Abstract
Black women workers in South Africa are highly marginalized in that their work has been undervalued and underpaid due to disadvantage and discrimination. They were severely curtailed by legislation that aimed to keep them away from urban areas and the formal job market. This paper reports the results of an empirical study of the work done by black women in the manufacturing and retail industries. The purpose of the study was to determine the kind of work black women do and the nature of the job processes. The article examines the main findings of the study.
Highlights
Gender oppression occurs in all societies and its form rests on the socio-political forces located in the society
The industrial register at the Bureau of Market Research (BMR) of the University of South Africa served as basis for choosing the sample
Question 8 in the questionnaire required fIrms to rate the extent to which they utilize the criteria in Table I to classify jobs
Summary
Gender oppression occurs in all societies and its form rests on the socio-political forces located in the society. In South Africa, women's oppression was mainly shaped by two socio-political factors: the ideology of apartheid and racial exclusivity which fostered white supremacy and black inferiority; and the development of the capitalist sector (Gwagwa, 1989). In South Africa, the oppression of black women was tightly bound to national oppression. The state viewed black women as the most inferior of all racial groups and capital regarded them as the cheapest source of labour. They had often no legal rights, could not own property, were given the least skilled jobs and were forced to eke out an existence in the tribal homelands. Black women were entrapped in a state of triple bondage in that they were oppressed as a race, a class and as women
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