Bearing Factors on Gender-based Work Segregation
The most important bearing factor on job segregation between men and women is social and cultural hangovers from traditional roles. Traditionally, jobs required brutal strength and physical endurance and they included activities such as cultivating and herding. Women were thus relegated to domestic chores that seemed easier. Technology has changed all that with a single turn of a lever being able to turn a 700,000-pound jumbo jet. Unfortunately, the presuppositions and assumptions associated with the traditional jobs have been visited in the new jobs despite the fact that men and women have gained parity in their capacity to work (Sawyer & Thoroughgood, 2017).
Why the Divisions Persist
The main reason for the persistence of divisions that are no longer based on any factual or logical premise is ignorance. People do not understand that in some cases, it would be beneficial to the family if the wife went to work and the husband took care of the kids, more so where the wife earns more than the husband. Ignorance has tied up the world into a past that no longer exists where the man was assumed to be professionally superior to the woman. This ignorance is unjustifiable and needs to be eliminated (Sawyer & Thoroughgood, 2017).
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Turning a Job Into a Gender Neutral One and an Example
Almost every job in the developed world currently is gender-neutral per se as any gender can perform it if the gender-based discrimination was to be eliminated. The first step in creating a gender-neutral job is to change the language used regarding the job into a gender neutral one (Sawyer & Thoroughgood, 2017). Any language with man or woman or where he or she is preferred should be changed to more neutral language. Another important step is training. For example, encouraging more women to train as doctors and more men to train as nurses. Finally, affirmative action is also necessary to encourage members of the gender that has lower numbers in a certain profession. The best example of where jobs have been made neutral is the clinical healthcare sector. Any reference of a doctor and a nurse would always be assumed to mean a male doctor and a female nurse. Today, it can very easily be a female doctor and a male nurse.
References
Sawyer, K., & Thoroughgood, C. (2017). Gender non-conformity and the modern workplace. Organizational Dynamics , 1 (46), 1-8
