The Center for American Progress will feature a panel discussion around the book Reshaping the Work-Family Debate: Why Men and Class Matter by Joan C. Williams, founding director of the Center for WorkLife Law at the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. The revolution in gender roles has stalled—in the United States, women’s workforce participation and men’s household contributions both leveled off in the 1990s. Jumpstarting that revolution, Williams argues, requires opening up a national conversation about gender pressures on men. One key is to understand how men’s identities are intertwined with the mandate of work devotion. Is this mandate required by competitive economic pressures, or is it the contemporary equivalent of the joust—a ritual that enables men to prove who is a "real" man?
Keynote Speaker:
The Hon. Jim McDermott (D-WA), Chairman, Ways & Means Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support
Featured author:
Joan C. Williams, Author of Reshaping the Work-Family Debate: Why Men and Class Matter and Founding Director, Center for WorkLife Law, University of California, Hastings College of the Law
Additional panelists:
Katty Kay, Washington Correspondent for BBC World News America and co-author of Womenomics
Michael Kimmel, Professor of Sociology, State University of New York Stony Brook and author of The Politics of Manhood, The Gender of Desire, and The History of Men
Michael Selmi, Samuel Tyler Research Professor of Law, George Washington University Law School and author of numerous articles on work-life conflict, class, and men
Heather Boushey, Senior Economist, Center for American Progress and co-author of “The Three Faces of Work-Family Conflict”