A Patchwork of Femininities

Working-Class Women's Fluctuating Gender Performances in a Pakistani Market

Bibliographic Data

ID2368352
AuthorsSidra Kamran (0000-0001-5312-1293, New School for Social Research, USA, corresponding author)
Year2021
Volume35
Issue6
Pages971-994
Publication date2021-12-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueGender & Society (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0891-2432 • E-ISSN: 1552-3977
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/08912432211046982
OpenAlexW3202468926
LanguageEN
Citations received15
References cited22

Scholars have studied multiple femininities across different spaces by attributing variation to cultural/spatial contexts. They have studied multiple femininities in the same space by attributing variation to class/race positions. However, we do not yet know how women from the same cultural, class, and race locations may enact multiple femininities in the same context. Drawing on observations and interviews in a women-only bazaar in Pakistan, I show that multiple femininities can exist within the same space and be enacted by the same individual. Working-class women workers in Meena Bazaar switched between performances of 'pariah femininity' and 'hegemonic femininity,' patching together contradictory femininities to secure different types of capital at the organizational and personal levels. Pariah femininities enabled access to economic capital but typically decreased women's symbolic capital, whereas hegemonic femininities generated symbolic capital but could block or enable access to economic capital. The concept of a patchwork performance of femininity explains how and why working-class women simultaneously embody idealized and stigmatized forms of femininity. Furthermore, it captures how managerial regimes and personal struggles for class distinction interact to produce contradictory gender performances. By examining gender performances in the context of social stratification, I explain the structural underpinnings of working-class women's gendered struggles for respectability and work

Bazaar · Femininity · Geography · Hegemony · Pariah group · Political science · Sociology · Gender Diversity and Inequality · Gender Politics and Representation · Gender Roles and Identity Studies · Gender Studies · Law

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