Mercedes Steedman, Angels of the Workplace: Women and the Construction of Gender Relations in the Canadian Clothing Industry, 1890–1940. Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1997. vii + 260. $24.95 paper.

Gender studies in history are at an intriguing point in their evolution. Having distinguished themselves from traditional historiography through a marked emphasis on language as the primary construction site of power relations, they have created a number of principal research tasks. One involves the retelling of history from the perspective of gender relations. A second consists of a description of the relationship between gender dynamics and those of other categories of identification, such as class and ethnicity. A third is the move from the “how” of the construction of gendered power relations to their “why.” In other words, it is the move from description to explanation. Despite a number of attempts to undertake the second and third tasks, this monograph by Mercedes Steedman most clearly presents itself as a gendered retelling of the history of the Canadian clothing industry, and it is in this light that it should be appreciated.