Entrepreneurial identities and the problematic of subjectivity in media-mediated discourses

Abstract

This article examines discourses of patriarchy and femininity in representations of Indian women entrepreneurs in the popular Indian print media. Through critical discourse analysis of data consisting of 46 articles, the article examines the subtle positioning of Indian women entrepreneurs in language that is at once restraining and indicative of empowerment and independence. The analysis illustrates media stance as ambivalent and ambiguous with Indian women portrayed as traditional and modern, passive and proactive, dependent and independent. The resistive stance of women entrepreneurs provides the oppositional discourse of difference termed the discourses of `being' and `becoming'1 based on Deleuze and Guattari's (1987) notion of `becoming'. I conclude the article by accentuating that a critical reading practice is required to identify stereotypes and tease out discourses that illustrate transformative practices.

Embodying entrepreneurial identity

“…Entrepreneurial identity, studies suggest, is formed by various discourses and discursive resources, including the enterprise discourse (Watson, 2009 upon and reproduce, but also resist, the enterprise discourse (Cohen and Musson, 2000;Warren, 2004;Hytti, 2005;Essers and Benschop, 2007;Jones et al, 2008;Ainsworth and Hardy, 2008;Watson, 2009;Iyer, 2009;Anderson and Warren, 2011;Díaz García and Welter, 2013). Agents are often powerfully constituted by the discourse of enterprise (Warren, 2004;Essers and Benschop, 2007;Achtenhagen and Welter, 2011), empowered as entrepreneurs (Anderson and Warren, 2011), or excluded from it (Ainsworth and Hardy, 2008).…”

How policy positions women entrepreneurs: A comparative analysis of state discourse in Sweden and the United States

“…Scholars have, for example, analyzed media (Achtenhagen and Welter, 2011;Iyer, 2009;Wallis, 2006), business periodicals (Gill, 2013), popular narratives (Smith, 2010;Smith and Anderson, 2004), teaching material (Ahl, 2007b;Jones, 2011) and entrepreneurship research (Ahl, 2004;Bruni et al, 2004). All results point to the male gendering of entrepreneurship and the stereotyping and second-ordering of women.…”

An Examination of the Competitive Attitudes of Entrepreneurs: Implications for Entrepreneurial Orientation at the Individual Level

“…On the negative side, they are seen as self-centered, hyper-competitive, not family-oriented and even neurotic: For example, some view entrepreneurs as ruthless competitors who are "exploiters of those around them, who take advantage of others for their personal gain," and who become marginalized in society by their "dubious" and "quasi-legal" activities (Atherton, 2004). Evaluating the reality behind these public stereotypes is important because such images may influence how entrepreneurs are treated by a variety of stakeholders (Gray and Finley-Hervey, 2005;Gupta et al, 2009;Iyer, 2009) and may also influence entrepreneurial effectiveness (Lumpkin and Dess, 1996). Of course, the mislabeling of entrepreneurs as socially marginal anti-social individuals can distort such processes as whether individuals choose entrepreneurship as a career and how entrepreneurs develop a positive self-image in their role.…”