Home is where the heart is? Organizing women’s work and domesticity at Christmas

Abstract

This article critically discusses domestication and women's work in household organization at Christmas, a case of meta-organizing which fuels commercialization. Located in the growing body of work on contesting femininity that challenges traditional notions of femininity, we problematize the binary divide between women's work at home and commercial organizations. By considering Christmas as a set of ritualistic activities replete with myths of femininity, we explore how the home-a major site of festival activity-constructs gender through the public/private divide. This division has been central to critical interpretations of women's subordination in work and leisure spaces where the concept of home has attracted feminist attention through its association with exile or retreat into domesticity. Home is, however, a culturally and politically contested space, and this article argues that home-work is a productive retreat from commercial-work. Home relates to domesticity and rituals in paradoxical ways and attesting to the ambivalence of Christmas provides opportunities for the subversion of traditional discourses of women in the household, especially those associated with older ideas of femininity understood through ritualistic practice. We demonstrate this by analysing cultural representations of rituals located and practised in and around the home that are central to the enactment of Christmas and discern how these both subjugate and offer subversive possibilities for feminine subjectivity. Using contemporary representations of Christmas and home from media culture, we conclude that home is a feminist space with Christmas acting as a gift for women's return to that space.

Compositions of professionalism in counselling work: An embodied and embedded intersectionality framework

“…As indicated above, in the individual counselling situation, set in the refuge of a counsellor’s private office, an older woman constitutes a privileged embodiment of professional credibility. Consistent with traditional gendered social norms in Russia (Ashwin, 2000; see also Vacchani and Pullen, 2011), feminine embodied capabilities are valuable in the intimate, private counselling space, where clients are seen as vulnerable and where the relationship between counsellor and client is seen as particularly personal and intense. On the other hand, male bodies, particularly younger ones, tend to have an advantage in a business environment:

In business training there are more men .

…”

“…In a similar vein, organizational spaces are both gendered and gendering (Tyler and Cohen, 2010). In other words, spaces are imbued with gendered practices and meanings, acquiring different degrees of social valorization (Simpson, 2014; Vacchani and Pullen, 2011). The view of the embodied self as situated, informed by our phenomenological epistemology, further helps to foreground analysis of how the context (both broader social and cultural processes and an immediate, localized spatial setting in which professional interaction occurs) may shape constitutions of professionalism and professional credibility.…”

Flesh in voice: The no-touch embodiment of transnational customer service workers

“…In addition, embodied knowledge, which is acquired through one's bodily experience in the world, is an important part of both paid and unpaid work (DeVault, 1991;Vachhani and Pullen, 2011). The concept of embodiment highlights the ways in which whole bodies are constructed, as well as how workers support or resist norms in the context of work (Coy, 2009;Derton and Phoenix, 2001;Wainwright et al, 2010).…”

Kritikai Emberi Erőforrás Menedzsment. A szervezeti életvilág szimbolikus szerkezeteinek újratermelése a vállalati karácsony kolonizációjának esetén keresztül

“…A női interjúalanyok említették elsősorban, hogy a karácsonyi időszakot feszítettebbé teszi az, hogy egyszerre két fronton kell megfelelni: a munkahelyen és otthon. Ez részben utal a családon belüli munkamegosztásra: a nő feladata az otthon előkészítése az ünnepre (Vachhani és Pullen 2011); részben pedig amiatt is lehet, hogy a női munkavállalók elsősorban a nagy munkaterheléssel járó HR és számvitel területeken dolgoznak. A karácsonyi időszak jellemzése kapcsán a karácsonyi hangulat létét/nem létét igyekeztek leírni a munkavállalók, amelyhez a következő tevékenységeket kapcsolták: az iroda feldíszítése, ajándékozás a munkatársak között, közös evés-ivás.…”

“…Azok, akik hiányolják a karácsonyfát és a díszeket, a karácsonyi hangulatot is ehhez kapcsolják. Az ünnepi tér feldíszítése része azon rituáléknak, amelyek karácsonykor a világot a profánból megszenteltté emelik (Durkheim, 1912in: Vachhani és Pullen 2011. Ezen rituálék hiányában a vállalati karácsony nem tud átváltozni megszentelt területté.…”