Women's Work

Abstract

Of course, women have always worked, and their efforts, paid and unpaid, celebrated or unheralded, contributed to the building of Western Pennsylvania in incalculable ways. Factors such as class, race, age, marital status, religion, and ethnicity all impacted what women were allowed, expected, or not allowed to do. As a recent exhibition at the New-York Historical Society observed, beyond the reductive parameters inside and outside of the “domestic sphere,” women’s work has always defied easy categorization, a continual balancing act between home, family, faith, external needs, societal expectations, and other factors that shifted as our culture changed.