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Farewell to the organization man: The feminization of loyalty in high-end and low-end servicejobs
Author(s): Karla Erickson and Jennifer L. PierceSource: Ethnography, Vol. 6, No. 3, SPECIAL ISSUE: GEOGRAPHIES AT WORK (September 2005),pp. 283-313Published by: Sage Publications, Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/24047861Accessed: 13-11-2015 20:48 UTC
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Ethno
ARTICLE
graphy
Copyright
2005 SAGE Publications
(London,
Thousand
Oaks,
CA and New
Delhi)
www.sagepublications.com
Vol
6(3): 283-313[DOI: 10.1177/1466138105060759]
Farewell to the organization man
The feminization of
loyalty
in
high-end
and
low-end
service
jobs
Karla Erickson
Grinnell
College,
Iowa,
USA
Jennifer L. Pierce
University of Minnesota, USA
ABSTRACT
Utilizing
data from two
ethnographic
case
studies,
one
of
high-end
service workers
in
a
powerful corporate
law firm
(paralegals)
and another
of
low-end service workers in a
small
family-run
restaurant
(food
servers),
this article
presents
a
comparative
analysis
of
the
consequences
of the transformation
of
the US
economy
and
accompanying
changes
in
the
culture(s)
of work for
women and men and
specifically
of
the
meanings
of
loyalty
in our
contemporary
service
society. Drawing
from
the cultural
repertoires
available,
women
and
men
make
gendered
sense
of
loyalty.
Women,
the vast
majority
of workers in these
two
jobs,
tell
stories of investment in their
jobs
and
personal
loyalty
to their
co-workers,
customers,
and bosses. But men mobilize their
masculinity
to detach their
sense of self from
perceived
feminized
work,
seeing
themselves as
occupational
transients who are on their
way
to more
appropriate
careers
or,
in the case of
waiters,
rejecting
narratives of
professional masculinity
in
defiance
of the
unsatisfying occupational landscape
available to them
as
working-class
men.
KEY
WORDS service
work,
emotional
labor,
gender,
waitresses,
paralegals, loyalty
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284
Ethnography
6(3)
My boss is such a good guy. It's the [law] firm that I could care less about.
They
get
my
time,
but
they
sure as
hell don't
get anything
else.
(Interview
with
Debbie,
a
paralegal)
What do I
like about
serving?
I like
interacting
with the
people.
I've known
so
many people
for so
long,
it's not
really
like
a
job.
I
call it
my
little social
life.
(Interview
with
Jessica,
a
waitress)
We are
currently experiencing nostalgia
for the
golden age
of
company
loyalty
... Is the death of the
company
man
something
that
should
be
lamented or celebrated?
(Adrian
Wooldridge,
New York Times
Magazine,
March
2000)
The notion
of
the
'organization
man' as
loyal
and conformist to
corporate
life was a dominant cultural motif in the
1950s
in the
United States
(Carroll
and
Noble,
1988;
Mills, 1951; Newman, 1998;
Whyte,
1957).
Contained
within
this narrative is an
implicit
social contract
between
workers and
corporations:
if
workers are
loyal
to the
company
and work
hard,
they
will
be rewarded in terms of
promotions,
raises,
and
job security by
the
employer.
The
meaning
of this
social contract is also structured
by gender.
In the immediate post Second World War era, the organization man was
not a
generic person,
but
specifically
a man who was
expected
to be the
mainstay
breadwinner
of
the heterosexual
family.
This
image,
in
turn,
was
buttressed
by
the
reemerging
cult of
domesticity
in
popular
culture
follow
ing
the
war
(Breines, 1992;
May,
1988;
Spiegel,
1992; Welter,
1966).
Thus,
in the
cultural
currency
of the
day,
company loyalty
was conflated
with
masculinity,
while
personal loyalty
to
husbands
and
family
was associated
with
femininity.1
Since the
1950s,
the American
economy
has
undergone
a dramatic shift
that has
challenged
the
possibilities
of this social contract and the
meaning
of loyalty at work. The decline of the industrial economy and the rise of
the
service
sector have
brought
about
changes
in
the labor force and the
labor
process,
in
possibilities
for workers'
long-term
financial
security,
and
in
culture(s)
of work
for
those
working
in service
jobs (Herschenberg
et
al.,
1998). First,
unlike
manufacturing
work,
service
work,
as we define
it,
involves face-to-face interactions with customers and often
requires
emotional labor
on the
part
of
the
workers
(Hochschild,
1983).
Conse
quently,
the
product
is
typically
the service interaction itself and the
formerly dyadic
model of
worker-management
relations
now
includes a
third element
-
the customer
(Leidner, 1993).
For service
workers,
this trian
gulation
of
power
raises the
question:
to whom is one
loyal?
Second,
women
have entered work
in
steadily increasing
numbers since the 1950s. From
1950 to
1998,
the
percentage
of women
in
the
paid
labor force increased
from 31
percent
to 60
percent
(Cleveland
et
al., 2000;
Reskin
and
Padavic,
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Erickson
and Pierce
Farewell to the
organization
man 285
2002). Given this increase in numbers, how has this narrative changed?
Third,
unlike
manufacturing
jobs,
the
majority
of service
jobs
tend to be
either
temporary
or
part
time,
rarely
include
benefits,
are
highly
feminized,
and have been difficult sites for
attempts
at worker union
organization.
Compared
to both
manufacturing
and white-collar office
jobs,
the service
sector is
marked
by
a remarkable annual turnover
in
staff,
due
in
part
to
the
minimal rewards accrued
from
staying
at one
particular company
(MacDonald
and
Sirianni, 1996).
Recent studies of American
workplaces
as well as articles in the
popular press suggest
that
a new
culture of work
has
emerged emphasizing flexibility
over
predictable
career
paths
and
opportunity over job security (Bridges, 1994; Martin, 2000; Mnk, 2000;
Sennett, 1998;
Smith,
2001).
Whereas in the
age
of the
'organization
man',
loyalty
and hard work
supposedly paid
off
in
terms of
recognition,
promotion,
and financial
security, today's
ambitious worker is
encouraged
instead to
be
flexible, mobile,
and
self-directed.
In
jobs
where service workers are treated as
imminently replaceable,
where the
potential
for
exploitation originates
not
only
from
management,
but from
customers
as
well,
how
do women and men make
sense
of
company loyalty?
In
other
words,
how have
these
changes
transformed the
narrative of the
organization
man?
To answer
these
questions,
we
draw
from two
ethnographic
case
studies,
one
of
high-end
service workers in a
powerful
corporate
law
firm
(paralegals)
and
another of low-end service
workers
in a small
family-run
restaurant
(food servers),
to consider the
consequences
that the transformation of
the US
economy
and
accompany
ing
changes
in
the
culture(s)
of work
has
had
for the
ways
women and
men understand the
meanings
of
loyalty
in our
contemporary
service
society. By
focusing
on
service
jobs
at each end of
the
spectrum,
our intent
is
to reveal the
range
of narratives service
workers draw
upon
to make
sense
of
changes
in
the culture of work in two
different service work
regimes.
As
feminist
scholars,
we also
pay
close
attention to the fact that
service
work is
highly
feminized.
In
the United
States,
the
predominance
of
women
in
particular jobs
and
occupations
is
associated with low
pay,
low
status,
and
no ladders for
mobility
both
historically
and
contemporarily
(Reskin
and
Padavic, 2002).
'Idioms
of
gender'
also
shape
the
meaning
of
occu
pations, rendering
women as
naturally
more
suitable for
particular jobs
in
varied social and
historical times and
places
(Acker, 1990;
Milkman, 1987).
So-called
women's
work
and men's work
can take on a
variety
of
meanings
-
for
instance,
in
one context women
are deemed most
suited to be clerical
workers,
while in
another,
men are
preferred
(Davies, 1982).
As Leslie
Salzinger argues,
'femininity
is a
trope
-
a
structure of
meaning through
which
workers,
potential
or
actual,
are
addressed,
understood,
and
around
which
production
itself is
designed'
(2003:
15).
Consequently,
we ask how
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286
Ethnography
6(3)
gender structures these two service workplaces and the meanings through
which
paralegals
and
food servers make sense of
loyalty.
In this
article,
we
begin
by
rethinking
conventional
understandings
of
loyalty.
Because our
focus
is on
service
jobs,
we
maintain that
loyalty
can
take
many
forms
-
not
only
to an
organization,
but
to
customers,
managers,
co-workers,
or to the
practice
of work itself.
Further,
as our multi-sited
ethnography
demonstrates,
particular
work cultures contribute to distinc
tive
gendered meanings
and
practices
through
which
loyalty
is
understood.
The stories
paralegals
and food
servers
tell
about
loyalty
draw rhetorical
elements from informal values
and
practices
at work as well as
from
larger
discursive
fields of
femininity
and
masculinity
to
make
gendered
sense of
their
experiences.
As we
find,
loyalty
has not
entirely
disappeared
in these
jobs,
but
has taken on new forms.
Rethinking loyalty
and
gender
in service work
The theoretical
questions
we
pose
about
loyalty
and
gender
in the new
service
economy
draw from several
overlapping
areas
in
the broad
field
of
the sociology and the anthropology of work. Here, we begin by critically
assessing
some
of the
conceptual problems
in the literature on
loyalty
at
work. To
improve
upon
these
weaknesses,
we draw
from
Raymond
Williams to
conceptualize loyalty
as
a 'structure of
feeling'
(Williams,
1966:
64)
and further
complicate
this
understanding by locating loyalty
within the
triangulated
relations
of
power
between
managers,
customers,
and workers
which
characterize service
work.
Finally,
we turn to feminist
scholarship
to
emphasize
the
importance
of
gender
in
constructing meanings
about
loyalty
in
varied
workplace
cultures.
In
his influential
essay
on
bureaucracy,
Max Weber
(1944 [1922]),
distin
guished personal forms of loyalty from what he called modern or insti
tutional
loyalty.
In Weber's ideal
type
of the modern
bureaucracy,
entrance
into
a
particular position
or
office within an
organization
does not estab
lish a
personal relationship
to
employer,
but
rather
an
impersonal
one based
on
modern
loyalty.
With the rise of western
capitalism
in the late 19th
century
and the
increasing
rationalization of all forms of
life,
Weber saw
modern
loyalty
as a form of commitment
to an
organization
rather
than
to
an individual
person.
In the
scholarship
on American workers
in the
1950s,
loyalty
and
conformity
to
corporate
life was a
finding
in
many
studies of
middle-class,
white-collar men
(Hughes,
1951; Mills, 1951;
Whyte,
1957).
Since the
1950s,
other studies have shown
that
despite
Weber's notion
of modern
loyalty,
personal
loyalty
continues to function
alongside
institutional
loyalty
as
an
important
feature of
organizational
life
(Kanter,
1979;
Pringle,
1988).
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Erickson and Pierce
Farewell to
the
organization
man 287
Most recently, popular critics have alternately lamented or celebrated the
death
of
company loyalty (Wooldridge,
2000),
while others
have
argued
that the model of the
loyal
worker is an outmoded one
in
the new
economy
where successful workers must be flexible
in
their
individual
quest
to
develop
new
skills,
moving
from
job
to
job
to find better
opportunities
(Mnk,
2000).
In
the midst of these more recent
debates,
scholars from business schools
maintain that
loyalty
is an
important
issue for
management, particularly
in
terms of the retention of their customers and investors
who
are
a
locus of
profit
for the firm. Workers also
play
a
part
in
this
equation;
for
in
their
view,
loyal
workers, in turn,
produce loyal
customers. In The
Loyalty
Effect,
for
example,
Frederick Reichheld defines
loyal
business as
'systems
that
incorporate
customers,
employees,
and investors
in a
single
constella
tion
of common interests and mutual benefits' and reminds
employers
that
loyal
workers save
companies money
(Reichheld
with
Teal,
1996:
26).
While these studies are useful
in
distinguishing
between
different
types
of
loyalty,
none
adequately conceptualize
the
term
loyalty
itself.2 For
instance,
when Weber writes about
loyalty,
he describes
an
overarching
contractual
relationship
between the
bureaucracy
and the
employee.
In this
contract,
workers
exchange
their commitment to the
organization
in
return
for a
secure
existence. But
just
what does commitment entail? For
Reichheld and others
writing
from the
managerial
perspective, loyalty
means
repeat
business
by
the
customer.
Loyal
customers and investors
keep
coming
back.
Although
he doesn't
discuss
the
workers'
point
of
view,
given
this
logic,
one would assume that
loyal
workers
just keep
coming
back to
work
everyday.
Hence,
loyalty
would be
equated
with
long-term
tenure.
The
problem
with
this
conceptualization,
however,
is
that workers
stay
in
jobs
for a
variety
of reasons that
may
have
nothing
to do with
feeling
loyal
-
they
lack better
job opportunities, they
need the
money,
or
they
are not
able to relocate.
Several recent studies
on
professional
women and work find that
corpor
ations and
law
firms evaluate commitment3
by looking
at the overtime
hours an
employee puts
in
each month
(Bailyn,
1993;
Epstein
et
al.,
1999;
Fried, 1998;
Hochschild,
1997; Pierce,
2002).
In
what
Mindy
Fried
(1998:
37)
describes
in her
study
of
a
large
Boston
corporation
as an 'overtime
work
culture',
women are seen as less committed than men
because
they
either work fewer hours or would like to work
part-time
in order
to better
balance
family
and career.
Here,
commitment is
equated
with
long
hours in
the office. As Fried and others
find,
women
in
these
corporations
see
long
hours as
unnecessary, recognizing
that the work can
get
done in less time.
Further,
they
see themselves as
highly
committed
professionals
and resent
the notion that
long
hours
-
as
opposed
to
the
quality
of one's work
-
signify
commitment.
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288
Ethnography
6(3)
Rather than looking at hours worked or length of tenure within a firm,
we define
loyalty
as
a
'structure of
feeling'
produced
at
work. Like
Raymond
Williams
(1977)
who
uses this term
to describe how
specific
emotions are
constructed
in
particular
social and historical contexts
through
social
consciousness,
we
see
loyalty
as
produced through
collective
practices
and narratives on the
job.
This structure of
feeling
is
produced
when
workers
say they
feel a sense of investment and
ownership
in their
jobs
or take
pride
in
doing
their
jobs
well. In
describing
their work and
themselves as
significant, important,
or
special,
it bears some
similarity
to
craft
pride,
but
differs
in
that it also
expresses
a sense
of
obligation
to others
such as
customers, co-workers,
or bosses. For
example,
narratives about
loyalty may emphasize pride
about
doing good
work as well as their obli
gation
to
others
in
doing
it
well.
Consequently,
this sentiment
is not an indi
vidual
quality,
but rather is
collectively practiced
and
produced.
What is further distinctive
about our
understanding
of
loyalty
is that we
conceive of
it
within unstable relations of
power.
Like
Weber,
we
place
loyalty
within an
institutional context where
one
group
of workers has
more status and
power
than another.
However,
because we are
studying
service
work,
we see these structural
relationships
as less fixed
and
more
variable in the deployment of power than Weber's ideal type of the regi
mented hierarchical
bureaucracy.
The triad of
worker,
employer,
and
customer not
only
introduces a new element into
worker-management
models of
organizations,
but also
complicates
the
dynamics
of
power
(Fuller
and
Smith, 1996; Leidner,
1996).
Consequently,
we examine not
only
how
workers narrate institutional and
personal loyalty
in this new
economic,
organizational,
and cultural
context,
but how their
understandings
of
customer
(or client)
loyalty figure
into
working relationships.
Finally,
as
the
growing
literature on
gender,
work,
and
sociology
of
emotions
finds,
the
production
of
feelings
on
the
job,
or what Arlie
Hochschild (1983) terms emotional labor, is shaped by gender (Annals of
the American
Academy of
Political and Social
Sciences, 1999; Halle, 1990,
1993; Leidner, 1991;
Pierce, 1995).
While this literature considers the social
construction of
variety
of
emotions,
it does not examine
loyalty.4
Neverthe
less,
it
does
provide
two
important insights
that we draw
upon
and
extend
to further
complicate
our theoretical
understanding
of
loyalty
in
service
work.
First,
feminist scholars
argue
that
gender
shapes
the
meaning
of
occupations, rendering
women as
naturally
more suitable for
particular
jobs
in varied social and historical times and
places
(Acker, 1990; Milkman,
1987;
Reskin and
Padavic,
2002;
Salzinger,
2003).
For
example, during
the
Second World
War,
women's war work
in
factories
was defined as an exten
sion
of their
domesticity,
and
then,
after the
war,
reconstrued as men's work.
As Ruth Milkman
argues,
the war mobilization
demonstrates how 'how
idioms of sex
typing
can be
flexibly
applied
to whatever women and men
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Erickson and Pierce
m
Farewell to the
organization
man 289
happen to be doing' (1987: 50). Further, workers themselves draw upon
these idioms to make sense of who
they
are and what
they
are
doing
at
work. This research
prompts
us to ask how
gender
structures service
work
places
and the
meanings through
which workers make sense of
loyalty.
Second,
we take
seriously
the
argument
from feminist
anthropologists
that
workplaces
are sites for the
reproduction
of culture. In her classic
book,
Counter
Cultures,
Susan Porter Benson was
among
the first to describe a
work culture as 'the
ideology
and
practice
with
which workers stake out a
relatively
autonomous
sphere
of action on the
job'
(1986:
228).
In
this
light,
work cultures can be understood as the
underlying
rules and
practices
estab
lished
by employees
to contain the
alienating potential
and
exploit
the
potential
for
recognition
and
pride
of their
jobs.
Studies of
work
cultures
bring
us to our third and final
insight
from this
literature: work cultures
vary
from site to site
(Lamphere
et
al., 1993).
Hence,
we take
seriously
insights
from feminist
geographers
who insist
upon
the
importance
and
specificity
of
place
in
understanding practices
and
meaning
(Rose, 1993).
For
example,
as
Salzinger
finds
in
her
comparative study
of four
maquiladora
factories on
the
Mexican
border,
despite
the
prevailing trope
of women as docile
labor,
each
workplace
had a different
gendered
regime.
As she writes:
gendered
subjectivity
intervenes at all levels of the
process,
from
managerial
decision
making
to worker consent and
resistance,
but it is never
fixed
Docile labor
cannot be
bought,
it is
produced,
or
not,
in the
meaningful
prac
tices and rhetorics of
shop-floor
life.
(2003: 15-16)
Building
on this
scholarship,
we
argue
that
loyalty
must be understood
as
a
structure
of
feeling
that
is
produced
at work. Because we are
studying
service
work,
we
contend
that
loyalty
can
take
many
forms
-
loyalty
to
customers,
managers,
co-workers,
or the
practice
of
work itself.
Finally,
we
argue that work cultures contribute to the gendered meanings and practices
through
which
loyalty
is
understood
by
workers,
and
further,
that
gendered
meanings
and
practices
are not
fixed,
but
vary
within and between different
workplaces.
The selection of cases and method
We address these central
questions through
a close examination of the
ways
service workers narrate the
meaning
of
loyalty
in two
different service sites.
In the first
site,
we consider the
experiences
of
paralegals
in a
large
corpor
ate
law
firm,
and in the
second,
we focus on the work of
food servers
in
a
family-style
restaurant.
By focusing
on
service
jobs
at each end of the
spectrum,
our
intent is
to reveal the
range
of narratives
service workers
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draw upon to make sense of changes in the culture of work in two differ
ent service
regimes. Throughout,
we use the term narrative
purposefully
to
emphasize
the
socially
constructed nature of the material from our inter
views and fieldwork. As Susan
Chase
has
argued,
'narrative
[s]
share a
fundamental interest
in
making
sense of
experience,
in
constructing
and
communicating meaning'
(1995: 8).
Furthermore,
narratives are
always
constructed
in
particular
contexts,
most
immediately
within
the fieldwork
encounter,
but more
broadly
within
particular
social and historical times
and
places.
This is not to
say
that narratives do not contain individual
biographical
or
idiosyncratic
elements,
but
rather to underscore the
point
that
they always
draw
from
larger
cultural discourses
(Scott, 1991).
As we
will
demonstrate,
paralegals
and food servers tell at once
similar,
yet
distinc
tive stories about
loyalty,
stories that reflect not
only
their
different stand
points
and
personal biographies,
but also draw from
larger
cultural
narratives about
gender
and
the
changing meaning
of
work
in
the
new
economy.
Methodologically,
we
utilize
the extended case method in
comparing
these two service work
occupations
(Burawoy,
1991).
The extended case
method uses
participant
observation to reconstruct
existing theory, relying
upon intensive study of specific cases to draw out the links between micro
and macro levels
of
analysis. By comparing
these two
sites,
we uncover both
similarities and differences in the contradictions
and tensions that revolve
around
the
meanings
of
loyalty, particularly
as it is
expressed
in
one's
investment
in
the
work
itself
within the
larger landscape
of the new
economy.
Our intent is not to
generalize
about all service
workers,
but
rather to
critically
thematize and
problematize
the evidence relative to our
theoretical
questions
about how the new service
economy shapes
and
gives
meaning
to workers' investment
in
these
jobs
and to extend
and
reconstruct
existing theory
about how
gender
and
loyalty
operates
within
these triadic
working arrangements.
Paralegal
and food service
jobs
are both
highly
feminized service sector
occupations
that are characterized
by
triadic work relations
and
require
emotional labor.
Our first
site,
a
large corporate
law
firm
located
in
a
luxurious
high
rise
building
in the San Francisco
Bay
Area's financial
district,
is
highly
sex
segregated
with a
preponderance
of men
(88
percent)
who work as
attorneys,
while the
majority
of women work as
paralegals
(86
percent).
Pierce conducted fieldwork as
a
participant
observer there for
six
months in the
litigation department
between 1988
and 1989 and inter
viewed
legal
assistants as well as
lawyers
and secretaries.5 The second field
site
is a
family-oriented neighborhood
bar
and
grill
located
in
a suburban
strip
mall. From 1999 to
2001,
Erickson conducted
participant
observation
and 30 interviews at
her
primary
research
site,
a Tex-Mex
restaurant called
the
Hungry
Cowboy.6
At
any given
time,
the service staff
is
ordinarily
75
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Erickson and Pierce
Farewell to the
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man 291
percent female, while most bartenders are male. All five of the male servers
interviewed worked
primarily
in
the
bar,
while 10
of
the women interviewed
worked
solely
in the restaurant.
In
addition to workers and
managers,
Erickson also interviewed and
surveyed
customers to include their voice
in
her
study
of the
triadic
power arrangements
which
take
place
within
inter
personal
service
exchanges.
Paralegals
and food servers are also both
situated
within
triangular
service relations.
Although paralegals
may
appear
to work for
lawyers,
their
work is
paid
for
by
clients
in
whose interests
they
labor.
In
this
particular
firm,
legal
assistants tend to have limited direct contact with
clients,
but as
our
examples
below illustrate, it is the client behind the scenes who unwit
tingly
orchestrates the flow of work
in
the office.
By
contrast,
in food
service,
the interaction of the three
parties
is
inextricably
linked. For
the
food
server,
both customers
and
managers
are
immediately present
and
contact is face-to-face.
In
addition,
each
job
requires
emotional labor.
And,
despite
the fact that 10
years
separate
these
studies,
both
workplaces
are
squarely
situated
within the
new
economy
of the last 30
years
and
changes
in
cultures of work.
By
contrast,
in
terms of
physical space, organizational
structure,
and
salaries
and
wages,
these
two
workplaces differ,highlighting
some of
the
key
differences between
high-end
and
low-end
service work
cultures.
Visually
and
spatially,
these sites look
quite
different. At
the law
firm,
an
oriental
rug
in the
rather
grand
entry
way
and an
antique
Chinese vase filled
with
fresh-cut birds of
paradise
on
the
receptionist's
desk marks the
space
as
corporate
and
professional.
The
distribution of
space
coincides with the
relative
prestige
of the
job.
While senior
partners
are located in
luxuriously
furnished,
large
corner offices with
unencumbered views of the San
Francisco
Bay,
paralegals
are housed
in
closet-sized
offices
on
the inside of
the
corridor without windows to the outside.
In contrast to this lush corporate setting, the Flungry Cowboy is decked
out
with
silverware,
ashtrays,
and stained
carpeting.
The restaurant
is
designed
for
the convenience and
enjoyment
of the
customers,
not the
employees
or
managers.
Servers have no
personal space
in
the
restaurant,
while
three to four
managers
share one
office located between the
food
preparation
area
and the cooler.
Managers
do have
access to a
phone,
a
desk,
and
a
computer,
while
hourly employees
store
their
personal
belong
ings
in their
car,
due to the lack of
any
employee-dedicated space.
In
contrast to the front
of
the
house,
meticulously
maintained
by
staff for the
customers,
the back of the
house,
the
only
place
workers
can
go
to
'get
away'
from
customers,
is often in
disrepair,
uncomfortably
hot,
and over
crowded with work
products.
The two
workplaces
also differ
structurally.
The
law firm
is a
pyramid
structure with a
professional
stratum
resting
on
top
of a
non-professional
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Ethnography
6(3)
or support-staff tier. The top comprises lawyers - partners and associates -
most of whom
are male.
The
bottom tier contains librarians and their
assistants,
personnel employees,
paralegals,
secretaries,
receptionists,
case
clerks,
duplicating operators
-
most of whom are female. The law
firm,
then,
is stratified
by
occupational
status and
by
gender.
The
restaurant
is
cross-cut
by
the front-of-the-house/back-of-the-house
division. For
example,
while cooks are
just
as essential to the
delivery
of
food to the customers as food
servers,
their
invisibility
behind the scenes of
the restaurant
insulates
them from
the
brunt of the
service
interaction but
also
lowers
their
level of control
in
the restaurant.
Next,
like
most
bar/restaurant
establishments,
working
on the 'bar side' versus the 'restau
rant
side'
of
the establishment is twice as lucrative
due
to the
higher
volume
and
the
higher
tips
associated with
bartending.
At the time of the
study,
50
percent
of the bartenders and
only
10
percent
of the food servers were male.
Finally,
within the front of
the
house
staff,
power
is also influenced
by
proximity
to
the
customer.
While
managers
have access to
the front
of
the
house and
the
back of
the
house,
their
contact
with
customers
is not
as
immediate,
limiting
their
power
and
increasing
servers'
power. Knowing
the
customers'
wants and needs lends
power
to the
servers,
in
contrast to the
paralegals
who are asked to react and
respond
to a
client who
is
primarily
invisible to them.
In
terms of
pay
and
status,
the
pyramid
structure
in
the law
firm
reflects
pay
differentials,
whereas in restaurant
work,
multiple pay
structures create
multiple
hierarchies within one
workplace.
Because
paralegals
do not
possess
law
degrees, they
are
invariably paid
less than
attorneys
with
comparable years
of
experience.
In
1989,
the
average
salary
for
beginning
paralegals
was
US$22,000
a
year
(San
Francisco Association
for
Legal
Assistants
Survey,
1989).
By
contrast,
the
average salary
for
first-year
associates
just
out of
law
school at this
firm was
US$58,500. Thus,
begin
ning lawyers at the private firmwere paid between two and three times as
much as the
beginning paralegal
in the same office. These
disparities
in
income widen as the two
groups
become
more
experienced. Paralegals
with
seven-plus years experience averaged
US$35,000
a
year,
while
partners
at
the same
firm could earn
up
to
US$250,000,
plus earnings
from
profit
sharing.
At the
Hungry Cowboy, managers
are
salaried,
and are often
scheduled
to work
up
to 60 hours
per
week.
While
tipped
incomes are diffi
cult to
track,
easy
to
spend,
and
impossible
to
rely
on
due to the seasonal
and even
weekly variability
of
tips
earned,
at the time of the
study
the
servers' total income
of minimum
wage
(US$5.15)
plus tips
ranged
between
US$20,000
and
US$50,000
for
servers,
while
managers
made between
US$35,000
and
US$80,000.
Tipped employees
often
averaged
more
per
hour than
managers.
Of all the
tipped employees,
bartenders
routinely
earned
up
to 50
percent
more than
servers
in the restaurant.
Subsequently,
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Farewell to
the
organization
man
293
power differentials between managers and workers were not always directly
correlated
to income. Unlike the clear distinction between
lawyers
and
para
legals,
servers,
and
specifically
bartenders,
are not
always
situated below
managers
on the
pay
scale.
Benefits such as healthcare and
paid
vacations also differ at each site. As
part
of a
professional
and
corporate
work
space, paralegals,
like the
lawyer
for whom
they
work,
receive healthcare and two weeks' vacation
with
increasing
vacation
days
over
years
of tenure at the firm. Food
servers,
on
the other
hand,
are not
eligible
for vacation or health insurance.
Managers
receive healthcare benefits and bonuses based on
profits
and labor
efficiency.
Unlike the law
firm,
the service workers in restaurants are offered no incen
tives for
longevity
of
employment
other than
improved
access to lucrative
shifts.
The differences
in
these two sites reflect the
range
of
jobs
in
the service
sector.
Many
jobs,
like food
serving,
have work
arrangements
with
irregular
hours,
low
pay
and no
benefits,
while those at the
higher
end
include
predictable
work
schedules,
better
pay,
and benefits
(Barker
and
Christiansen, 1998;
Herschenberg
et
al., 1998;
Rogers,
2000).
Gendered narratives of
loyalty
In
this
section,
we describe and
compare
service workers'
gendered
narra
tives about
loyalty
at each
workplace
while
attending
to the
triangulation
of
power
between
worker,
manager,
and
customer,
and the cultures of work
in
each site. As we
argue,
femininity
and
masculinity operate
as structures
of
meaning through
which workers make
gendered
sense of
loyalty
to
organizations, supervisors,
and
customers,
but also
serve as
ways
that
service workers themselves are addressed and understood.
We
identify
two
main narrative strategies for coping with the tensions and contradictions
that surround
loyalty
in the
workplace:
investment and detachment. Invest
ment,
as
a
narrative,
entails a sense of
ownership
in
the service
process,
positioning
the
paralegal
or server as an
authority
or bearer of
good
will
through
their labor in the service
encounter.
It
highlights
the
significance
of
how one does one's
job, overlooking
the relative
prestige
of
the
job,
defer
ring
to
employers
or customers and
insisting
that their work does
have
meaning. By
contrast,
narratives
of
detachment describe the
job
as
'just
a
job'
and
minimize
personal engagement
with other
co-workers,
employers,
or customers.
In
doing
so,
it
presumably protects
workers
by limiting
the
significance
of their work. As the narratives we
share below
demonstrate,
although
these narrative
strategies
emerge
at each service
workplace, they
take different
forms
in
each.
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Ethnography
6(3)
Loyalty in a corporate law firm
At 5 o'clock
one winter
evening, John,
a
partner
at the law
firm,
told
Debbie,
a
paralegal,
to
do
an
urgent project
for him as he was
leaving
the
office. The client
had
called him
at the last minute with an
emergency
request.
Debbie didn't realize how
time-consuming
the
project
was until she
started
working
on
it
and ended
up staying
at the office all
night
to finish
it. The next
day,
she
bragged
to her
paralegal
and
secretary
friends that she
had
stayed up
all
night
to
complete
the
work,
sleeping
for
only
a
few
hours
on a couch
in
the
attorney's
office. Her continual
bragging
served to adver
tise the importance of her work to others in the office. It also hinted at the
closeness of her
relationship
with
John.
After
all,
she had
spent
the
night
on the couch in his
office.
The
significance
of this last detail
was
not lost on her
audience. Some
immediately
responded,
'You
slept
on his couch ' Debbie
invariably giggled
and
said,
'Yes,
yes,
I
slept
all
night
on
the couch.'
Despite
the
obvious sexual
overtones,
John
had not even
been
in his office that
night.
Nor did he and
Debbie
have
any
romantic involvement.
In
fact,
he and
Debbie didn't even
socialize
together.
Nevertheless,
Debbie
delighted
in
telling
and
retelling
the
story.
And,
when
anyone
commented that it was a lot
to
expect
on such
short
notice,
she
proudly
exclaimed: 'But I did it
[staying
up
all
nightj
because I
really
like
John.'
No
one
made her do
it;
she did it because she
chose to do
something
nice
for
John
whom she liked.
Thus,
she character
ized her fondness for her work in terms of an
interpersonal relationship
with
her boss.
Like
Debbie,
over
half
of the women
paralegals
Pierce interviewed told
narratives
about work
and
working relationships
that revealed
a
strong
sense of investment in the
job,
insisting
that their
work had
meaning
and
that
they
took
pleasure
in
doing
it well. These
women
also
expressed
a sense
of
loyalty
to their
bosses,
and sometimes to the firm and its clients. These
investment narrative
strategies
took two forms.
The first narrative
person
alized work
relationships.
Here,
we are
referring
to the
tendency
for
para
legals
to redefine their
working
relationships
with
attorneys
as
personal
friendships.
In formal and informal
interviews,
these women often said
they
'liked' the
attorneys
for whom
they
worked.
Although they recognized
that
many attorneys
were difficult to
work
with,
they
often
regarded
their bosses
as 'different'.
In
recasting
their
working
relations
as
personal
ones,
these
women
sought
to make themselves feel
'indispensable',
'important'
or
'special'.
This strategy seemed to work when attorneys also participated in this
process.
It made
paralegals
feel
important
and
special.
However,
attorneys
often had different interests
in
pursuing
this
strategy
than
paralegals
did. In
his
interview,
John
explicitly
stated
that he
'put up
with it' to
get
work done.
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and Pierce
m
Farewell
to the
organization
man 295
And another lawyer described encouraging such relationships as a means
to 'lubricate the
squeak
in
the wheel'. As other scholars
have
observed,
personalizing relationships
between
employer
and
employee
can be
a subtle
form
of
psychological exploitation
(Rollins, 1985).
Treating
workers 'as
if'
they
are friends when in fact
they
are
not,
obscures the
asymmetrical
nature
of the
relationship.
Further,
it becomes
difficult for the
paralegal
to
complain
about mistreatment
when the
attorney encourages
a
personal
relationship.
These women
expressed
a
strong
sense of
personal loyalty
to the
lawyers
for
whom
they
worked.
Expressions
of
loyalty
to the firm and its
clients,
however,
were not as common. Women who
personalized relationships
were,
on the one
hand,
loyal
to their
bosses, and,
on the
other,
openly
critical of the firm and its clients.
Debbie,
for
instance,
though
uncritical
of
her boss' last minute
request,
had this to
say
about the client:
He
[the
client]
always
does that. He
always
waits
until
things get really
bad
before he calls
John. John
has to
explain
to him over and over that he
shouldn't do that
-
but, [name
of
client]
is so
bullheaded. I can't stand
him.
In her
interview,
Debbie had more
to
say
about
problems
with the
firm
itself.
John
always gives
me the
highest rating
for
my performance
evaluation,
but
that doesn't mean I
get
a
good
raise. The firm
doesn't deliver raises like that
to
paralegals.
John's
gone
to bat for me with the
managing partner,
but
they
wouldn't do
it,
because
they
think I
get paid
too much
already anyway.7
Like other
women who
adopted
this narrative
strategy,
she
expressed
a
strong
sense of
personal loyalty
to her
boss,
while
denying
client and insti
tutional
loyalty.
The second narrative
strategy adopted by
women was
simply 'being
nice'. This is similar to
personalizing
work
relationships
in
that it involves
creating personal relationships;
however,
it
operates
on a more
general
level.
These women were not
simply
interested in
creating
exclusive
friendships
with their
bosses,
but in
creating
a
pleasant
and
humane
working
environ
ment.
By taking
an active role in
making
the
office a nice
place
these women
were
organizing
the
workplace
in
ways
that felt comfortable to them.
These women
attempted
to
please attorneys
and other office workers
by
doing
'nice'
things
such as
remembering birthdays
with cards or
flowers,
throwing anniversary
luncheons for various
employees
and
having baby
showers. Others attempted to please attorneys by doing excessive amounts
of overtime and
running
personal
errands for them. For
example, during
the
holiday
season,
Anna did enormous amounts of
overtime
work,
spent
her lunch hours
helping
an
associate
with his
Christmas
shopping,
and
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baked cookies for everyone in her team [five attorneys, three secretaries and
two
paralegals].
These
women workers
seemed to
think
that
if
they
were
'nice',
the
attorneys
would
eventually
be nice back.
Women
paralegals
who
employed
this
strategy
also
expressed
a
strong
sense of
loyalty
to their
bosses and
sometimes to
the firm
as well.
Cindi,
for
example, repeated
several times in
her interview how fortunate
she was
to
be
working
for such a
prestigious
firm,
enumerating
the
many
benefits it
provided
such as health
insurance,
a Christmas
bonus,
and a
two-week
paid
vacation. She
was also
impressed by
the
national and international
stature
of
some
of
the banks
and
corporations
the firm
represented.
Others were
more ambivalent.
Marsha,
for
instance,
described
many
of the same
benefits,
but
later when her
daughter
became
seriously
ill,
requiring
a
long
hospital stay
and a
longer period
of
recuperation
at
home,
the firm
refused
to
grant
her an
unpaid
three-month leave of
absence.8
I couldn't believe it
when
they
told me that
they
couldn't
promise
that
my
job
would
be here when
I
got
back. I
kept saying,
but I
have worked so hard
for
you
people,
I've
stayed
late,
I've worked
weekends. Doesn't that count
for
anything?
In light of larger shifts in the economy, particularly the downsizing of large
corporations,
Marsha's
question
about whether her
commitment 'counts'
expresses
a more
generalized anxiety
about the
obligations
(or
lack
thereof)
of
the
firm
to its
employees,
one
voiced
by
many
of the
legal
assistants
inter
viewed.
It
would
appear
that
the contract
implied
in
Weber's notion of
modern
loyalty,
in
other
words,
the
'acceptance
of a
specific obligation'
in
exchange
for
a
'secure
existence',
has been
broken. Given this understand
ing,
it is not
surprising
that the
majority
of
paralegals
neither
expressed
loyalty
to
the
firm nor
to its clientele. What
is
striking,
however,
is how
many
women continued to feel a sense of
personal loyalty
to
their bosses
and to invest in their jobs.
In
contrast to narratives of
investment,
other
paralegals
told stories
about work that
emphasized
their
detachment from and sometimes disdain
for
lawyers
and the
job
itself. Detachment
strategies
for
negotiating loyalty
and
commitment
to the
job
manifested themselves
in
several
ways.
The first
detachment
strategy
entailed
defining
oneself as an
occupational
transient.
'I'm
planning
to
go
to law school
[or
business
school or
graduate
school]
after
working
as a
legal
assistant
for a few
years.
This
is a
good way
to
get
experience.'
For men
-
and most of
the
legal
assistants who
adopted
this
strategy
were men
-
being
a
paralegal
was
a
means
to
an end
-
money,
experience
and a letter of
recommendation
to
graduate
or
professional
school.
They
were
willing
to tolerate the
job
because
it was
temporary.
Although
almost half of the men interviewed said
they planned
to
go
to
professional
school,
only
two
actually
went,
suggesting
that even if
they
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man 297
didn't actually go to law school, it was important to define themselves in
this
way.
Some
of the
men, however,
had no
interest
in
going
to
professional
school. For
them,
rather than
defining
themselves
as
an
occupational
transients,
they
described
themselves
in terms of their 'real'
interests
and
accomplishments.
Over half told me
(Pierce)
that
they
were
artists, writers,
actors or
photographers
-
the
job
was
'just
for
money'.
In
fact,
during
the
course of
my
interviews,
several men insisted
upon showing
me their artistic
work which
was
prominently
displayed
on the walls of their offices or
apart
ments. For these
men,
being
a
paralegal
was not
part
of their
occupational
identity: they
were
artists
-
not
paralegals.
As a
consequence, they
did not
take the
job very seriously. Jonathan,
a
25-year-old paralegal
said: 'I don't
let all the firm
politics get
to me
-
I don't
care about those
people
[the
attorneys].
It's not
my
life ' Like Goffman's
strategic
actors
in The
Presen
tation
of Self
in
Everyday Life
(1959),
these workers viewed social inter
action
with
attorneys
as a
carefully stage-managed
affair. The
performance
was
conveyed
through
the
proper
dramatic
props:
a
Brooks Brother look
alike suit
purchased
at a thrift
shop,
the
proper
demeanor and the
proper
tone of
voice. Such
an
instrumental,
pragmatic approach
made
life at the
law firm bearable - 'I'm just waiting 'till 5 o'clock so that I can go home
and do
my
"real"
work'
-
and
their real interests and
accomplishments
which
lay
outside the office made them feel
important.
For men who
adopted
these
detachment
strategies,
neither
personal
loyalty
nor institutional
loyalty
was
exchanged
within
the context of
their
working relationships. They
distanced themselves from
lawyers,
from co-workers
(particularly
from
women),
and from the law firm
as
an
organization.
None
expressed loyalty
to the
firm
or its clients. For
example,
when the firm
was
sponsoring
a blood drive
to create a
private
blood bank for its
attorneys,
one
paralegal
retorted: 'Give
my
blood to
the firm Ha
They already get my
sweat.
They're
not
gonna
get
my
blood too.'9
In the
third detachment
strategy,
employed primarily by
women,
workers
did not
deny
their
occupational
identities as
legal
assistants,
but instead
distanced themselves from their
bosses
through
an
attitude
of
disdain or
irreverence. This social
psychological strategy
became
evident when
I
sat
in
on
'gripe'
sessions that
paralegals
held
when
lawyers
weren't
around.
In
these
sessions,
attorneys
were
frequently
denigrated
as
egotistical jerks,
petty tyrants,
'drones', 'dweebs',
or
workaholics with no
social skills. But
what came up with equal frequency was the tendency to describe an
attorney
as a
'baby'
or a child
and to describe one's
job
as a
paralegal
as
'babysitting'.
One
woman
paralegal
was
even referred to as
Michael's
[an
attorney]
'security
blanket'. Michael's
secretary
said
about Debbie and
Michael's
working
relationship:
'Michael is
like Linus. He needs
her to
go
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everywhere [court, settlement conferences, depositions, etc.] with him - it
makes him
feel more secure.'
By
reversing
the
asymmetrical relationship
between
attorney
and
para
legal,
this
strategy
serves an
interesting psychological
sleight
of hand. The
powerful attorney
becomes the
powerless, helpless,
ineffectual,
demanding
baby,
whereas the
paralegal
becomes the
all-powerful,
all-knowing, compet
ent mother.
In
the short
run,
such a characterization made
legal
assistants
feel better about themselves and
the work
they
did for
attorneys. By making
fun of their
bosses,
they
could feel
superior, knowledgeable
and
competent
-
feelings
their work
rarely gave
them. It also served as an ironic twist on
the
attorneys' implicit assumption
about
'mothering'.
Rather
than
refusing
to take care of
them
altogether,
Marilyn,
a
34-year-old paralegal
said,
'So
they
want me to be their mother?
Fine Then I'll
treat
them
just
like
they
are
little
kids.'
These moves involved
a careful
balancing
act on the
part
of
paralegals.
As
long
as the
attorneys thought
their comments
or
actions
humorous or
even
useful,
they
were successful.
Paralegals
continued to
feel
superior
and
contemptuous
and
attorneys
received
the
assistance
and
support they
needed.
However,
paralegals
could
not
push
the
strategy
too far. Those who
did were quickly reminded of their appropriate place in the law-firm hier
archy.
One
attorney
yelled
at a
legal
assistant
who had
previously
worked
as a
first-grade
teacher:
'Stop talking
to me like
I'm a five
year
old.' She
immediately
backed
down,
'Sorry,
I
used to
be
a school
teacher. It's hard to
lose that tone of voice.'
Nevertheless,
she
managed
to retain her sense of
dignity.
As she related
in
a later
conversation,
'What he doesn't know is that
I didn't even talk to
my
first
graders
that
way.'
Like the men who
employed
detachment
strategies,
these women
expressed
neither
personal
nor institutional
loyalty
on the
job.
And,
though
they
were often
friendly
with
co-workers,
they
distanced themselves
from
lawyers, clients, and from the firm itself. Many depicted the firm and its
clients
in
negative
terms,
telling
stories about clients'
various misdeeds. In
describing
a controversial
employment
case,
one
paralegal
said, '[Name
of
lawyer] actually
had to
explain
to the client
[a
foreign
national]
that
in
this
country,
sex
discrimination is
illegal.
Can
you
believe it? What idiots '
Overall,
more
women
paralegals
told stories of
investment in their
work,
while more men constructed
tales of detachment. These
findings suggest
that
women were more
likely
to understand
work
through personal
connec
tions and
relationships,
to
express personal
loyalty
to their
bosses,
although
not to
the firm or the client.
By contrast,
men's attachments to work and
their
loyalty appeared
to be more
fleeting
and
strategic.
Closer examination
reveals,
however,
not
only
a difference
in who tells what kind of
story,
but
in the structures of
meaning
contained
in
the stories
themselves. Investment
narratives
emphasize
elements such as
personal
concern,
caretaking,
and
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man 299
'being nice'. This rhetoric operates on a still larger field of practices and
images
of
femininity
-
a
field which clusters around women's
traditional
position
as
primary
caretaker
in the
family (Hays,
1996;
Salzinger,
2003).
The
logic
of
this structure
is also heteronormative: as
in
the
family,
at work
it was women
(and
not
male)
paralegals
who were
expected
to
care for men
attorneys
(Butler,
1990).
At the same
time,
male
lawyers
also
participated
in
this discursive
field,
for
instance,
explaining
in
their interviews that
they
preferred
to have women
working
for
them,
particularly
women who were
attentive to
their
needs.
Thus,
gender
structured
the
meanings through
which women
legal
assistants
were
understood
and addressed and the
ways
they,
in
turn,
talked about this
workplace
and
about
personal loyalty.
A
gendered
structure
of
meaning
also
underlies
the
logic
of
narratives of
detachment.
While
investment narratives draw from discourses of
traditional
femininity,
detachment narratives
respond
to a
larger
field
of
practices
and
images
about
masculinity. Hegemonic understandings
of
masculinity
underscore success and the achievement of
identity through
work,
the breadwinner
role,
rationality
and
neutrality
(Connell, 1995).
Given these discursive
elements
and
the fact that the male
paralegals
worked
in a female-dominated
occupation,
the
logic
of their detachment narratives
entailed locating the sources of their identity and self-esteem somewhere
outside
the
workplace.
Their
stories
highlighted preparation
for
a
career,
the
job
as
only temporary.
Others
said
they
kept
the
job
to make
money
to
enable them
to
pursue
other more
appropriate
male
occupational
identities,
for
example,
as the virtuous artist. In
defining
themselves
as
occupationally
transient
in
a female-dominated
occupation,
by
emphasizing
other more
appropriate
male
occupational
identities,
or
downplaying
their
loyalty
to
the
firm,
male
paralegals
at
once defended
against
their
gender
transgression
and mobilized their
masculinity (Yancey
Martin, 2003).
At
the same
time,
the rhetoric of
preparing
for
the
future,
assuming
this
work as a temporary step to another job, and developing other skills and
expertise
-
also draws
from
newer
managerial
discourses of the flexible
worker who is
encouraged
to invest
in
themselves rather than
in
organiz
ations,
and
in
potential
opportunities
rather than
predictable
career
paths.
Attorneys,
as
professionals
who were once in
training,
also
participated
in
constructing
these narratives.
They
encouraged
male
paralegals
to
go
to
professional
school,
wrote
them
letters
of
recommendation,
and
recognized
their other identities and achievements as
appropriately
masculine.
As a
consequence,
male
paralegals
were not
treated
in
the same
way
that female
paralegals
were.
They
were addressed as
'professionals
in
training',
while
women were addressed
as
caretakers and mothers.
Not all women told stories of investment and
personal
loyalty
in
the
workplace
-
think,
for
instance,
of the women who
adopted
the
'babysitting
strategy'. Significantly,
these women distanced
themselves from the
job
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Ethnography
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through humor or irreverence, but they also drew upon the field of prac
tices and
images
associated with
traditional
femininity
to
exaggerate
and
parody
the role of
mother. While
the
tone of their
story may
be
contemp
tuous
or
disdainful,
the rhetorical elements
they
utilized are
gendered
as
traditionally
feminine.
Interestingly,
when women tried to draw
from
elements
of masculine narratives such as the
occupational
transient,
they
were
not
taken
seriously.
For
example,
when Pierce
was
doing
her field
work,
many
of
the
lawyers
knew she was
in
graduate
school,
but
they
could
never remember what
field
she was in
-
'Social
work,
isn't it?' Nor could
they
seem to recall that she was
pursuing
a
PhD
-
'What are
you getting
your
masters in
again?'
What her
transgression suggests
is the
power
of
narrative
strategies
in
making gendered
sense of workers.
Women
para
legals
who went to
professional
school and
pursued higher degrees
were
unintelligible
within this context.
Loyalty
in a
family
restaurant
Jessica
is a
34-year-old
single
mother of two children
who works two
jobs.
She is hard
working,
but more than
anything,
she is
friendly
and a
good
conversationalist. For her, serving work has always been a form of support
-
from the customers that she has known
for
years
who ask about her life
and
progress,
who ask
to
see
pictures
of her children
-
and also as
a
way
of
hearing
about other
people's
lives,
subsequently fulfilling
her natural
curiosity
about other
people.
For
her,
work
time
is
'social
time'.
On
any given night,
a dozen
customers
request
Jessica's
section. When
she is on vacation
or
sick,
customers ask
where she is and
express
concern
that
they
didn't
get
to see her.
In
surveys,
when customers
were asked what
they
liked best about
eating
at the
Hungry
Cowboy,
over
a third named
Jessica
as
part
of what makes the restaurant a
special
favorite
of their
families. Obviously her approach appeals to many customers, and encour
ages
them to also view the
exchange
of cash
for food as an
opportunity
to
exchange pleasantries
and
perhaps
even form
relationships.
Like
Jessica,
Beth
likes to
come
into work to 'see who's there'. When
describing
their
jobs,
the labor of
serving disappears:
they say they
come
in
to work to
hang
out and drink
coffee,
even
though
they spend
much of their
time
lifting trays,
filling
orders,
clearing
dishes,
and
rushing
to
gather
supplies. They say they
'really
care' about
what
they
do.
Because
both Beth and
Jessica
have
worked
at
the
Hungry Cowboy
for
a
decade,
their
approach
to the work has a
profound
influence
on the work
culture
as a whole. As an investment
narrative,
'really caring'
was the most
common
strategy,
12 of 20 servers used
it. As
servers
who train
in
many
new
employees,
Beth and
Jessica
have a lot of clout
with both
regular
customers
and
managers,
and derive
power
from
their
knowledge
of the
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301
work process and the shared history of the work site, these waitresses in
particular
influence what Susan
Porter Benson calls the 'realm of
informal,
customary
values and rules'
which are 'created as workers confront
the
limitations and
exploit
the
possibilities
of their
jobs'
(Benson,
1986:
228).
Performing
a form of work that
is often
viewed
as
demeaning
and
belittling,
these
waitresses
say they
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