Disability, Caring and Marriage: The Experience of Younger Couples when a Partner is Disabled after Marriage

Correspondence to Prof Gillian Parker, Nuffield Community Care Studies Unit, Leicester University, 108 Regent Road, Leicester, LE1 7LT Summary Despite a large literature on marriage and growing ones on disabilityand on caring there is little which specifically examines theexperience of disability and caring within marriage. This paperdraws on evidence from a small-scale qualitative study of couplesunder pensionable age where one partner had become disabledsince marriage. Partners were interviewed both together andseparately allowing exploration of ‘both sides’of the relationship. The paper first examines the couple's sexualrelationship and the ways in which impairment and caring affectedit. Both partners' views about the nature and meaning of marriageand how this related to their continuing relationship are thenexplored. Finally, by comparing different marriage and by comparingthe same marriages at different points in time, factors whichmight predispose marriages to break up after one of the partnersbecomes disabled are discussed. The research shows that marriedcouples are left virtually unsupported, either practically oremotionally, at times when their relationship may be under considerablestrain. Sexual relationships may falter or cease because oflack of knowledge, embarrassment or not knowing whom to approachfor help. Other couples may be left in an empty shell of a marriagebecause no practical alternatives to their situation are offered.     

No Longer “One of the Boys”: Negotiations with Motherhood,as Prospect or Reality,among Women in Engineering*

La maternité est généralement considérée comme constituant un tournant dans la carrière des femmes professionnelles, particulièrement chez celles qui occupent des emplois à prédominance masculine. S'inspirant de la documentation dans le domaine des femmes et du travail non traditionnel, l'auteure de cet article tente d'expliquer la signification critique de la maternité, antieipée ou réelle, pour les femmes travaillant dans le domaine de l'ingénierie. Elle va au‐delà des arguments plus conventionnels sur l'équilibre travail‐famille en suggérant que les femmes entreprennent une carrière en génie non en tant que femmes, mais conceptuellement comme des hommes – un statut qu'elles peuvent trouver difficile à conserver en tant que mères. Le défi pour celles qui deviennent effectivement mères est alors de gérer la tension découlant de l'obligation d'équilibrer deux identités potentiellement incompatibles – celle de«mère» et celle d'« ingénieure ». Cette conception est étudiée empiriquement au moyen de données d'interviews de 37 femmes formées comme ingénieures. Motherhood is widely considered to be a watershed in the careers of professional women, particularly those working in male‐dominated occupations. Building on the literature in the field of women and non‐traditional work, this paper seeks to account for the critical significance of motherhood, either anticipated or actual, for women in engineering. The paper moves beyond more conventional work‐family balance arguments in suggesting that women enter engineering not as women, but conceptually as men–a status that, as mothers, they may find difficult to maintain. The challenge for those who do become mothers, then, is to manage the tension of balancing two potentially incongruous identities–“mother” and “engineer.” This view is explored empirically through interview data from 37 women trained as engineers.     

Paraplegics in Scotland: a Survey of Employment and Facilities

Summary The results of a survey of employment facilities and socialservices available to 50 paraplegics living in Glasgow or thesurrounding counties are reported. The degree of unemployment in the group (74%) was far greaterthan has been reported in other surveys and although the generalunemployment level in the area is high, services to help thedisabled gain employment were only partially utilized. Liaison between social workers was not always successful. Someparaplegics were visited at home by both a medical social workerand a local authority social worker, while others were not supportedby either. There was no apparent attempt by local authoritiesto identify the disabled as is required in England under Section1 of the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act (1970) andseveral paraplegics lacked facilities which are covered by Section2 of the Act. It appeared that the exclusion of Scotland fromSections 1 and 2 of the Chronically Sick and Disabled PersonsAct might widen the differences between the two countries asthe Scottish legislation is less specific. (This work led to the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons(Scotland) Act, 1972; see note, p. 37.)