Policy Press

Ann Oakley

Ann Oakley is Professor of Sociology and Social Policy at the UCL Social Research Institute. A social researcher for more than 50 years, and author of many academic publications, she is also well known for her biography, autobiography and fiction. Her books include The Sociology of Housework, From Here to Maternity and The Men's Room which was serialised by the BBC in 1991, and most recently Women, Peace and Welfare (Policy Press, 2018).
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Welfare and wellbeing

Richard Titmuss's contribution to social policy

This book brings together a selection of Richard Titmuss's important writings on a range of key social policy issues, together with commentary from experts in the field.

The companion volume is, Private complaints and public health: Richard Titmuss on the National Health Service edited by Ann Oakley and Jonathan Barker (The Policy Press, 2004).

Policy Press

Private complaints and public health

Richard Titmuss on the National Health Service

Richard Titmuss was one of the 20th century's foremost social policy theorists. This accessible Reader is the first compendium of his work on public health, health promotion and health inequalities.

Policy Press

The Ann Oakley reader

Gender, women and social science

Edited and selected by the author, this reader starts with work first published in the early 1970s. Ann Oakley's research and writing on sex and gender, housework, motherhood, women's health, and social science have influenced many inside and beyond social science, helping to shape the academic study of women and gender up to the present day.

Policy Press

Fracture

Adventures of a broken body

Fracturing her arm in the grounds of a hotel in the USA leads Ann Oakley on a journey into some critical themes of modern Western culture.

Policy Press

Father and Daughter

Patriarchy, Gender and Social Science

Father and daughter provides an unique ‘insider perspective’ on two key figures in twentieth-century British social science, combining biography of Richard Titmuss and autobiography by his daughter Ann Oakley.

Policy Press

Women, Peace and Welfare

A Suppressed History of Social Reform, 1880-1920

Between 1880 and 1920 many women researched the conditions of social and economic life in Western countries, driven by a vision of a society based on welfare and altruism. Ann Oakley uses the women’s stories to bring together the histories of social reform, social science, welfare and pacifism.

Policy Press

From Here to Maternity

Becoming a Mother

Ann Oakley interviewed 60 women to find out what it’s really like to have a baby. She discusses whether and why women want to become pregnant, how they imagine motherhood to be, the experience of birth, post-natal depression, feeding and caring routines and the challenges for the domestic division of labour and to fathers.

Policy Press

Social Support and Motherhood

The Natural History of a Research Project

Ann Oakley develops a sociology of the research process, telling how a research project on caring and social support is undertaken. It has much resonance for social science researchers and others interested in the experiences of mothers, and the relations between social research, academic knowledge and public policy.

Policy Press

The Sociology of Housework

Ann Oakley analysed the perceptions of 40 urban housewives around housework, their feelings of monotony and fragmentation, the length of their working week, the importance of standards and routines, and their attitudes to different household tasks. This classic book paved the way for the sociological study of many more aspects of women’s lives.

Policy Press

Forgotten Wives

How Women Get Written Out of History

Forgotten Wives examines how marriage has contributed to the active ‘disremembering’ of women’s achievements. Ann Oakley uses case studies of four women married to well-known men to ask questions about gender inequality and contributes a fresh vision of how the welfare state developed in the early 20th century.

Policy Press

The Science of Housework

The Home and Public Health, 1880-1940

This book recaptures the buried history of the household science movement, including domestic science teaching, public health, higher education for women and the scientific content and aims of domestic science courses.

Policy Press