ABSTRACT
This book analyses the impact that women cotton workers had on industrial development in Great Britain and the United States between 1780 and 1860. It argues that a broader framework than those currently offered by historians is needed to explain and understand women’s role in the industrial process of both Great Britain and the United States – one that allows for the complications of work and business and includes many definitions of ‘best practice’. Current historiography about the women cotton workers of both Britain and America emphasizes social concerns and defining how women’s lives and those of their families were changed by their waged labour outside the domestic environment. Explaining women’s employment patterns with a single cause, such as patriarchy, occupational segregation, or simplistic notions of choice does not allow for the complex determinants involved. This book reverses these debates and examines how these women sought to control their working lives. It is not intended to be an obviously feminist history, although I believe it will contribute to that literature. Rather, this book should change some views about women’s experiences of waged work through its examination of the variety of encounters women had working in the cotton mills. It highlights and explains the differences in women’s agency as operatives and workers in the process of industrialization and developing perceptions of women’s work. Furthermore, it sheds light on the development of relations between labour and management, male and female workers, and government and industry.
