Care Work Archives - Public Seminar

Capitalism

Resurgent Dreams of the Capitalist Family’s Positive Supersession

To have family is to own something

March 30, 2026 • by Sophie Lewis

“The Left has largely abandoned questions of the family,” charged the queer and trans Marxists K. D. Griffiths and J. J. Gleeson in 2015. “Tacitly, at least, leftist organizations today have accepted families as a feature of contemporary capitalist society, which they will do nothing to end.” The authors’ timely ...

Resurgent Dreams of the Capitalist Family’s Positive Supersession

Body & Mind

Mothers Resist!

Why communal care must be at the heart of feminism

September 12, 2025 • by Maggie Wyss

Privatized parenting asks individuals to do the work of a village and then punishes them when they can’t keep up....

Podcast

What Austerity Has done to Care Work and Care Workers: An Interview with Emma Dowling

Unproductive Labor Podcast, Episode 14

May 6, 2022 • by Luke Mergner and Pete Sinnott

Unproductive Labor · What Austerity Has done to Care Work and Care Workers: An Interview with Emma Dowling Emma Dowling is a sociologist and political scientist and teaches at the University of Vienna. She previously held academic positions in Germany and the UK. Her research interests include political economies of unpaid ...

Migration

At the Border

Going into Poland’s forests to help migrants gave me a sense of peace but the journey is far from over

December 17, 2021 • by Pawel Knut and Franciszka Sady

Before leaving for Podlachia I naively assumed that my trip would have a beginning and an end, that I would gain a better understanding of the ongoing crisis and the role people such as myself could play in it. I seem to have reached some geographical and symbolic end. However, ...

Education

Being a Woman is Work

How capitalist society (de) values ‘female’ labor

November 30, 2017 • by Judith Elster

This is essay is part of the OOPS course Law and Sexuality. The current division of labor has been perceived as equal for many, but remains impractical in the long term, especially in our contemporary capitalist America. The challenges that come with capitalism, such as inflation and recession, has forced each member ...