Occupational Community and Fishermen's Wives in a Newfoundland Fishing Village

Abstract

involvement, strong attachment to primary work groups and freedom from rigidly scheduled, machine dominated assembly line labor and supervisory constraints. The roles that women play, as actors in the occupational community and as effectors of occupational identity and ideology, are ignored Analysis of women's activities in the localfishery of a southwest coast Newfoundland fishing village demonstrates that women do act as arbiters of community ideology and identity through their family and household roles, extensive participation in women's voluntary associations, and labor in the fish processing sector. However, while female input to occupational identity and social imagery is psychologically functional at the intracommunity level, it does not contribute to the development of radical social action or the competitive viability of the local fishery in the world fishery markets.