Never Done: Change and Continuity in Women’s Work

‘A woman’s work is never done’ says the old saying, referring to the endless round of household tasks assigned to women in the past.

Whether as housewives or domestic servants, most women worked in the home throughout the nineteenth century, kept there by social conventions that barred women from many occupations. But from the 1860s other paid work began to emerge for women, in Victoria’s expanding manufacturing industry, and then later in office jobs. The rise and fall of manufacturing and the transformation of office work, is also a story of women’s changing world of work. Housework changed too, but slowly, and even now women perform far more household tasks than men.

In this online live presentation Margaret Anderson reviews the history of women’s work in Victoria within the context of both continuity and change, with time for a Q&A at the end of the zoom.

Presented by the Old Treasury Building.