TY - BOOK

T1 - Creative differences

T2 - the performativity of gender in the digital media sector

AU - Proctor-Thomson, Sarah

PY - 2009

Y1 - 2009

N2 - The digital media sector is a site for competing claims about women’s equality inemployment. On the one hand, commentators have claimed that the digital mediasector is exemplary as an open and egalitarian domain for all workers, includingwomen. On the other hand, feminist researchers have identified persistentinequalities in the quality and quantity of women’s participation in this sector. I usethis apparent paradox as a starting point to develop an analysis of the performativityof gender in the digital media sector in the North West of England, during the period2001–2007.Previous feminist research has addressed this paradox by arguing that genderinequalities in the creative and digital industries are obscured by emancipatoryaccounts of new forms of work. I take an alternative route. Drawing on the work ofJudith Butler, I investigate how positive articulations of work in the digital mediasector might ‘perform’ gender inequalities. The theory of gender performativityemployed in this study views gender as produced through repetitive discursivepractices.In this study I analyse qualitative data from four sites in the ‘discursive field’ ofthe digital media sector. These data consist of: 1) statements in policy documentationfrom UK government agencies; 2) textual and visual representations of workers incareers and recruitment literature; 3) field notes from a participant observation of adigital industries training event; and 4) interviews with 23 female and male industrybrokers and practitioners working in and around the digital media sector. Idistinguish four apparently progressive articulations of work and women’sparticipation in these sites. These address changing skills requirements, shiftingimages of work and workers, and increased recognition and valuing of ‘difference’ and‘diversity’ for creativity in the digital industries. I denaturalise these pervasivearticulations by showing the discursive practices involved in their formation.I argue that there are shifts away from the sector’s previous characterisation asan exclusively technical, ‘geeky’ and male domain and that there has recently been aproliferation of possible worker subject positions in this work domain. Moreover, in acontext of increasing attention to creativity, women are identified as ‘different’ andthus as potentially valuable creative workers. Yet, despite these shifts, womenworkers continue to be marginalised through repeated differentiation from some ofthe most valued subject positions in the sector. While women are seen to bring‘difference’ and ‘diversity’ into the digital media sector, they also bring gender.Differences attributed to women are consistently devalued and are seldom recognisedas ‘creative differences’.My thesis contributes an analysis of gender to debates about work in the creativeeconomy. It also contributes to the development of feminist investigations of gender,work and organisation by providing a case study of the discursive construction ofideal and normalised workers in the creative work domain of the digital media sector.

AB - The digital media sector is a site for competing claims about women’s equality inemployment. On the one hand, commentators have claimed that the digital mediasector is exemplary as an open and egalitarian domain for all workers, includingwomen. On the other hand, feminist researchers have identified persistentinequalities in the quality and quantity of women’s participation in this sector. I usethis apparent paradox as a starting point to develop an analysis of the performativityof gender in the digital media sector in the North West of England, during the period2001–2007.Previous feminist research has addressed this paradox by arguing that genderinequalities in the creative and digital industries are obscured by emancipatoryaccounts of new forms of work. I take an alternative route. Drawing on the work ofJudith Butler, I investigate how positive articulations of work in the digital mediasector might ‘perform’ gender inequalities. The theory of gender performativityemployed in this study views gender as produced through repetitive discursivepractices.In this study I analyse qualitative data from four sites in the ‘discursive field’ ofthe digital media sector. These data consist of: 1) statements in policy documentationfrom UK government agencies; 2) textual and visual representations of workers incareers and recruitment literature; 3) field notes from a participant observation of adigital industries training event; and 4) interviews with 23 female and male industrybrokers and practitioners working in and around the digital media sector. Idistinguish four apparently progressive articulations of work and women’sparticipation in these sites. These address changing skills requirements, shiftingimages of work and workers, and increased recognition and valuing of ‘difference’ and‘diversity’ for creativity in the digital industries. I denaturalise these pervasivearticulations by showing the discursive practices involved in their formation.I argue that there are shifts away from the sector’s previous characterisation asan exclusively technical, ‘geeky’ and male domain and that there has recently been aproliferation of possible worker subject positions in this work domain. Moreover, in acontext of increasing attention to creativity, women are identified as ‘different’ andthus as potentially valuable creative workers. Yet, despite these shifts, womenworkers continue to be marginalised through repeated differentiation from some ofthe most valued subject positions in the sector. While women are seen to bring‘difference’ and ‘diversity’ into the digital media sector, they also bring gender.Differences attributed to women are consistently devalued and are seldom recognisedas ‘creative differences’.My thesis contributes an analysis of gender to debates about work in the creativeeconomy. It also contributes to the development of feminist investigations of gender,work and organisation by providing a case study of the discursive construction ofideal and normalised workers in the creative work domain of the digital media sector.

M3 - Doctoral Thesis

PB - Lancaster University

CY - Lancaster

ER -