Education and Gender Discrimination in the Workplace

                                                                                    Koroma1

Running Head: Education and Gender Discrimination in the work place ( The Wage Gap by Gender)

Kadija Koroma

11/17/2017

Ohio University

Women’s Gender and Sexuality Studies- Loran Marsan

Name of Interviewee- Char Rae

Date of interview- 11/07/2017

Title: Education and Gender Discrimination in the workplace (The wage Gap by Gender)  

                                                                                                                                           Koroma2

The experiences of my interviewee, Dr. Char Rae, shows how women went from being housewives to having the rights to education, and having the same jobs as men; however, women still experience discrimination (The Wage Gap) in the work place due to their gender.

Education holds an important role to people for many reasons. People wanted to be educated to pursue a career that they loved or to increase their knowledge about different diversity and cultural viewpoints. This was different for women. In the 19th century, it was difficult and rare for women to be educated. They were considered property of men. Women were meant to be in the house to rear children, look after the family, prepare food and keep the house clean. They were never included in trying to bring income to the family, so they were not required to be educated which was needed for jobs to earn money. Women wanted to have access to education that was free from sex discrimination. They wanted to hold the same jobs as men and they wanted financial independence. “Bell Hooks, an American author, stated that the most pressing problem for women was the need to get outside the home and work.” “Hooks argued that, work outside the home was the key to liberation and it would allow women to break the bonds of economic dependency on men.” In her article, “Re-thinking the Nature of Work” (1984), Bell Hooks stated that when women talked about work, they were equating it to “high paying careers” not low paying jobs or so called “menial labor” (95).  Since the approval of the Title IX in 1972, the rights to education that was free from sex discrimination was guaranteed. Women then started getting educated and because of their education, they started working side by side with males to bring income to the family.

                                                                                                                                    Koroma3

In my interview with Dr. Char Rae, she stated that her family suffered from poverty. Her parents were not educated, and they survived on low paying jobs that required labor. She never

saw herself doing jobs that required labor or technology, so she decided to go to college. She went to college because school was the only thing she was good at and she loved it. She also stated that the other major reason why she was inspired to be education was because of financial issues. She hated the idea of living in poverty and education was the only way for her to not live in poverty. She got her a Bachelor’s Degree, Master’s Degree and a PHD. Her experience in getting and education creates a connection with how women wanted to be educated to have sophisticated jobs instead of jobs that required labor. Being educated does not only give you the satisfaction of financial stability but also respect in society and a chance for your opinion to matter and be important.

However, with women being educated, they still experience inequality in the work place. Since their primary role is considered motherhood and homemakers, women are not given jobs with high positions. Women in all careers strive to gain equality in the workplace. Gender discrimination in the work place has being going on since the 1960s and is still a problem in the 21st century. Women get access to lower positions even with more experience and higher education. A reason why there is inequality in the workplace is because women are expected to attend family obligations like caring for an elder, caring for a sick family member and having a baby. Even in the case of some women not having children, they still do not have access to higher positions in the work place because they believe that men can get the job done better than women. If companies were more favorable to family schedules, women will hold the same positions as men.

                                                                                                                               Koroma4

According to my interview with Dr. Rae, she applied for a higher position at a job that she worked 10 years and she was denied. She was more qualified than her opponent who was a

male and a recent college graduate. She had more years of experience and a PhD with no children or a family of her own, but she wasn’t chosen. There are two types of discrimination- direct and indirect discrimination. Dr. Rae experienced indirect discrimination because as a woman, she was overlooked for a promotion. She also mentioned that she experienced age discrimination. Age would be considered as a factor for her not getting the position because her opponent was younger. “Eva Kittay, a philosophy professor at SUNY Stony Brook University, spoke about the idea of equality not serving all women well.” “Kittay argue that equality-based policies have failed women in the public arena as well as in the private sphere, neither achieving their goal in representation in political office nor in sharing of domestic chores and childbearing responsibilities.” Women have careers and still become mothers and home makers, but they don’t get appreciated or rewarded for it because that is what they are known for. In her book, “Love’s Labor”, (1999), Eva Kittay puts forth the idea of the dependency critique as “responding critically to the third formulation of sexual equality, the inclusion of women into an association of equals, an inclusion that gives women access to the rights and privileges held by men” (13-14).  Women want to have the same rights and privileges as men. They want to prove themselves that they can equally do what men do but they get denied of equality.