We're Our Own Boss
Gendered Class-Consciousness and White Privilege among Hooper's Island Crab Pickers
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2472697 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Kelly Feltault |
| Year | 2005 |
| Volume | 26 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 1-13 |
| Publication date | 2005-03-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Anthropology of Work Review (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0883-024X • E-ISSN: 1548-1417 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1525/awr.2005.26.1.1 |
| OpenAlex | W2074179789 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 15 |
This article analyzes the gendered class-consciousness of white crab pickers of the Chesapeake Bay through their claim that they are their own boss. Although crab pickers work in a factory for a wage, have a boss, and punch a time clock, this article argues that gender, whiteness, kinship, and localized myths of hard work and independence tied to the coastal landscape formed a unique local and regional history linked to class and racial ideologies that actually allowed white crab pickers to contest packinghouse owners' authority over their schedules, speed, and other political aspects of work. The article analyzes ethnographic fieldwork, discourses in federal documents, and a strike by crab pickers to argue that white women's claim of self employment was an historically contingent process where class and class-consciousness operated as relationships defined by women as they lived their own lives. The article concludes that scholars must separate class-consciousness from class action and understand the political power of dominant classes to control the latter, especially in relation to gendered labor markets. Women crab pickers' claim of self-employment points to a consciousness of oneself within a specific power relationship and subordinated position
Labor Movements and Unions · Migration, Ethnicity, and Economy · Race, History, and American Society
Like a Family
Hegemony and the Language of Contention
Other Modernities
The Concept of Cultural Hegemony
White Women, Race Matters
A Woman's Place in the Crab Processing Industry of Eastern Carolina
Labor Markets as Gendered Institutions
Women and Class Analysis
The Trouble with Nature
How Chiefs Come to Power
Crossing the Great Divides
Women and Class Analysis
| Citations per year | 0.13 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2010 - 2014 (5) |
| Highly cited | No |