The World in a Bottle: Gender,Age,and Direct Sales in Costa Rica.
详细信息
- 作者：Preston-Werner ; Theresa.
- 学历：Doctor
- 年：2012
- 导师：Weismantel,Mary,eadvisorTranberg Hansen,Karenecommittee memberSchwartzman,Helenecommittee member
- 毕业院校：Northwestern University
- Department：Anthropology.
- ISBN：9781267620262
- CBH：3527619
- Country：USA
- 语种：English
- FileSize：190542334
- Pages：312
文摘
In this ethnography I explore why middle-aged,Costa Rican women 40--60 years old) chose to affiliate with direct-sales organizations and,later,why many distributors remained loyal to their respective companies when only a handful of affiliates ever earned sustainable incomes. I believe that the answers to these two questions lay buried in complex questions of identity and social hierarchy in Costa Rica. To discern local configurations of status,I examined how middle-aged,Costa Rican women valued,exchanged,and wielded various forms of economic,cultural,and emotional capital throughout their direct sales tenure. The arc of my dissertation traces the three activities within direct sales: 1) the consumption of the products,2) the work of direct sales,and 3) the teaching and performance of self-empowerment within the community of company affiliates. I employ the concept of capital cultural,economic,social,and symbolic) Bourdieu 1984) to explain the multiple benefits that distributors anticipate in each of these three arenas,and I extend Bourdieus formulation to include moral Lamont 1992) and emotional capital Nowotny 1981),two resources important to middle-aged,Costa Rican women. Ultimately,my data demonstrate that low status distributors,such as poor,middle-aged women,neither improved their individual positions in society nor altered local gender,age,or class conceptions during their involvement with direct-sales companies. Nevertheless,these same distributors often remained loyal to the companies and their ideology of self-empowerment. Direct-sales companies capitalized on distributors like these women,who paid affiliation and quota fees earning little money in sales) in exchange for hope and self-empowerment. This ethnography documents the ways in which direct-sales organizations harnessed a neoliberal discourse of agency and hard work to exaggerate the possibility for individual mobility in order to attract workers and increase company profits.