TRANSFORMED BY TECHNOLOGY - THE CHANGING NATURE OF WOMENS TRADITIONALAND NONTRADITIONAL WHITE-COLLAR WORK

This article contributes to debates on gender and technology by examin ing how women's white-collar work is being reshaped in the financial a nd business service sectors in Canada. These sectors are of distinct i nterest given their growing use of 'second wave' technologies which ai m at 're-engineering' traditional work flows. The article examines the gendered dimensions of such change, focusing particularly on the pote ntial of new technologies to reshape task divisions, and job content, which have long been structured along specific gender and occupational lines. Case studies are used to examine how women's work is being tra nsformed in 'traditional' areas, such as secretarial work, as well as 'non-traditional' areas in para-legal work and insurance sales. The fi ndings show that there has been a blurring of task divisions between c lerical/non-clerical and female/male work, with women experiencing div erse consequences depending on their occupational location. The articl e illustrates the complexity of current processes of technological cha nge and the importance of tracing out interconnections between differe nt forms of white-collar labour.