Invisible Room Attendants: Outsourcing as a Dispositive of (In)visibility and the Resistance of Las Kellys in Spain

Abstract

Outsourced room attendants have been described as invisible to both guests and management. However, room attendants in Spain have managed to create a movement called Las Kellys, which has raised their visibility and earned them respect in society. The article questions how outsourcing leads to the invisibility of room attendants in Spain and how Las Kellys renders them visible. Based on a study conducted with room attendants who were working at hotels in different parts of Spain in 2020, the results show how outsourcing works as a dispositive that creates invisibility through a socio-spatial and socio-legal segregation, while workers are seen as a number to be managed. Against the dispositive of invisibility, Las Kellys has raised their visibility as social actors to contest these ways of being (in)visible.