This ethnographic study of service interactions in Korean immigrant women–owned nailsalons in New York City introduces the concept “body labor” to designate a type of gendered work that involves the management of emotions in body-related service provision. The author explores variation in the performance of body labor caused by the intersection of the gendered processes of beauty service work with the racialized and class-specific service expectations of diverse customers. The study examines three distinct patterns of service provision that are shaped by racial and class inequalities between women: (1) high-service body labor, (2) expressive body labor, and (3) routinized body labor. These patterns demonstrate that a caring, attentive style of emotional display is dominant in workplaces governed by white, middle-class “feeling rules” but that different racial and class locations call forth other forms of gendered emotionalmanagement that focus on displaying respect, reciprocity, fairness, competence, and efficiency.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Anderson, Margaret, and Patricia Hill Collins. 2001. Race, class, and gender: An anthology. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
2.
Baca Zinn, Maxine. 1989. Family, race, and poverty in the eighties. Signs: Journal Of Women in Culture and Society14:856-*8*874.
3.
Banks, Ingrid. 2000. Hair matters: Beauty, power, and Black women’s consciousness. New York: New York University Press.
4.
Banner, Lois. 1983. American beauty. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
5.
Bordo, Susan. 1993. Unbearable weight: Feminism, Western culture and the body. Berkeley: University of California Press.
6.
Burawoy, Michael. 1991. Ethnography unbound. Berkeley: University of California Press.
7.
Chapkis, Wendy. 1986. Beauty secrets. Boston: South End.
8.
Cheng, Lucie, and Edna Bonacich. 1984. Labor immigration under capitalism: Asian workers in the United States before World War 2. Berkeley: University of California Press.
9.
Frank, Arthur W. 1990. Bringing bodies back in: A decade review. Theory, Culture, and Society7:131-162.
10.
Gilroy, Paul. 1993. The Black Atlantic: Modernity and double consciousness. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
11.
Gimlan,Debra.1996.Pamela’s place: Power and negotiationin the hair salon. Gender & Society10:505-526.
12.
Hall, Elaine J. 1993. Waitering/waitressing: Engendering the work of table servers. Gender & Society7:329-346.
13.
Hill Collins, Patricia. 1991. Black feminist thought: Knowledge, consciousness, and the politics of empowerment. New York: Routledge.
14.
Hochschild, Arlie. 1983. The managed heart: The commercialization of human feeling. Berkeley: University of California Press.
15.
hooks, bell. 1981. Ain’t I a woman: Black women and feminism. Boston: South End.
16.
hooks, bell. 1990. Black looks: Race and representation. Boston: South End.
17.
Hu-DeHart, Evelyn. 1999. Across the Pacific: Asian Americans and globalization. Philadelphia:Temple University Press.
18.
Hurtado, Aida. 1989. Relating to privilege: Seduction and rejection in the subordination of white women and women of color. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society14:833-855.
19.
Kang, Miliann. 1997. Manicuring race, gender, and class: Service interactions in New York City Korean nail salons. Race, Gender, and Class4:143-164.
20.
Kerner Furman, Frida. 1997. Facing the mirror: Older women and the beauty shop culture. New York: Routledge.
21.
Lee, Jee-Young Jennifer. 2002. Civility in the city: Blacks, Jews, and Koreans in urban America. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
22.
Leidner, Robin. 1993. Fast food, fast talk: Service work and the routinization of everyday life. Berkeley: University of California Press.
23.
Leidner, Robin. 1999. Emotional labor in service work. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science561:81-95.
24.
Lively, Kathryn. 2000. Reciprocal emotion management: Working together to maintain stratification in private law firms. Work and Occupations27:32-63.
25.
Macdonald, Cameron. 1996. Shadow mothers: Nannies, au pairs, and invisible work. In Working in the service society, edited by Cameron Lynne Macdonald and Carmen Sirianni. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
26.
Marx Ferree, Myra, and Elaine J. Hall. 1996. Rethinking stratification from a feminist perspective: Gender, race, and class in mainstream textbooks. American Sociological Review61:929-950.
27.
Nakano Glenn, Evelyn. 1992. From servitude to service work: Historical continuities in the racial division of paid reproductive labor. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society18:1-43.
28.
Nakano Glenn, Evelyn. 2002. Unequalfreedom: How race and gender shaped American citizenship and labor. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
29.
Ngan-Ling Chow, Esther. 1994. Asian American women at work. In Women of color in U.S. society, edited by Maxine Baca Zinn and Bonnie Dill Thornton. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
30.
Ong, Aihwa. 1987. Spirits of resistance and capitalist discipline: Factory women in Malaysia. Albany: State University of New York Press.
31.
Pierce, Jennifer L. 1995. Gender trials: Emotional lives in contemporary law firms. Berkeley: University of California Press.
32.
Rooks, Noliwe. 1996. Hair rising: Beauty, culture, and African American women. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
33.
Schmitt, Frederika E., and Patricia Yancey Martin. 1999. Unobtrusive mobilization by an institutionalized rape crisis center: “All we do comes from victims”. Gender & Society13:364-384.
34.
Smith, Dorothy. 1987. The everyday world as problematic: A feminist sociology. Boston: Northeastern University Press.
35.
Steinberg, Ronnie, and Deborah Figart. 1999. Emotional labor since The Managed Heart. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science561:8-26.
36.
Wharton, Amy. 1999. The psychological consequences of emotional labor. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science561:158-177.
37.
Wolf, Naomi. 1991. The beauty myth: How images of beauty are used against women. New York: William Morrow.
