Negotiating Selves: Gender

Abstract

This paper suggests a way of framing gender production in workplaces as a negotiation with varying results. The basis for such a frame is a combination of the notions of ”positioning” (the discoursive production of selves, as suggested by Davies and Harré, 1990), ”doing gender” (gender as an accomplishment, an achieved property of situated conduct: West and Zimmerman, 1987), ”negotiation of identities” (which take place when positioning is contested: Pavlenko and Blackledge, 2004) and ”coercive gendering” (ascribing gender to people through discriminatory action: Czarniawska, 2006). One could then distinguish a self-positioning from an attributive positioning and observe their interplay. Using examples from the field, the paper then reviews varying outcomes of such negotiations in workplaces. Although the examples start with gender, the same frame can be successively applied to various instances of intersectionality.