Call for Papers: Women’s work in the rural areas - a long-term perspective (XII-XXI century)

RHN 51/2015 | Call

European Labour History Network (ELHN)

14-16 December 2015, Turin, Italy

Deadline: 30 June 2015

 

First Conference of the European Labour History Network (ELHN)

Women’s work in the rural areas:
a long-term perspective (XII-XXI century)

Women’s work and more broadly the gender history are fields of research that during the last few years are achieving a greater importance in the historiographical debate. The political, economic and cultural role played by women in the ancient régime societes and in the contemporary ones represents a new and stimulating topic, able to give a new importance to women for a long time victims of a “male” historiography. At the same time, this change in the research perspectives can be considered a symptom of a broader new reflection on specific historiographical categories and of a greater flexibility in the historical analysis that has in the research of the complexity one of his fundamental paradigms. This panel wants to be a summary of these elements: the aim is to gather the themes of the Global Labour History and the role played by women in the labour market, focusing the attention on the rural areas.

This is a field of research that scholars have not analyzed in a satisfactory way until now, so we encourage to submit proposal that suggest general questions on a long-term perspective (from the Middle Ages to our times), in order to promote future debates and in-depth analysis. The subjects included in the panel are the following ones:

  • The women’s role in the rural labour market from the putting out system to the industrial economy: amount and characterization of women’s presence.
  • Wage dynamics
  • National and International migrations: an exclusively male phenomenon?
  • Labour and life cycle: the work activity in the life of women, wives and mothers.
  • The role played by women in the trade-unions in the rural areas.

 

Given the huge number of themes, the panel can be broken up into various discussing groups depending on the number of attendance requests.

Please, send an abstract before June, 30, 2015 to Giulio Ongaro (giulio.ongaro@univr.it), coordinator of the SISLav – Labour and Rural Workers Group