Ann Oakley (born 1944) is a distinguished British sociologist, feminist, and writer. She is Professor and Founder-Director of the Social Science Research Unit at the Institute of Education, University of London and in 2005 partially retired from full-time academic work to concentrate on her writing and especially new novels. Oakley is the only daughter of Professor Richard Titmuss and wrote a biography of her parents as well as editing some of his works for recent re-publication. Her mother Kathleen, née Miller, was a social worker.
She was educated at Somerville College, Oxford University taking her BA in 1965, having married fellow future academic Robin Oakley the previous year. In the next few years Oakley wrote scripts for children's television and wrote numerous short stories and had two novels rejected by publishers. Returning to formal education at Bedford College, University of London, she gained a PhD in 1969; the qualification was a study of women's attitudes to housework, from which several of her early books were ultimately derived. Much of her sociological research focused on medical sociology and women's health. She has also made important contributions to debates about sociological research methods.
Ann Oakley has written numerous academic works, many focusing on the lives and roles of women in society as well as several best-selling novels, of which the best-known is probably The Men's Room, which was adapted by Laura Lamson for BBC television in 1991, and which starred Harriet Walter and Bill Nighy. She has also written an early partial autobiography. She divides her life between living in London and in a rural house where she does most of her fiction writing. She is a mother and grandmother.
The above is an extract from Ann Oakley's Wikipedia page - some background information on who she is and what she has studied.
I have had a look through my Sociology Notes and Booklets and have found some information on how women were viewed/treated in the past that might be helpful when exploring Idea 3. These are:
Ann Oakley argued that the housewife role was created by men, and is not women's natural role - it is socially constructed. Oakley said that in pre-industrial times, women worked in family businesses (cottage industries). During industrialization (from about 1750 onwards), factories were being set up, and women worked in factories, mills and even in mines. A lot of mine workers were women and children, as this suited them as they were small.
However, laws gradually came in that restricted the work of women and children. Various factory and mine acts limited women's and children's employment, and banned them from more dangerous jobs. Children gradually became seen as vulnerable rather than as little workers - the concept of childhood as a separate stage of life emerged. This meant that children were now dependent on their parents as they couldn't work. It became the accepted belief that children needed care and supervision which fell to women. Having to supervise and care for children meant that women's working opportunities became restricted.
From 1841 up to the beginning of the First World War, a combination of pressure from male workers and from philanthropic reformers (people who wanted to change things for others own good) meant that government introduced many laws that restricted women's employment. Women were seen by many male factory workers as a threat to their employment - they were seen as rivals. By banning women's employment in certain jobs, men could keep the work for themselves and restrict their wives to the home (giving men the power as they earned the money). In 1841, committees of male factory workers called for the gradual withdrawal of all female labour from the factories. In 1842 the Mines Act banned the employment of women as miners. From the mid-1800s to the 1960s, marriage bars were in place in many jobs - these marriage bars meant that women had to leave their jobs when they got married.
The above is a few paragraphs from a booklet on feminism in sociology. I think this could help with my research because it talks about how women have been forced into the way they were, not just what they have been forced into.
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