Although there have been many equity initiatives to encourage women to train and work in the trades, Canadian women still represent less than 3 percent of tradesworkers. Why does this disparity continue to exist? in Men & Women and Tools, Marcia Braundy - herself a tradesperson - explores this issue by focusing on male resistance To The inclusion of women in technical work. Early in her research, Braundy conducted an interview with several male and female tradespeople. Finding this interview rich with deeply ingrained notions of masculinity and femininity, Braundy constructs a short play from their words. Deconstructing the play line by line, this book weaves together scholarly research and lived experience to explore the historical and cultural origins of the ideas expressed."We know that class is gendered, and that often upper class professionals and blue collar working men set the highest barriers to women's entry. In her careful and erudite book, Marcia Braundy brings together the tools of the trade And The hands that hold them. By exploring men's resistance to equality, this book explodes the myths on which that resistance is based.

" - Michael Kimmel, author of the Gendered Society, Professor of Sociology, Stony Brook UniversityThis is a singular book-academic and accessible, critical and creative, political and passionate. With a lifelong commitment to feminism, social activism, and education, Marcia evokes and provokes transformative possibilities for living with imagination, intellect, and heart. - Carl Leggo, poet and professor, The University of British Columbia.