Rendering sexism invisible in workplace narratives. A narrative analysis of female entrepreneurs’ stories of not being talked to by men

Entrepreneurism is widely regarded as being one way in which women can sidestep the sexism of male‐dominated institutionalized work environments and enter into a world in which men and women operate on a level playing field. Yet, in a corpus of stories of female entrepreneurs’ experiences, we noted that being ignored by men was a constant theme. Taking a social constructionist and narrative approach to identity, we analyse the gendered identity work that female entrepreneurs do in these stories and we seek to explicate the process through which female entrepreneurs do not evaluate being ignored by men as sexism‐in‐action. Using positioning theory as an analytical tool, we analyse these stories at three different levels: the here‐and‐now interaction between interviewer and storyteller; the there‐and‐then identity work of the characters in the storyworld; and the wider societal Discourses that the storytellers enact, and which are enacted by such identity work. Findings indicate that despite making gendered difference, inferiority and lack of agency relevant, the stories are not evaluated as sexism‐in‐action because the female entrepreneurs enact a postfeminist and neoliberal Discourse of freedom, autonomy and choice, rather than a feminist Discourse of discrimination and sexism.     

The ‘good mother’ struggles: Obstacles to the attainment of motherhood ideals among adult women formerly placed in residential care

We analysed narratives of motherhood produced by 13 women who were involved with the welfare system or the justice system during adolescence. The original contribution of our study was its focus on mothers who were turning age 30, so they were not in that period of generalized instability that characterizes the transition from care and into adulthood. This qualitative study was part of a larger study on French‐Canadian adolescents with a history of residential care. Semi‐directed interviews were conducted with 13 women, more than 15 years after their admission to residential care. Our data highlights that motherhood can contribute to the vulnerability of women who were involved with the welfare or the justice system as adolescents. Our results suggest that in order to shed a perceived deviant label and to compensate for the adverse events they experienced, they pursue internalized ideals of “good motherhood” that translate into restrictions and strain. Furthermore, they tend to refrain from allowing people into their lives and asking for help for fear of being judged. Yet, as their children are getting older and exhibiting problem behaviors of their own, the questioning of their parental practices and skills only becomes more intense.     

Chinese youth performing identities and navigating belonging online

This paper examines the experiences of belonging of young Chinese internet users through an analysis of their online identity practices. Drawing on a qualitative research project about online citizenship practices of 31 young Chinese citizens from mainland China, I explore their experiences of belonging on two online platforms (Weibo and WeChat) and the identities formed and sustained through these experiences. The results show that young people experience different senses of belonging in different social media spaces. Their strategies in navigating these experiences are informed by (a) their perceptions of online spaces as private or public, and (b) using online identity performance as a supplement to or escape from identities in physical life. I argue that young Chinese internet users experience different senses of belonging by flexibly appropriating the affordances of social media platforms for communication and networking; these senses of belonging play a key role in forming and sustaining their identities, and are crucial for their wellbeing.     

Violence in the name of god? A framing processes approach to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria

Since summer 2014, the insurgent group ‘Islamic State in Iraq and Syria’ (ISIS) has become a major concern for international politics and global security due to its rapid territorial gains, violent operations and the propagation of Salafi-jihadist ideology. This study aims to enhance the academic understanding of ISIS by demystifying the ideological reasoning behind its use of violence. It therefore investigates the link between structural factors that served ISIS’s evolution, its ideological outlook and the significance of this ideology to legitimize violent action. As its theoretical basis, the study employs framing processes within the study of social movements. Methodologically, discursive frame analysis serves to explore the relation of ISIS’s ideology to structural events and experiences to better understand how the group justifies violence. Therefore, the study draws on audio speeches and issues of the magazines Dabiq and Dar al-Islam published by ISIS, which are examined on the rhetoric of othering, collective identity and justifying violence. It is argued that ISIS constructs a collective action frame which creates a social reality that bestows the group with a rationale for action. ISIS’s ideology, based on Islamic symbolism, presents an interpretative lens which assigns meaning to the structural environment of ISIS’s emergence. In this context, violence is justified as a necessity to defend Islam and as an obligation for the true Muslim believer. The discussion concludes that ISIS’s ideology legitimizes the very existence of the group and conceals its mundane struggle for power, territory and wealth through reference to divine authority.     

Beyond the heartlands: deindustrialization,naturalization and the meaning of an ‘industrial’ tradition

Deindustrialization is a complex and multifaceted series of processes and transitions, reflecting the equally complicated web of social relationships and interdependencies that constitute(d) an industrial society. Contemporary scholars have looked beyond just the economic impact of industrial loss, to the cultural, temporal and spatial legacies and impacts wrought by the mass closures of the 1980s, as well as the continuing presence of an industrial identity in struggles over representation and regeneration. However, deindustrialization has a history that precedes the volatility and culmination of that period, and has impacted upon a more geographically diverse range of former industrial locations than are commonly represented. The narratives that surround some sites are complicated by their displacement in time, place and discourse; they lack the political capital of an ‘industrial’ identity through this disassociation. In this article I aim to go beyond what we might consider the industrial ‘heartlands’ of the UK to a place that has felt the impact of deindustrialization, but which falls outside of the usual representations of the UK's industrial past. I explore how the industrial identity and memory of a place can be naturalized and selectively reworked for the needs of the hour, the very meaning of ‘industrial’ altered in the process. I argue that for sites unable to access or utilize the imagery of modern, heavy industry for community or promotional aims, deindustrialization becomes a process of rewriting an historic identity – one that sheds new light on industrial loss in diverse situations, and at an ever‐increasing distance from closure.     

Spaces of Muslim Identity in Inverness,Scotland

Each generation of immigrants has its own challenges; for example, how to maintain already constructed identities among first generation immigrants and how to construct identities of the second generation of immigrants. Numerous literature suggests that the previous studies on these topics have been conducted within larger cities such as London, Glasgow or Edinburgh. This article examines how Muslim immigrants in a small city maintain and modify some aspects of their religious and cultural identities. The data consist of 30 interviews conducted with first and second generation of Muslim immigrants in Scotland, analysis of which suggests the size of the city does not appear to affect daily Muslim practices nor their ability to maintain Muslim identity. Rather, access to shared spaces, such as Inverness Masjid and the local halal meat shop, become critical to how Muslim's maintain and modify their identity in a new place.     

Growing up on the sidelines: identity negotiations of Palestinian youth from ‘collaborating’ families relocated to Israel

By examining the experiences of the children of Palestinian collaborators whose families have relocated to Israel, this study explores how youth negotiate self within the context of marginalisation and cultural dislocation. Due to the actions of their parents, the research participants have become outsiders and outcasts in their Palestinian communities of origin, outsiders in Israel, and outsiders among Israeli-Arabs. Based on qualitative, in-depth interviews with 11 Palestinian male youths, we describe and analyse the experience of identity negotiation in the context of fear and their families’ past deceit. Our findings highlight that the youths’ identities are negotiated by engaging in a dialogue of self on belonging and not belonging that is based on visions of their past, present and future selves. This is accompanied by a forced dialogue with others, explaining who they are in order to fit in with the ‘audience’, a presentation that is then acted out.     

Transnational queer sociological analysis of sexual identity and civic‐political activism in Hong Kong,Taiwan and mainland China

The sociology of homosexuality lacks engagement with queer theory and postcolonialism and focuses primarily on the global metropoles, thus failing to provide a plausible account of non‐Western non‐normative sexual identities. This research adopts the author’s newly proposed transnational queer sociology to address these deficiencies. First, it critiques the Western model of sexual identity predominantly employed to elucidate non‐Western, non‐normative sexualities. It does so by examining not only the queer flows between West and non‐West but also those among and within non‐Western contexts to produce translocally shared and mutually referenced experiences. Second, the proposed approach combines sociology with queer theory by emphasizing the significant role of material, as well as discursive, analyses in shaping queer identities, desires and practices. This article employs the approach to examine young gay male identities, as revealed in 90 in‐depth interviews conducted in Hong Kong (n = 30), Taiwan (Taipei, n = 30) and mainland China (Shanghai, n = 30) between 2017 and 2019. More specifically, it highlights the interplay between the state and identity by investigating the intersection and intertwining effects of these young men’s sexual and cultural/national identities, revealing three different forms of civic‐political activism. The article both demonstrates the way in which sexuality and the state are mutually constituted and provides nuanced analysis of the heterogeneity of contemporary homosexualities in Hong Kong, Taiwan and mainland China. In applying a new sociological approach to understanding sexuality, this research joins the growing body of scholarship within sociology that is decentring the Western formation of universal knowledge.     

Finding common ground: how superdiversity is unsettling social work education

For social work education in the Netherlands, the rapid transition towards superdiversity means that its capacity to adapt to this new reality and to adjust to diverse students’ backgrounds is fiercely challenged. The key aim of this article is to discuss how social work educators are dealing with the unsettling challenges of increasing diversity, based on the research outcomes of an explorative study amongst Turkish–Dutch and Moroccan–Dutch female professionals. Two different groups of educators were asked to comment on the outcomes of this study. One of the dilemmas for educators is to determine what can be considered supportive and inclusive and as reducing inequality in education. The authors used two key theoretical concepts, ‘superdiversity’ and ‘the capability approach’. These theoretical perspectives were used to deconstruct the rather massive concepts of diversity and social justice, by emphasising contextual approaches. Both perspectives stress the urgent need to involve students as ‘active agents of change’, by building a social work community to stimulate and facilitate an on-going dialogue. To successfully fulfil a pivotal role in the upward mobility or emancipation of ethnic minority students, social work education needs to be adjusted to accommodate diverse student groups.     

Sofiia Andrukhovych’s Felix Austria: the postcolonial neo-Gothic and Ukraine’s search for itself

ABSTRACT

Sofiia Andrukhovych’s 2014 novel Felix Austria (Feliks Avstriia) became Ukraine’s most critically acclaimed and commercially successful work of literature published in the immediate aftermath of the Euromaidan revolution of 2013–14. It combined an ambitious historical reconstruction of daily life in the year 1900 in a mid-size city in the Habsburg-ruled part of Ukraine and an engaging plot skilfully employing multiple devices associated with the Gothic tradition, especially in its latter-day and postmodernist reinterpretations. The novel’s success is especially telling in the context of the rising interest in the Gothic in Ukrainian culture. Told by an unreliable narrator, the novel prompts readers to interrogate their assumptions. In the context of Ukraine, it is particularly subversive in its engagement with the nostalgic myth of the Habsburg Empire as a multi-ethnic utopia of tolerance, and by implication it challenges all imperial myths. The novel’s emphasis on the quest for (self-)discovery strongly resonated with readers in the context of a socio-political crisis, which highlighted the relevance of the distinct postcolonial overtones in its message.