Saturday, July 01, 2023

Sounds kinda different.

"The Gibbs School did much more than make its founder fabulously wealthy: It helped establish the image of the secretary as an unfailingly professional, naturally demure, and resolutely feminine helpmate. 'Katie Gibbs girls,' as they eventually came to be known, were fined for chewing gum in class. They prepared coffee in silver-plated urns, and from the 1940s to the mid-1960s were required to wear white gloves. Lucy Graves Mayo, a Gibbs instructor and author of the 1965 advice manual You Can Be an Executive Secretary, preached that achievement in the field required recognizing that the 'boss is KING.'”

~ Jess Bergman

"How Bosses Ate Feminism" | The New Republic

https://newrepublic.com/article/170220/bosses-ate-feminism

In 'WOMEN WORKERS AND THE YALE STRIKE,' her 1985 account of Yale’s nascent clerical and technical employee union, historian Molly Ladd-Taylor describes how, in the course of their organizing campaign, 'women who had never before stood up for themselves learned to run lunch meetings, speak before large groups, talk back to their supervisors, and lead other workers to stand up to Yale.' Collective action allowed them to step out of their everyday roles, and understand their own abilities in new ways. In other words, they felt empowered."

~ Jess Bergman

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