Keep Your ‘N’ in Check: African American Women and the Interactive Effects of Etiquette and Emotional Labor

Abstract

Black professional women report that they must transform themselves to be welcomed and accepted, especially in the workplace. They speak of performance weariness in verbal and nonverbal communicative interaction-exchanges with white colleagues. Many simply state that they feel they are in a 'parade', being judged for appearance, personal decorum, communication skills, and emotion management in addition to productivity. The objective of this article is to describe these women's experiences in line with promotion opportunities. For them, going to work involves a multilayered performance: (1) they must engage in racialized, gendered impression management at the generalized bureaucratic level; and (2) they rely on instructions grounded in race-based survival strategies to cope with challenges they face in unwelcoming work environments with concrete ceilings. Our analysis of these aspects of workplace behavior reveals that black women co-mingle etiquette and emotion management to gain acceptance and promotions, which strengthens race/ethnic group solidarity.

Dispensing emotions: Norwegian community nurses' handling of diversity in a changing organizational context

“…6, 2013;Ingebretsen and Nergård, 2007), with new demands on home care nurses in terms of language barriers and cultural complexity (Debesay et al, 2014). Therefore, investigating the impact of ethnicity on emotional labor in workplaces is critical (Durr and Wingfield, 2011). This article examines how community nurses in Oslo carry out emotional labor when assisting a more diverse group of users in the context of time constraints exacerbated by NPM reforms.…”

Integrating Dark Humor and Compassion

“…According to Tseelon (1992), impression management research following Goffman assumed that actors strategically manipulate their public displays to hide their true selves (see Bolino et al 2008;Durr and Wingfield 2011;Kumra and Vinnicombe 2010 for recent examples). By extension, this scholarship often concludes that the backstage is more "authentic" than the front stage (Chriss 1995).…”

Struggles and Strategies of Black Women Business Owners in the U.S.

“…Black women cite walking away, praying, and trying to manage the pace of the stressor as coping mechanisms for workplace stress (Hall et al 2012). Professional Black women attempt to adhere to Western cultural norms of corporate spaces (Durr & Wingfield 2011), which ultimately uphold standards of whiteness. By attempting to align themselves with the workplace culture, Black women engage in emotional labor that can be taxing and stressful to manage in already high-pressure occupations.…”

“…Understanding the various techniques Black women business owners use to cope with stress and discrimination allows us to situate their experiences within a broader context. If Black women are spending more time holding their tongues, monitoring their self-presentation, and attempting to merge different social positions as they are known to do in adapting to White workspaces (Bell 1990;Durr & Wingfield 2011), their experiences with success and business ownership might differ from other business owners.…”