Sticking to it or Opting for Alternatives: Managing Contested Work Identities in Nonstandard Work

Research shows that people who face stigmatized work identities attempt to reconfigure their employment more positively, such as by concealing their involvement with their jobs or reframing the value of it. Yet, in an era of rising nonstandard work, how might managing work identities also involve ma...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inQualitative sociology Vol. 45; no. 2; pp. 219 - 239
Main Authors Wilson, Eli R., Schieber, David
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published New York Springer US 01.06.2022
Springer Nature B.V
Subjects
Cross Cultural Psychology
Employment
Identity
Job hunting
Job searching
Part time employment
Personality and Social Psychology
Prostitution
Restaurants
Sex industry
Sex workers
Social Sciences
Society
Sociology
Stigma
Work
Workers
Nonstandard work
Work identity
Sex work
Stigma
Restaurant work
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Summary:Research shows that people who face stigmatized work identities attempt to reconfigure their employment more positively, such as by concealing their involvement with their jobs or reframing the value of it. Yet, in an era of rising nonstandard work, how might managing work identities also involve managing multiple jobs across fluid employment contexts? We draw insights from two cases of nonstandard workers facing differing degrees of contested work identity—frontline restaurant workers and sex workers. We find that these workers use similar strategies to manage their employment that involve identity work and job searching, yet their decision to stick to their line of work or opt for alternatives stems in part from the symbolic characteristics of their respective jobs. We conclude by laying out a broader framework for how workers manage contested work identities in an era of nonstandard employment.
ISSN:0162-0436
1573-7837
DOI:10.1007/s11133-021-09506-y