This thesis explores gendered work and women‟s empowerment in interactive service work in Nepal, focusing on two five-star hotels, two deluxe resorts and two casinos. It develops a conceptual framework to explore how gendered work and women‟s empowerment are related, paying attention to the interactional and structural levels. This feminist research uses mixed methods of 21 questionnaires to gather quantitative data that shed light on the gendered workforce. Qualitative data is derived from 65 interviews (semi-structured and in-depth) with male and female workers, managers, male family members and policy experts, two focus group discussions with women working in two casinos and observations in the six sample establishments. The study makes three arguments. First, gendered work is constructed by three distinct but related dimensions, namely: the gender division of labour; the gendered ideologies of managers and workers; and the gendering of skills provided through training. Second, workers, to a variable extent, perform gendered emotional, aesthetic and (hetero) sexualised labour and such performances shape and are shaped by gendered work. Third, women‟s paid work empowers them to some extent at an individual level; however, structural constraints continue to impede their empowerment. The thesis makes theoretical as well as empirical contributions to existing knowledge. Theoretically, it contributes to understanding of the relationship between gendered work and empowerment in which structural context is of critical significance. At the empirical level, this makes an original contribution to the analysis of interactive service work in Nepal. The thesis finds that women doing gendered work are to some extent empowered at the individual level and perhaps „doing‟ gender per se is not a problem. However, structural constraints continue to impede women‟s empowerment, despite some gradual changes. The thesis also finds that the hotel and casino sector are not feminised in contrast to studies conducted in the „West‟.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:582372 |
| Date | January 2013 |
| Creators | Shrestha, Mona |
| Publisher | University of Warwick |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Source | http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/57260/ |
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