ABSTRACT
This part introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters. The part focuses on the upper end of the distribution of black women in the workplace in her study of managerial black women. It recognizes the upper tier of a multitiered system of black female employment: those black women who work in nontraditional jobs; those who work in typically female professional jobs; those who work in typically female clerical jobs; those who are marginally employed in service and private household jobs; and those who revolve between work and welfare. Though black women's history has been a history of steady labor force participation, black women's work legacy has been low-paid, unstable work in the service sector. Though the status of black women has changed, the inequity that has tinged the work experience of black women remains the fruit of this legacy.
