This volume is distinctive because of its clear focus on gender stratification. It begins and ends with the question of structured inequality between the sexes. Because of this orientation, readers will find the book to be more crosscultural and historical than others available, and containing more information on theories of gender stratification. Nielsen clearly defines and summarizes the questions, issues, and debates in sex stratification and, without promoting a single theoretical explanation, provides a conceptual framework with which to study it and enough detail abut the nature of sex stratification to see how it is built into the very structure of society. In addition, an abundance of specific detail in the context of the general themes of the book is offered: from descriptions of genital mutilation and footbinding to theories that highlight the relation between capitalism and patriarchy; from studies of hermaphrodites and transsexuals to women's use of informal power; from historical analysis of the effect of nineteenth-century industrialization on the division of labor by sex to the women's liberation movement of the 1960s; from an analysis of how the family wage contributes to the gender gap in earnings to feminist theory in the 1980s.