sorry, i've overposted here, but really... to amplify gordon's polite point... and to note to chris that, again, i just cannot separate white from male from class so frickin easily....
the question "what is work" isn't "just" a definition thing and i don't think gordon means to present it this way.
attitudes about "real" work lead to the systematic devaluation of some kinds of work so that it is paid less because it is supposed to be done for its own intrinsic rewards. why do you think that there is systemic labor market segregation. while there is plenty of "sexism" such that employers actually do pay women and people of color less than their male/white equals much more of it has to do with labor market segregation into jobs that appear to be "natural" choices. as my studs say, ofcourse women should be social workers. men just can't do it. as a friend used to say, "my sitter is so great. i just don't know how she does it. not just anyone can take care of kids all day long. what a job. she's a special person" all the while paying her $1.50 an hour for the "honor" of doing something she was a natural at, while other women just couldn't take care of kids all day long. <barf>
it has real consequences so that in bourg and marxist theory both, the work of "reproduction" isn't accounted for. it has real consequences such that i've seen ardent marxists argue that we shouldn't organize sex workers on the same grounds that we unionize other kinds of work because sex work isn't the same kind of work as, say, sashaying your fanny in front of patrons at the diner while you sling their hash.
it has real consequences so that some work is seen as redemptive and worthy, while the rest isn't. it provides some work with "status" so that a professor earns less than some manual laborers, but she's accorded a helluva lot more respect than say, the truck driver ex who would face uncomfortable silence whenever the inevitable, "what do you do" question came up and you saw the thoughts pass, "what is she doing with this bozo. oh, i guess it's b/c he's good looking..." (and, of course, as i finally learned that meant that i couldn't be taken seriously b/c well i actually was something other than a talking head, as one prof used to call professorial labor)
it leads some people to aver "white collar work" and pat themselves on the back for their manual labor. it leads them to engage in their own stereotypes and biases that make cutting across these status differences harder to do if you're trying to organize. i been there on that one. it's not easy to overcome them from both sides.
it means that in the mid 80s wives were doing an entire month of 24 hr days more of the second shift than their husbands, with middle class and upper middle class professional men being the bigger offenders -- precisely because they were accounting for their perception that they'd been doubly emasculated: sharing the breadwinning with wifey and engaging in labor that wasn't manly as their father's had engaged in.
yadda yadda.