archives@tulane.edu / In the United States, work is a central dimension of adult life and a critical site through which we articulate who we are and who we want to be. Recent economic trends indicate that the middle class is shrinking, bottle-necking more working people into the burgeoning informal economy marked by lower-wages, at-will employment, few benefits, and the loss of collective bargaining rights. This study examines how men and women workers in the informal economy negotiate a sense of self within and through the structures that shape their working lives. Using standpoint theory and institutional ethnographic methodologies, this study explores identity negotiation processes and outcomes through interviews with 40 New Orleans-area bartenders. A comparative analysis between men and women bartenders identifies the rebel worker as an affirmative and self-made occupational identity formed in relationship to structures that produce vulnerability and instability. Identity negotiations among men and among women reveal that ascriptive statuses play a critical role in how work is experienced and navigated—rebel barkeeps and rebel barmaids are the gendered manifestations of workplace self-development projects that are formed in relationship to broader gender hegemonies. Finally, this study analyzes the impact of the rebel worker identity on the non-working lives of bartenders across and within gender statuses to map how the structures that shape our working selves are refracted and implicated within the intimate, non-working dimensions of bartenders’ lives, particularly in bartenders’ negotiations with family life. This study finds that the development of self-made identities is negotiated in relationship to relations of ruling that produce marginalizing effects in bartenders’ lives. The individualization of marginalization results in participants internalizing the outcomes of marginality rather than localizing and politicizing the outcomes of informal economies within broader relations of ruling. Moreover, identity projects through work are not only gendered, but play a central role in workers’ considerations of their opportunity structures beyond the workplace. As the informal economy continues to grow, the entrenchment of instability and vulnerability could play a central role in who Americans think they are and what they believe is possible for their futures. / 1 / Emily Hay Starr

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The question of gender, specifically gender identity, is prominent in today’s society. It is highly debated and through the development of queer theory it is gaining more academic recognition. However, there is a gap regarding representation of the gender-queer identity of one contemporary poet, Andrea Gibson. Gibson provides a much needed perspective and voice in society and scholarly debates. This is why this essay uses queer theory along with Kate Bornstein and Judith Butler to examine three poems by Gibson, “Swing-Set, “The Jewelry Store” and “A Genderful Pep-Talk for my Younger Self”. The essay analyses the ways Gibson, through poetry, formulates a gender-queer identity and thus questions the generic gender binary system.

<p> This transdisciplinary inquiry is about (de)positioning the (hetero)normative model of identity and facilitating systemic equity for the trans*/gender non-conforming community. The purpose of this research is to explore how the positioning of a heteronormative model of identity is socially and culturally constructed and positioned as normative and can be depositioned by a transformation of social consciousness regarding sexual and gender identity formation. </p><p> This dissertation examines some of the theories that have shaped the U. S. based social and cultural formations of gender and sexual identity, created and evolved U.S. social movements of politics and identity, and shaped the U.S. systemic language used to create categories of gender and sexual identities. The goals of this dissertation are to (1) understand and demonstrate the positioning of social norms regarding sexuality, gender identity, and gender expression, and; (2) employ this understanding in order to suggest and facilitate a framework for the transformation of social consciousness. </p><p> Through these processes, I analyze feminist theory, queer theory, communication theory, and systems theory by bracketing, bridging, and creating transitions zones to develop a metatheory that I call <i>trans*/gender non-conforming standpoint epistemology of identity formation.</i> </p><p> The implications of this study are to locate the nexus of normative social identities and those correlations to systemic equity. Further implications include an impetus of the transformation of social consciousness regarding all gender and sexual identity formation.</p>

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published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Literary and Cultural Studies / Master / Master of Arts

published_or_final_version / Literary and Cultural Studies / Master / Master of Arts

<p>This essay will analyse Jane Austen’s novel <em>Pride and Prejudice</em> from a feminist point of view, the emphasis being on how the environment and nature can reflect femininity and the relationships between men and women. The nature portrayed within <em>Pride and Prejudice</em> can also be looked at from a gender perspective in order to help understand how Jane Austen used nature to reflect the realities of gender differences in her society.</p><p><strong> </strong></p>