ABSTRACT
Whenever a social issue emerges and receives public attention, much controversy and debate occurs over its definition and boundaries (Gillespie and Leffler, 1987). Sexual harassment is no exception. Prior to 1976 (MacKinnon, 1979; cf. Farley, 1978), sexual harassment was just a part of everyday life for working women where such treatment was considered “business as usual”. However, with Farley’s (1978) book, Sexual Shakedown: The Sexual Harassment of Women on the Job, such businessas-usual behaviors were relabeled as “sexual harassment.” Such is the case currently with the identification of incivility and bullying in the workplace, which emerged as a topic of importance in the 1990s (Jones, 2006). Other chapters have described bullying in greater detail. In this chapter, we discuss sexual harassment research and literature as a critical source from which we can increase our understanding of workplace mistreatment.
