Date of Award
4-1982
Degree Name
Master of Arts
Department
Sociology
First Advisor
Dr. Ellen Page-Robin
Second Advisor
Dr. David Chaplin
Third Advisor
Dr. Gerald Markle
Access Setting
Masters Thesis-Open Access
Abstract
Except for the highly unusual, women have been historically invisible. Based on the British Census of 1851, this exploratory and descriptive study uses a subsample of all heads of households drawn from a one-percent cluster sample of the population of Greater London. The theoretical model is stratification based on occupation, age, and sex. The occupational skill status of heads of households is examined and compared on the basis of age, sex, and marital status. Findings indicate that the major predictor of occupational skill is marital status, in complex interrelationships with age and sex. Women heads of households, supporting themselves in a mid-Victorian urban patriarchal society, occupied an anomalous position. In terms of occupational skills, married women heads of households had the lowest status; widows' occupational skill status varied by age, with the lowest held by the older subjects; single women consistently occupied the highest position, regardless of age and sex.
Recommended Citation
Robbert, Rosamond, "Sampling the Invisible: Occupational Status in Victorian England" (1982). Masters Theses. 1731.
https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/masters_theses/1731