Women’s Empowerment at the Moroccan Supermarket: An Ethnographic Account of Achieved Capabilities and Altered Social Relations in an Emerging Retail Servicescape

2020 ◽  
Vol 40 (4) ◽  
pp. 492-509 ◽  
Author(s):  
Delphine Godefroit-Winkel ◽  
Lisa Peñaloza

This study bridges CCT and macromarketing perspectives in carrying out an ethnographic study examining how Moroccan women empower themselves in shopping in the supermarket. Our three-year ethnographic study in Casablanca among women and men illuminates the ways in which women develop new capabilities and alter social relations with family members, friends, store employees and customers. In turn, the interplay of women’s competencies, their interactions with men and women, and their socio-demographics of age and social class, together with supermarket characteristics, provide favorable conditions for the women to empower themselves. As women gain confidence to demonstrate their competencies and manifest their desires in leveraging their traditional nurturing roles and taking on tasks previously in the domain of men, they alter their relations with their husband and with the women who exercise control over them. Theoretical contributions contribute to knowledge of the importance of gender and family interactions as they impact the acquisition of key competencies in novel marketspaces through which women empower themselves, and generate further insight into the complex interweaving of market and social systems.

Author(s):  
Leonie Lockstone-Binney ◽  
Judith Mair ◽  
Tom Baum ◽  
Faith Ong

The nature of events demand uniqueness and memorability, but the specific elements of experience that produce these have not been deeply examined, particularly over the course of the event experience. Much of this relies heavily on event places and the social relations they facilitate. This research used the concept of temporary communitas and built on the Event Experience Scale (EES) through an ethnographic study of an iconic multi-day, spectator driven sporting event. Solicited participant diaries of eight friends and family who travelled to attend the 2017 Boxing Day Ashes Test in Melbourne, Australia, were collected pre, during and post-event to capture the event experience as it emerged over time. Qualitative analysis of the ethnographic accounts revealed four event experience themes (competition, emotions and atmosphere, special experience and interactions), which collectively were connected to a strong sense of temporary communitas. These themes were evident across the event cycle, providing insight into the nuances of the event experience, and highlighting the importance of understanding the social relations generated in the event place pre- and post-event. Consequently, it is suggested that revision to the existing EES instrument is required to more comprehensively assess for temporary communitas as part of the event experience. Future studies could usefully test the factor structure of the EES with and without the suggested additional temporary communitas items and compare both models on the basis of their reliability and validity.


2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 91-105
Author(s):  
Tiago Bittencourt

The purpose of this paper is to examine how students inhabiting distinctive social spaces and experiencing considerably different material realities define, value and problematize the concept of international mindedness. Drawing on a larger multi-sited ethnographic study of two International Baccalaureate schools in Ecuador, the study found that while students from distinct social backgrounds provided similar definitions of what international mindedness entails, they differed notably in what they considered to be the value and potential pitfalls of embodying the concept as a personal disposition. These differences emerged primarily as a result of how students related to their immediate surroundings and the assumptions they made about their future lives. Focusing on students’ constructions of ‘place’ and their imagined futures provides an important insight into how students engage with international mindedness specifically, and the International Baccalaureate more broadly. Furthermore, it attests to why matters related to ‘social class’ deserve a greater degree of scholarly attention.


2017 ◽  
Vol 45 (6) ◽  
pp. 1029-1042 ◽  
Author(s):  
Na Zhang ◽  
Jian Zhang ◽  
Jing Wang

To expand the business ethics research field, and to increase society's understanding of Chinese insurance agents' business ethics, we investigated how gender differences are related to agents' business ethical sensitivity and whether or not these relationships are moderated by empathy. Through a regression analysis of the factors associated with the business ethical sensitivity of 417 Chinese insurance agents, we found that gender played an important role in affecting business ethical sensitivity, and empathy significantly affected business ethical sensitivity. Furthermore, empathy had a moderating effect on the relationship between gender and business ethical sensitivity. Both men and women with strong empathy scored high on business ethical sensitivity; however, men with strong empathy had higher levels of business ethical sensitivity than did women with little empathy. The findings add to the literature by providing insight into the mechanisms responsible for the benefits of empathy in increasing business ethical sensitivity.


2021 ◽  
pp. 136078042098512 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louise Folkes

Discussions around social mobility have increasingly gained traction in both political and academic circles in the last two decades. The current, established conceptualisation of social mobility reduces ‘success’ down to individual level of educational achievement, occupational position and income, focusing on the successful few who rise up and move out. For many in working-class communities, this discourse is undesirable or antithetical to everyday life. Drawing upon 13 interviews with 9 families collected as part of an ethnographic study, this article asks, ‘how were social (im)mobility narratives and notions of value constructed by residents of one working-class community?’ Its findings highlight how alternative narratives of social (im)mobility were constructed; emphasising the value of fixity, anchorage, and relationality. Three key techniques were used by participants when constructing social (im)mobility narratives: the born and bred narrative; distancing from education as a route to mobility; and the construction of a distinct working-class discourse of fulfilment. Participants highlighted the value of anchorage to place and kinship, where fulfilment results from finding ontological security. The findings demonstrate that residents of a working-class community constructed alternative social mobility narratives using a relational selfhood model that held local value. This article makes important contributions to the theorisation of social mobility in which it might be understood as a collective rather than individual endeavour, improving entire communities that seek ontological security instead of social class movement and dislocation.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-33
Author(s):  
Aurélie Toivonen ◽  
Ignasi Martí

This study examines activities and processes through which projects of moral regulation are implemented as well as lived, transformed, and resisted by their targeted actors. Our ethnographic study focuses on discourses and practices of civic duty for orderly and hygienic conduct in the rehabilitation of marketplaces in Yaoundé, Cameroon. By drawing on the inhabited institutions approach and the literature on ethics as practice, our analysis extends research on moral work to put forward a perspective on moral regulation as a situated practice. We show how moral work is built on individual reflections but is simultaneously negotiated through actors’ relationships, that is, responsibilities to family, interactions within the community, and personal history.


2020 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 312-335
Author(s):  
Jae-Woo Kim ◽  
Chaeyoon Lim ◽  
Christina Falci

This study investigates the link between social relationship and subjective well-being in the context of social stratification. The authors examine how perceived quality of social relationships and subjective social class are linked to self-reported happiness among men and women in South Korea. The study finds that one’s perception of relative social standing is positively associated with happiness independently of objective indicators of socioeconomic status, while social relationship quality strongly predicts the happiness among both men and women. However, the mediation pathway and moderating effects vary by gender. For men, the nexus between subjective social class and happiness is partially mediated by the quality of interpersonal relationships. No similar mediating effect is found among women. The study also finds gender difference in whether the link between social relationship quality and happiness varies by subjective social class. The happiness return to positive social relationships increases as men’s subjective social status becomes higher, which is consistent with the resource multiplication hypothesis. No similar moderation effect is found among women. Combined, these results reveal potentially different pathways to happiness across gender in Korea, where social status competition, collectivistic culture, and patriarchal gender relations are salient in daily life.


2012 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-68 ◽  
Author(s):  
Coretta Phillips

This article explores recent concerns about the emergence of gangs in prisons in England and Wales. Using narrative interviews with male prisoners as part of an ethnographic study of ethnicity and social relations, the social meaning of ‘the gang’ inside prison is interrogated. A formally organized gang presence was categorically denied by prisoners. However, the term ‘gang’ was sometimes elided with loose collectives of prisoners who find mutual support in prison based on a neighbourhood territorial identification. Gangs were also discussed as racialized groups, most often symbolized in the motif of the ‘Muslim gang’. This racializing discourse hinted at an envy of prisoner solidarity and cohesion which upsets the idea of a universal prisoner identity. The broader conceptual, empirical and political implications of these findings are considered.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dragana Glogovac ◽  
◽  
Marina Milošević ◽  
Bojan Lazić ◽  

Modern primary education, especially mathematics, requires constant innovation of teaching practice in order to modernize, rationalize, and efficiently the teaching process. Teaching mathematics should be experienced as a process that promotes learning with understanding, stimulates motivation, active learning, research, critical thinking, analysis, problem solving, drawing conclusions, exchange of experiences. The tendency to improve the quality of mathematics education has resulted in many studies pointing to the benefits of research-based mathematics (IN) teaching, known as inquiry-based learning (IBL), recognized as an essential way of organizing the teaching process to develop key competencies, abilities and skills in 21st century. Тhe aim of this paper is to see, based on a comprehensive theoretical analysis and the results of previous research. The created model of teaching mathematics based on research represents a useful framework for improving the quality of the process of teaching and learning mathematics, and empowers teachers in its application and affirmation, gaining insight into the way of organizing research learning.


2018 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 233339361879295
Author(s):  
Oona St-Amant ◽  
Catherine Ward-Griffin ◽  
Helene Berman ◽  
Arja Vainio-Mattila

As international volunteer health work increases globally, research pertaining to the social organizations that coordinate the volunteer experience in the Global South has severely lagged. The purpose of this ethnographic study was to critically examine the social organizations within Canadian NGOs in the provision of health work in Tanzania. Multiple, concurrent data collection methods, including text analysis, participant observation and in-depth interviews were utilized. Data collection occurred in Tanzania and Canada. Neoliberalism and neocolonialism were pervasive in international volunteer health work. In this study, the social relations—“volunteer as client,” “experience as commodity,” and “free market evaluation”—coordinated the volunteer experience, whereby the volunteers became “the client” over the local community and resulting in an asymmetrical relationship. These findings illuminate the need to generate additional awareness and response related to social inequities embedded in international volunteer health work.


2018 ◽  
Vol 56 (3) ◽  
pp. 822-867 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher P. Brown ◽  
Joanna Englehardt ◽  
David P. Barry ◽  
Da Hei Ku

Kindergarten in the United States has fundamentally changed. It is the new first grade where children are taught increased academic content and experience more standardized testing. There is much debate among education stakeholders about these changes, but such discussions are often siloed— making it difficult to know whether these changes reflect these stakeholders’ understandings of kindergarten specifically or public education in general. This explorative video-cued multivocal ethnographic study addressed this issue by examining how local, state, and national education stakeholders made sense of the changed kindergarten. Such findings provide insight into what it is they viewed driving these academic and instructional changes, what opportunities for further reform exist, and whether these stakeholders will work to support and/or alter such changes.


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