The Gendering of Artistic Labour in Mid-Victorian Britain

Abstract

In contrast with earlier periods when work was considered to be an activity commanding low social status (such as classical Greece and feudal Europe), post-Reformation Europe, especially during the industrial revolution, saw the idea of work become highly charged with religious and moral significance. A long debate inaugurated by Max Weber in his essay of 1904–5, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, and continued by R.H. Tawney² and others has problematized the intellectual and ideological roots of this cultural formation, acknowledging that the duty of work came to occupy a central position in ethical as well as economic theory and behaviour. However, the central role of gender in discourses of work has been largely overlooked. Focusing on British middle-class and artisan culture of the nineteenth century, this chapter examines ways in which work came to be associated predominantly with masculinity. This is not to say that women did not work in the nineteenth century; on the contrary, the employment of women in industry was on a massive scale. Domestic service was predominantly carried out by women, and, as Davidoff and Hall (1987) have shown, many middle-class women were involved in business enterprises.³ Nonetheless, across a wide range of representations and ideological forms, from the novel to painting, from political debate to journalism and philosophy, work was perceived and presented as an essentially masculine activity.

This chapter derives in part from research conducted for my doctoral thesis, ‘Representations of Labour in British Visual Culture, 1850–75’ (1994), which is currently in the process of revision for publication. I would like to acknowledge the constant support and inspiration provided by my supervisor, Marcia Pointon.