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Originally printed in 1997. Women are a considerable portion of the labour force. The majority of them also establish relationships and become mothers. Combining work and family has created considerable problems for women, domestic circumstances and main responsibility for housework and children still affect women, meaning they enter the labour market with one hand tied behind their back. How do women today cope with the dilemmas caused by their dual roles? This book takes a critical look at the concept of dual roles, and makes an assessment of women's locations in the workplace and at home, considering both continuities and change. The book concentrates on a wide variety of issues around work, family and their interrelationships. Unresolved dilemmas from different cross-cultural perspectives are considered, integrating the problems of modern women.

The lives of young people are lived in the context of social changes associated with neo-liberal politics. In neo-liberalism, individuals are considered autonomous units who steer their own futures, and the transition from youth into adulthood is understood as a change from dependence into independence from family ties. It has been assumed that autonomy is the endpoint of this development. Yet this approach has turned out to be too restricted. Several studies suggest that the family still remains a significant component in the social, educational, emotional and material lives of young people. Parents are important resources in young people's paths to adulthood. In this article, we discuss changing reflections of young Finnish women and men on their relationships with their parents. We analyze parents as providers of material resources, as well as emotional and social ones, in order to facilitate the transition to adulthood. We suggest that whilst young people are willing to move from semi-dependence to independence in relation to material resources, in emotional and social terms they strive for interdependence. We came to know these young people in an ethnographic study when they began secondary school. This article draws from re-interviews with the same young people at the ages of 17–18 and 19–20.

Hvad jeg lærte om forskning i min sovepose...Skiftande identiteter och könsvarationer i yngre skolbarns samspel med kamraterWallflowers?

In this methodological article we discuss ways in which researchers observe girls and boys in the classroom. The article is based on a comparative cross-cultural, collective ethnographic study, 'Citizenship, Difference and Marginality in Schools: With Special Reference to Gender', which was conducted in secondary schools in Helsinki and London. When we analysed our own actions, we realized that educational researchers – like teachers – tend to concentrate on events taking place in the classroom, particularly visible and audible action. They are less likely to direct their gaze on stillness and silence. In most of the classes that we followed, boys used more voice, time, space and movement than girls, although there were also differences among girls and among boys. In the early stages of our study, noisy and physically active boys drew our attention. But in our practice as the research continued, and in this article, we turn our gaze onto non-events, and ask reflexive researchers to problematize their categories of active and passive. Drawing from our own observations, we discuss how activity, passivity and agency are conceptualized and gendered in educational research.

In this article, the authors draw on two qualitative, longitudinal studies of young people's transitions to adulthood and how they construct these transitions over time in social, cultural and material terms. The authors focus on the hopes, anxieties and imagined futures of young women. They discuss the individualization thesis, and the contradiction for female individualization between expectations of equality and the reality of inequality between the genders. The debate is moved beyond 'pitiful girls' and 'can-do girls' by exploring how young women in the UK and Finland anticipate and try to avoid being locked into the lives of adult women.

The twentieth century has been marked by the expansion of educational opportunities worldwide. It has been the century of education, and the role of the state in the promotion of public education has been decisive. Yet, at the millennium's turn efforts to diminish the role of the state are rapidly changing education, especially in terms of its role in democracy. This comprehensive handbook offers a fresh view of the social context of education, outlining the challenges as well as the advances in public and private education systems. The book offers a systematic account of current social theory and methodologies, applied perspectives on the development of education in many regions of the world, and compares key themes such as access, school choice, equity, and educational performance.