8 March 2021
Webinar
17:00
8 March 2021
Dr Ioana Ramia
The gendered effects of COVID-19
About this event
This event has now expired
COVID-19 has affected the rich and the poor, and we have seen different tactics to contain the spread of the virus, approaches to protect vulnerable people and different policy responses to support those in need. Yet, while we are all at risk of suffering from this virus we are not all equally affected by it.
Gender-based inequalities have long been discussed, but they become more evident in times of crisis. They become evident at home, at work and in the broader society. Gender is one way to approach the discussion of inequality, and this discussion becomes further complex when we interweave aspects like disability, age or race.
Some talk about the ‘double double shift’ or the ‘third shift’ that women are doing at home. In some homes men and women are sharing - more or less equally - the cooking, cleaning, looking after children or supporting them with remote learning, while both partners are working from home or not.
In other homes, men hold the secure job and the woman’s paid work has become secondary, her role being primarily to ‘keep everything afloat’ at home - pushing us back to the 1950s.
Some situations are also brighter than others. We have seen an unprecedented increase in the cases of domestic violence, where most often the victim is a woman.
Many jobs have been lost, but as women are overrepresented in industries like tourism and hospitality, or are more likely to be employed casually, women and men have been disproportionately affected by job losses. This will unavoidably have a negative impact on women’s financial independence and well-being.
We have also seen in Australia, unfortunate reactions against people of different races, opening a whole new discussion at the crossroads between gender and race.
In this webinar, a panel of experts from across the studies of gender, human rights, workplace relations and financial wellbeing, discuss the effects of the pandemic – and crisis situations in general – on women.
The panel also discuss the inequalities we should be prepared to address and the potential tactics we should apply to ensure existing disadvantage is not further entrenched. The webinar also taps into the experience of women in different circumstances, including women in academia.
8 March 2021