“Feminization of Work”
Angeline Henriquez
Digital Media and Society
Ross Definitions- “Feminization of Work”
In chapter 1 Ross dives into one aspect of the free-labor frenzy, internships, and how this has affected women in a disproportionate manner. Internships, Ross states, are “the fastest growing job category of recent years for a large slice of educated youth trying to gain entry into work places” (23). However, although individuals go to extreme measure to land and keep a white-collar internship, the chances of them getting a job out if it are slim. Ross compares it to “the equivalent of a lottery ticket”. The only real beneficiaries in this equation are the employers who make a profit of $2 billion dollars from the work employed by the interns. Ross then questions why, given the lack of transparency in white-collar internships, individuals are not running towards apprenticeships instead. Here is where it presents a conflict for women. Only “10% of registered apprentices are female” which results in women being allocated in 77% of unpaid internships, and thus affected disproportionately which is known among sociologists as the “feminization of labor” but Ross goes a step further in defining this term. He states that in this instance, the feminization of labor not only takes place because of the number of women in internships, but because of the lack of transparency and regulations that separate “task and contract” and “duty and opportunity”. This occurrence only promotes a communal mindset of self-exploitation as a rite of passage, and reinforces the blurry lines that underlie the unfairness in the freelance and salaried fields.
