A Cultural History of Work in the Modern Age

A thematic overview of work and its role in and impact on Western society and politics in the period from 1920 to the present.

Winner of the 2020 PROSE Award for Multivolume Reference/Humanities

Changes in production and consumption fundamentally transformed the culture of work in the industrial world during the century after World War I. In the aftermath of the war, the drive to create new markets and rationalize work management engaged new strategies of advertising and scientific management, deploying new workforces increasingly tied to consumption rather than production. These changes affected both the culture of the workplace and the home, as the gendered family economy of the modern worker struggled with the vagaries of a changing gendered labour market and the inequalities that accompanied them. This volume draws on illustrative cases to highlight the uneven development of the modern culture of work over the course of the long 20th century.

A Cultural History of Work in the Modern Age presents an overview of the period with essays on economies, representations of work, workplaces, work cultures, technology, mobility, society, politics and leisure.