Traditions of Women and Work

This program combines the themes of "Women and Industrialization" and "Cross-dressing and the Sailor-Maid Dichotomy" to look at women as workers in two very different contexts. Taking shape over a 50-90 minute class, this presentation combines brief evocative explanations of the songs' contexts with the singing itself. The songs are then used as texts for our further discussion.

Women and Industrialization

The Factors that Brought Women into Factories

"My father was a farmer and I, his only daughter…"

"Millworker"James Taylor's song "Millworker" deals with the shift from family farm work to proletarianization in the US. "Millworker" shows the difficulties of factory work—namely the danger and the boredom.

The Need for Women Workers to Organize

"As we go marching, marching, we battle too for men, for they are women's children and we mother them again."

"Bread and Roses" Written shortly after the 1912 walkout of Lawrence, Massachusetts mill girls, "Bread and Roses" provides a radical historical vision of the struggle to organize. It is particularly interesting to scholars (and students) of gender because it uses Victorian ideals of women as morally superior to men in making its case.

Discussion
We don't usually think of "separate spheres" as being used as an argument for the rights of women in the work place, but "Bread and Roses" evokes this strategy. Many songs of this era provide examples of how women's labor organizing is viewed as gendered.

Cross-Dressing and the Sailor-Maid Dichotomy

The Progress Narrative

"When I Was a Fair Maid" The young woman narrator of "When I Was a Fair Maid" claims that she cross-dressed and went to sea for the excitement of joining the navy.
Most other folk songs about cross-dressing sailor-maids explain their female characters actions as being brought about by the search for a lost love.
In either case, the cross-dressing women are put into what Marjorie Garber calls a "progress narrative"—that is, rather than viewing cross-dressing as the primary activity which then opens up the possibility of a variety of "male" roles, the songs view the women as people who would not "normally" cross-dress, but do so in order to achieve some further goal. Garber's own example of the progress narrative, is the commonly expressed explanation that Billy Tipton—though biologically female—lived as a man in order to be a jazz musician.(See Note 1)

Discussion
Does this make sense given current thinking about cross-dressing and various other points along a spectrum of transexuality? If not, why is it such a powerful narrative in folk songs?

Discussion Questions
Why does this gender bending serve as such a key source of tension in the songs?
What underlying concerns about gender roles can we uncover by examining this tension?
What can this tell us about women in traditionally male occupations today?