We'll Call You If We Need You: Experiences of Women Working Construction (ILR Press books) [Paperback]

Susan Eisenberg (Author)

Book Description

Series: ILR Press books | Publication Date: February 1999

"For my very first day in union construction I was sent to a bank in downtown Boston where a journeyman needed a hand pulling wire. Arriving early with my new tools and pouch, I knocked on the glass door in the high-rise lobby and explained to the guard that I was a new apprentice working for the electrical contractor. He refused to let me in. So I sat down on the tile floor, my backpack and toolpouch beside me, and waited for the man whose name I had written down alongside the address and directions on a piece of paper: Dan. The guard explained to Dan later that he'd figured I was a terrorist planning to bomb the bank. In 1978, that seemed more likely than that I might actually be an apprentice electrician."

Susan Eisenberg began her apprenticeship with Local 103 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers in 1978, the year President Jimmy Carter set goals and timetables for the hiring of women on federally assisted construction projects and for the inclusion of women in apprenticeship programs. Eisenberg expected not only a challenging job and the camaraderie of a labor union but also the chance to be part of a historic transformation, social and economic, that would make the construction trades accessible to women.

That transformation did not happen. In this book, full of the raw drama and humor found on a construction site, Eisenberg gracefully weaves the voices of thirty women who worked as carpenters, electricians, ironworkers, painters, and plumbers to examine why their numbers remained small. Speaking as if to a friend, women recall their decisions to enter the trades, their first days on the job, and their strategies to gain training and acceptance. They assess, with thought, passion, and twenty years' perspective, the affirmative action efforts. Eisenberg ends with a discussion of the practices and policies that would be required to uproot gender barriers where they are deeply embedded in the organization and culture of the workplace.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

At a time when feminism seems mired in the hermeneutics of gender--whether, for instance, there is such a thing as feminine discourse or a feminine management style--We'll Call You When We Need You serves as a refreshing reminder of what movements like feminism and affirmative action truly stand for. Twenty years ago, Susan Eisenberg showed up for her first day as a union electrician, only to be refused entrance by the building's security guard. He thought she was a terrorist; as Eisenberg puts it, "In 1978, that seemed more likely than that I might actually be an apprentice electrician." Also in 1978, the federal government first put into place its ambitious time lines for opening construction work to women; in three years, the Department of Labor anticipated, women would constitute 6.9 percent of the industry's workforce. Perhaps predictably, this never came to pass, and what women did find work in the trades did so in the face of considerable hostility, abuse, and even physical violence from their male coworkers. We'll Call You When We Need You is the story of how these women persevered, learned their trades, and in the process prevailed. Eisenberg allows their voices to speak directly to the reader, intertwining interviews with her own observations on topics ranging from job training to sexual harassment. The 30 women represented here speak with passion and humor about their lives as carpenters, electricians, and plumbers, using 20 years of experience to evaluate what feminism and affirmative action have achieved--as well as what they have not. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Library Journal

Eisenberg, a master electrician and poet, shattered more than one female stereotype when she began her apprenticeship with Local 103 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers in 1978. Affirmative-action programs had been initiated, and it was thought that a historic transformation was beginning in the construction industry. But as evidenced by her interviews with 30 women carpenters, electricians, painters, plumbers, and ironworkers, the attitude of "Here comes another damn woman on the job" has remained intact. Eliciting gritty insights during her interviews, she reveals indignities and disillusion as well as the strategiesAincluding humorAthat women have used to survive on these jobs. She also discusses why change has not occurred and why women put up with the abuse: "I hated [the foreman]," says one woman, "I just kept my mouth shut because I needed the job." Eye-opening and often disturbing, this is a fine study on the limits of affirmative action that can be appreciated by lay readers and scholars alike.AKay Meredith Dusheck, Univ. of Iowa, Anamosa
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: Cornell University Press (February 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 080148605X
• ISBN-13: 978-0801486050
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #437,559 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

A poet, multidisciplinary artist, author and educator, Susan Eisenberg grew up in a three-generation household in Cleveland, and raised her family in Boston. Her projects often combine or cross genres to re-imagine the everyday, playing with scale and juxtaposition to investigate issues of power and social policy.

Introduced to the craft of poetry by Denise Levertov, Susan holds a BA in Women's Studies from the University of Michigan, an MFA in Creative Writing from the Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College, and a master electrician's license from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. She entered the construction industry in 1978, when affirmative action opened those jobs to women, and worked fifteen years as a union electrician. She lectures nationally and internationally on issues of occupational segregation. Her nonfiction book, We'll Call You If We Need You, was selected as a New York Times Notable Book.

Susan taught creative writing for a decade at the University of Massachusetts Boston, and is currently a Resident Artist/Scholar at the Women's Studies Research Center of Brandeis University, where her projects focus on employment equity and patient-centered medical care. She has developed two touring exhibits: the photographs and poems of Perpetual Care, and the mixed media art installation, On Equal Terms, that exhibits February - May 2012 at the Michigan State University Museum of Art. See www.susaneisenberg.com for images and www.susaneisenberg.wordpress.com to join a blog conversation to Move the Decimal Point.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An American Classic, December 12, 2006

By 

Richard Coeur de Lion "Free Man In Paris" (BOSTON, MA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: We'll Call You If We Need You: Experiences of Women Working Construction (ILR Press books) (Paperback)

Susan Eisenberg honored our literature class at UMass/Boston with a poetry reading. This wonderful poet constructs vivid images which are rooted in her experience on the front lines of the Women's Movement. As a man, I didn't really expect to identify with her work. MEA CULPA. If you've ever had a dream of better life, a better place, a better YOU - then this is the author for you. My dad, a retired lineman and Eisenberg's union brother in the IBEW, can't get enough of her work. A true American classic.