FBA) and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.