Analysing work: arguments for closer links between the study of labour relations and gender

This paper argues that research on feminised terrain suffers a professional discount in the field of labour relations, and that understandings of work are impoverished by this discounting and the quarantining of “gender” in the study of working life. Secondly, the paper sets out a number of feminist concepts that illuminate understandings of work. Thirdly, the article poses a series of challenges that face feminist researchers at present, arguing that their attention to a number of issues – including the closer study of the material aspects of work, alongside its many other dimensions – remains a challenging and important task.