Women at sea
Women at Sea
 Ship`s hairdresser |
From being a stewardess or nursery nurse in 1930s to an
engineering officer today. The future for women at sea has many
more opportunities. From dining room to engine roomIn this narrative officers and crew members have usually been
referred to as `he`. This reflected the real situation at sea.
Women at sea worked only as stewardesses, as nurses on ships with
large numbers of passengers, and sometimes as cooks, or
entertainers on passenger ships. Until quite recently, going to sea
as a deck officer or engineer was seen as an exclusively male
profession. 
Women in a radio room |
In the last half century, this has changed. The lead may have
come from the former Soviet Union, where women often had more
freedom to take `male` jobs than in the west, including working at
sea. In the UK, the Union-Castle Line began to employ women
pursers, giving them the title `purserettes`. The next male
preserve to fall to women was the radio officer, although this job
has now practically disappeared. Today there is no technical
barrier to women becoming deck or engineering officers.
Nevertheless, most seafarers are still men, and ships often remain
a masculine environment.
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