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Previous chapters addressed the persistence of inequality in existing institutions; this chapter examines persistence at sites of economic and social innovation. Evidence shows that gender stereotypes change more slowly than material arrangements between men and women (cultural lag). At sites of innovation, people implicitly draw on lagging stereotypes to help organize their uncertain new situations, rewriting gender inequality into the new organizational procedures and structures they create. Some of these new organizational routines spread widely to become blueprints for new industries and social forms, reinventing but also modifying inequality for a new era. This argument is examined through studies of innovative work sites (biotechnology and information-technology start-ups) and forms of heterosexual union (student hook-ups).

This chapter provides a summary of changing sexual behaviour and attitudes in the first two thirds of the 20th century. It shows that English sexual mores were shaped by ignorance of physical sexuality and reproduction, the estrangement of the genders, and deep-seated reticence. The contribution of highly sexually active (previously described as promiscuous) heterosexual and homosexual men and women to sexual change was important, but such people remained a minority and the majority of the population limited their sexual activity severely in the interwar period and continued to be sexually conservative well into the post-war period.

Power dynamics in one’s family of origin shape internalized notions of normative family relationships. Therefore, the division of housework in one’s family of origin socializes children to hold specific attitudes and beliefs about how relationships should work. We examine this hypothesized empirical relationship in Chapter 9 of the book by using Latent Profile Analysis to identify profiles for the adult children of the NSFH couples used to construct the five housework classes (Ultra-traditional, Traditional, Transitional Husbands, Egalitarian, and Egalitarian High Workload). We found three classes for adult female children (Ultra-traditional, Traditional, and Nontraditional) and three classes for adult male children (Traditional, Transitional, and Nontraditional). Children responded to their parental division of labor in gendered ways, providing evidence for not only the parental socialization of housework behaviors but also the challenges faced by women and men in the changing cultural climate of the United States around gender and family responsibilities.

This chapter focuses on another historical source of gender change: a powerful wave of immigration into the United States. It begins by discussing the competing patterns of gender differentiation that immigrants brought and the ways in which immigration infused American gender culture with individual transformation and social diversity. The chapter also explores the challenges to gender orthodoxy, and how new immigrants met postmodernity and magnified the force of gender change.

Chapter 1 presents an overview of the key issues and previous research relevant to changing gender roles and family formation. The chapter presents a review of the literature covering several inter-related topics. These include changing gender role attitudes and behaviour, as well as the relationship between women’s labour force participation and fertility. The effects of family policies on women’s labour force participation and fertility are also discussed. Special attention is paid to the demographic changes which have been occurring and the emergence of new family forms. Finally the chapter looks at the economic and social effects of these changes on society and the psychological effects of the changing nature of the family on individuals and on society. The approach is international, with a special focus on Ireland.

This concluding chapter of the book summarizes our key findings, focusing on the evidence of housework as a proxy for understanding power dynamics in couples. We present suggestions for practitioners based upon the changing demographics of the United States along side our insights from the Latent Profile and Latent Trajectory Analyses described in the book. We conclude with suggestions for family scholars interested in trying to understand power dynamics in intimate relationships.

Discusses, in 2001, the then current position of transsexuals in the law. The Court of Appeal had applied the Corbett rule in the case of Bellinger v Bellinger, and the European Court of Human Rights were showing signs of impatience with the UK position on the matter. Bellinger was subsequently affirmed in the House of Lords, the European Court's patience snapped in 2002 and the Gender Recognition Act 2004 was passed.

Among the Jads, the women belong to the social and the men to the natural order; therefore, the village belongs to the women who play the central role in social life and village economy. In this chapter the work and lives of women are described as well as their location and agency within the social order. It discusses the role-playing of women while situating the Jad women within the larger social universe of Himalayan women and Tibetan cultural influence. It details the division of labour, construction of ideal gendered personhoods, and highlights the lives of the woman village political head and the Buddhist nun, along with the other local women. It also discusses changing gender relations and women’s attitudes towards marriage and men, and emphasizes their comparative individuality and agency linked to practices of village endogamy, inheritance patterns, and women’s control over economic and social resources.