Published in 1915, this report provides an account of the working conditions and wages of longshoremen in the United States in the early twentieth century. It highlights the problems that come with intermittent employment and casual labor.
CHARLES B. BARNES was fellow at the Bureau of Social Research, New York School of Philanthropy, and director of New York State Public Employment Bureau.
This 1935 pamphlet from the Division of Education at the Russell Sage Foundation details the investigation of American city school systems in 1913 to gather facts concerning the boys in these schools from kindergarten to the last year in high school and the fathers of these boys, to secure a more definite fact basis in the field of industrial education.
LEONARD P. AYRES was director of the Division of Education at the Russell Sage Foundation.
This 1913 paper examines the use of psychological tests in selecting applicants who are best fitted to perform work for positions in certain occupations and industries. Also studied is the possibility of using psychological tests for the purpose of selecting fitting vocations for people.
LEONARD P. AYRES was director of the Division of Education at the Russell Sage Foundation.
This paper, published in 1912, analyzes the argument that the effectiveness of a school and its teachers must be measured in terms of the results secured by the school. It looks at how applied science may avail to better educational practices, similar to industrial activity.
LEONARD P. AYRES was director of the Division of Education at the Russell Sage Foundation.
This pamphlet explores constant occupations, occupations which offer opportunities for employment to a number of workers in a variety of areas, rather than site-specific, less constant, or variable occupations, and their implications on vocational education.
LEONARD P. AYRES was director of the Division of Education at the Russell Sage Foundation.
This volume was published as part of The Pittsburgh Survey, edited by Paul Underwood Kellogg.
MARGARET F. BYINGTON was associate director of the Charity Organization Department of the Russell Sage Foundation.
A look into the rising cost of education, Trends of School Costs was published in 1920. It analyzes the different aspects at play in the cost of public school education, including the relationship between growing attendance rates and cost. Of prime importance are trends in teachers' salaries, compared to the cost of living and the salaries of other workers. Future pricing trends are predicted.
W. RANDOLPH BURGUESS, Department of Education, Russell Sage Foundation
Winner of the 2016 American Sociological Association’s Asia and Asian America Section Book Award
“In this well written and wide ranging book, Dina Okamoto puts forward a new theory describing the relationship between race, ethnicity, and assimilation among Asian Americans. This provocative racial boundary approach to understanding the identities and the incorporation of Asian Americans is a sophisticated and welcome contribution to the field. Using the case of Asian Americans it contributes to our understanding of the concepts and changing nature of race and ethnicity in general.”
—MARY C. WATERS, M.E. Zukerman Professor of Sociology, Harvard University
“Redefining Race redefines our understanding of the making of Asian America. By carefully articulating a theory of panethnicity as a process of shaping and shifting group boundaries, collecting data apposite to that theory, and designing demanding empirical tests, Okamoto expertly shows that Americans of diverse Asian backgrounds did not become panethnic overnight and ex nihilo as a passive response to state- constructed racial categories. Rather, Okamoto presents a vivid account of the accidents, opportunities, and contexts that fire up panethnic moments of collective action and douse them back into quiescence. Redefining Race is a major advancement and original contribution to the fields of immigrant incorporation, racial and ethnic formation, and Asian American studies.”
—TAEKU LEE, professor of political science and professor of law, University of California, Berkeley
“Through a sophisticated marshaling of theory and evidence from historical archives, interviews and social surveys, Dina Okamoto demonstrates how Americans of Japanese, Filipino, Korean, Chinese, Indian, Vietnamese, and other origins created an Asian American identity and Asian American institutions in the last quarter of the twentieth century. Despite disparate languages and conflicting histories, leaders of ethnic organizations defined by their nation of origin and others would strategically organize along panethnic lines when they found common interests rather than simply respond to the wider American society’s imposition of race. Okamoto’s Redefining Race is a new benchmark for understanding the social construction of ethnicity and ethnic identity.”
—EDWARD TELLES, professor of sociology, Princeton University
In 2012, the Pew Research Center issued a report that named Asian Americans as the “highest-income, best-educated, and fastest-growing racial group in the United States.” Despite this optimistic conclusion, over thirty Asian American advocacy groups challenged the findings, noting that the term “Asian American” is complicated. It includes a wide range of ethnicities, national origins, and languages, and encompasses groups that differ greatly in their economic and social status. In Redefining Race, sociologist Dina G. Okamoto traces the complex evolution of “Asian American” as a panethnic label and identity, emphasizing how it is a deliberate social achievement negotiated by group members, rather than an organic and inevitable process.
Drawing on original research and a series of interviews, Okamoto investigates how different Asian ethnic groups created this collective identity in the wake of the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s. Okamoto documents the social forces that encouraged the development of this panethnic identity. The racial segregation of Asians in similar occupations and industries, for example, produced a shared experience of racial discrimination, which led Asians of different national origins to develop shared interests and identities. By constructing a panethnic label and identity, ethnic group members created their own collective histories, and in the process challenged and redefined current notions of race.
The emergence of a panethnic racial identity also depended, somewhat paradoxically, on different groups organizing along distinct ethnic lines to gain recognition and rights from the larger society. According to Okamoto, ethnic organizations provided the foundation necessary to build solidarity within different Asian-origin communities. Leaders and community members who created inclusive narratives and advocated policies that benefited groups beyond their own moved their discrete ethnic organizations toward a panethnic model. For example, a number of ethnic-specific organizations in San Francisco expanded their services and programs to include other ethnic group members after their original constituencies dwindled in size or assimilated. A Laotian organization included refugees from different parts of Asia, a Japanese organization began to advocate for South Asian populations, and a Chinese organization opened its doors to Filipinos and Vietnamese. As Okamoto shows, the process of building ties between ethnic communities while also recognizing ethnic diversity is the hallmark of panethnicity.
Redefining Race is a groundbreaking analysis of the processes through which group boundaries are drawn and contested. In mapping the genesis of a panethnic Asian American identity, Okamoto illustrates the ways in which concepts of race continue to shape how ethnic and immigrant groups view themselves and organize for representation in the public arena.
DINA G. OKAMOTO is an associate professor of sociology and director of the Center for Research on Race and Ethnicity in Society at Indiana University.
Winner of the 2015 Max Weber Award from the Organizations, Occupations, and Work Section of the American Sociological Association
Winner of the 2015 William T. Goode Distinguished Book Award from the Family Section of the American Sociological Association
Winner of the 2015 Distinguished Scholarly Book Award from the Labor and Labor Movements Section of the American Sociological Association
“How long is the workday, and how thick the paycheck? To these questions, scholars have offered answers. But the key questions, Dan Clawson and Naomi Gerstel propose in this fascinating book, are: how shielded are we from unpredictable demands? And how do we control the unpredictability we’re made to face? Comparing doctors, nurses, EMTs and nursing assistants, men and women, the authors explore the lives of the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’ of such control, as well as the friends, co-workers and family on whom they call to create orderly lives in an increasingly disorderly world. A thought-provoking and very important read.”
—Arlie Hochschild, professor emerita, University of California, Berkeley
“Unequal Time is a meticulously and creatively researched study of how time at home and work is understood and managed. Time is not only an individual possession, but is relational. ‘Normal unpredictability’ rules. Dan Clawson and Naomi Gerstel explore the gaps between the rhetoric and realities of workplace flexibility. They find that flexibility is not just a matter of choice, but power.”
—Robert Aronowitz, M.D., professor and chair, History and Sociology of Science,
University of Pennsylvania
“Dan Clawson and Naomi Gerstel provide a powerful account of how inequalities are at the core of many of the vexing problems of work and family. Based on in-depth multi-method research in the health care industry, and this compelling book will change the way you think about work time issues. Essential reading for scholars and practitioners alike.”
—Juliet Schor, professor of sociology, Boston College
“This book's careful research design pays enormous dividends: comparing four critical occupations in the health care sector, Dan Clawson and Naomi Gerstel generate important new insights into the ways class and gender inequalities interact to shape struggles for control over working time. Unequal Time demonstrates that gender and class advantage and disadvantage are deeply implicated in the dynamics of ‘work-family balance’ and ‘flexibility,’ complicating the conventional wisdom in a provocative and fruitful way. This book is indispensable for scholars, policymakers, and anyone who cares about working families.”
—Ruth Milkman, professor of sociology, The Graduate Center, CUNY
Life is routinely unpredictable. Control over one's time is a critical resource for managing that unpredictability, keeping a job, and raising a family. But the ability to control one's time, much like one's income, is determined to a significant degree by both gender and class. In Unequal Time, sociologists Dan Clawson and Naomi Gerstel explore the ways in which social inequalities permeate the workplace, reverberating through a web of time in which the schedules of one person shape the schedules of others in ways that exemplify and often exacerbate differences between men and women, the privileged and disadvantaged.
Unequal Time investigates the connected schedules of four health sector occupations: professional doctors and nurses, and working-class EMTs and nursing assistants. While the work-family literature mostly examines the hours people work, Clawson and Gerstel delve into the process through which schedules are set, negotiated, and contested. They show how workers in all four occupations experience the effects of schedule uncertainty but do so in distinct ways, largely shaped by the intersection of gender and class. Doctors, who are largely male and professional, have significant control over their schedules, though they often claim otherwise, and tend to work long hours because they earn respect from their peers for doing so. By contrast, nursing assistants, primarily female and working-class, work demanding hours because they face penalties for taking time off, no matter how valid the reasons. Without institutional support, they often turn to co-workers to help create more orderly lives.
Unequal Time shows that the degree of control that workers hold over their schedules can either reinforce or challenge conventional gender roles. When male doctors work overtime, they often rely on their wives and domestic workers to care for their families. Female nurses are more likely to handle the bulk of their family responsibilities, and use the control they have over their work schedules to dedicate more time to home life. Surprisingly, the authors find that in the working class occupations, workers frequently undermine traditional gender roles. Male EMTs often take significant time off for child care, and female nursing assistants sometimes choose to work more hours to provide extra financial support for their families. Employers often underscore these disparities by allowing their upper-tier workers the flexibility that enables their gender roles at home, while low-wage workers are pressured to put their jobs before any unpredictable events they might face outside of work.
We tend to consider personal and work scheduling an individual affair, but Clawson and Gerstel put forward the provocative hypothesis that time in the workplace is both collective and highly unequal. A valuable resource for workers' advocates and policymakers alike, Unequal Time illustrates how social inequalities in the workplace shape the lives of workers and their families.
DAN CLAWSON is professor of sociology at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
NAOMI GERSTEL is a distinguished university professor of sociology at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
Now considered a classic in the field, this book first called attention to what Kanter has referred to as the "myth of separate worlds." Rosabeth Moss Kanter was one of the first to argue that the assumes separation between work and family was a myth and that research must explore the linkages between these two roles.
ROSABETH MOSS KANTER holds the Ernest L. Arbuckle Professorship at Harvard Business School, where she specializes in strategy, innovation, and leadership for change.
