Women’s Work
AN INTERNATIONAL PUBLIC ANTHROPOLOGY PROJECT
About
Women’s Work is an international public anthropology project documenting how collective action enables women’s economic independence and supports women-led responses to shared global challenges.
Research is led by Amanda Aronson.
Approach is guided by a trauma-informed, non-extractive research ethic emphasizing collective structures, consent, and community benefit.
Field Notes
Explore the Field Notes below to follow research in progress around the world.
Each card highlights a different site and shares themes, evolving insights, and stories from women leading change.
Research includes ethnographic fieldwork, network and systems analysis, and policy-oriented documentation. Field Notes track collective action, scale, and systemic impact across multiple sites.
Women’s Collective Action Has Global Impact
Women’s Work explores how women build economic independence through collaboration. It highlights how small collectives support one another with shared labor and resources, and how these efforts can grow to influence larger systems. Through comparative, multi-site research, Field Notes reveal patterns that recur across communities, sectors, and scales.
Below, the areas of focus are organized into three thematic systems to show how collective care and repair can scale from everyday practice into lasting structural change.
Labor, Trades, & Environmental Resilience
Examples of where women are building skills, participating in workforce development, and strengthening community resilience in traditionally male-dominated trades and environmentally-focused industries.
Global Market & Material Systems
Examples of where women-led enterprises are expanding care-based and economic networks, supporting artisan collectives, and increasing women’s benefit from global value chains.
State Policy & Infrastructure
Examples of where women are embedded in local, state, and national networks, driving change in economic development, and leading the policy and planning work that shapes wellbeing and opportunity.
