Sexism and Reentry: Job Realities for Women Librarians

This book analyzes how two social forces-upheaval in the economy and the emergence of the women’s movement-acted together to provide a cultural context in which re-entry into the work force became a significant stage in the work process for many women and drastically altered women’s work and family roles. Re-entry into the work force emerged as a new pattern of labor force participation for women in the 1950s and has continued as a significant pattern into the 1980s. It provides a detailed account and statistical analysis of the results of Dickson’s 1983 survey of women librarians who tried to re-enter librarianship from 1965 to 1983. The survey sought to explore, in detail: (1) the characteristics of job seeking re-entry librarians 1965-1983; (2) reasons for seeking re-entry; (3) the process of job finding; (4) what factors contributed to employment success or failure; (5) the extent to which there were continuities and changes in the re-entry situation during the period 1965 through 1983; and (6) the extent to which the two classes selected for study, the classes of 1962 and 1972, were similar or different in re-entry efforts, success or failure. Among the most significant findings were that 16 percent of the survey population attempted re-entry, and of those only 67 percent were successful and that even those who were successful experienced many difficulties.