Beyond Glass Ceilings and Brick Walls - International Labour ...

Language is also utilized in understated ways to degrade women in the
workplace. For instance, women can be treated as ‘small girls’ as in the
case of the salesperson Tharuni, whose male colleagues chose to call her
‘nangi’ and treated her with condescension, although she was older than
them. Conversely, women employees who are assertive at work were
treated disparagingly. Rani, a staff officer, was referred to as a ‘Yakinna 1 ’
by her colleagues because she ‘refused to take anything lying down’.
A software analyst says that she pretended ‘not to understand’ the sexist
remarks/jokes/innuendo/ slang that were indulged in by her male colleagues
in a previous place of employment-an Internet /Email service provider. As
in most cases of subtle sexual harassment, the interviewee did not see it as
a situation that she did not have to submit to, but rather, has adopted
strategies to avoid being humiliated.
The above examples convey that language is a powerful tool of gender
micropolitics that is employed both consciously and unconsciously-to
undermine women, control women, and force them into normative
frameworks at the workplace.
Morality at Work
Morality, or rather, the way in which moral double standards operate in the
workplace, constitutes another manifestation of gender micropolitics. Within
the job market, certain companies, certain trades, certain departments and even
certain tasks and activities associated with some jobs are sometimes regarded
from a moral perspective.
For example, there are negative perceptions with regard to the travel/
entertainment trades, or the job of a stewardess or a marketing department
of a corporation as being ‘sophisticated’ or ‘morally fast’ or as providing
opportunities for staff to indulge in permissive behaviour. These have
particular significance when it comes to the women working in these
sectors. For instance, women employees working in the Free Trade Zones
are looked down on by society and are often morally censured much more
than the men who work in the same sector (de Alwis 2000).
It is argued that this is due to social perceptions of these women workers
as being single, independent, salaried, and living alone, which are taken to
imply moral laxity. At the same time, women employees can be pressurized
by family and relatives to avoid entering these categories of jobs, trade or
work sectors.
Another instance of workplace micropolitics manifested itself in the way
in which colleagues/superiors took it upon themselves to ‘protect the
character/chastity’ of an employee.
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