A Study On Unmarried Women's Employment In Urban America: 1870-1920

This thesis is on the issue of the employment of unmarried women in urban America between the late 19th century and the 20th century. During that period, the United States experienced a significant social transformation: from a traditional agricultural society to a modern industrial society. Thanks to the new industrial structure, the demand of labor in the United States had greatly increased. A large number of young unmarried women took this opportunity in the industry to leave their home and become the wage-earning women, which formed the trade of a female employment. This thesis will focus on the employment of unmarried women, thus tracing their hard course in terms of leaving from family submission for social and individual independence.The preface mainly introduces the foundation on which this topic is chosen. It includes current research situations at home and abroad, as well as methodology and deficiencies. And finally, some main concepts are also defined and explained in this part.The first part is based on a large number of government data, elaborating on the rise of unmarried women in the labor market, then analyzing the regional and sector distributions, races and national of unmarried working women. The main intention is to describe the trends of development of unmarried women.The second part analyzes the historical reasons of unmarried women engaging in labor force in details. It includes the opportunity of industrialization, immigration influx, development of female education, requirement of individual unmarried women and the traditional restriction of married women. Among them, the main factor is the opportunity of the industrialization, which has lead to the others. However, these factors are interconnected and interrelated. They have contributed to the rise of unmarried working women together.The third part discusses the hard conditions of the unmarried working women, and focuses on the three points: long working hours, low wages and unsanitary working conditions. And finally, makes a brief analysis of the causes.The fourth part describes the influence on the society of unmarried women's participation in occupations. This new phenomenon became a hot topic during that period. Thus, the nongovernmental and governmental power had to initiate some measures, which has improved the condition of the unmarried working women. Meanwhile, unmarried working women made a great impact on the traditional female culture and broadened their living horizon The conclusion summarizes the whole paper and points out the importance of the pursuit of the equality on the unmarried working women. Because of the fall of the unmarried working women and the rise of the married working women from the 1920s, this part just simply discusses the transformation and plans to have a continuing research in the future.