Gender, work and identity: a case study from the English further education sector

Abstract

English further education (FE) has traditionally been dominated by men. For decades FE, with its emphasis upon vocational education and training, was characterised by a preponderance of male staff and students and a somewhat masculine culture. However, the past two decades have seen a significant numerical and cultural feminisation of FE. Whilst this could partly be a result of an ‘organic’ development deriving from the changing nature of work and the structure of the economy more broadly, this paper argues that the feminisation of FE can only be fully understood at the intersection of critical structural and post‐structural perspectives. Data from a case study are used to illuminate this argument and to provide insights from the perspective of men in the college workplace – men that have witnessed the transformation of FE from the patriarchal peculiarities of local authority control to its position today.

Keywords:

• gender
• further education
• England

Acknowledgement

I would like to thank my colleagues, Pamela Fisher and Roy Fisher, at the University of Huddersfield for their helpful feedback on an earlier draft of this paper.