Encounters in the workplace: everyday diversity in a multinational professional firm. (12th June 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Lee, Sandy
• Is Part Of: Social & cultural geography. Volume 21:Number 5(2020)
• Page Start: 738
• Page End: 760
• Publication Date: 2020-06-12
• Subjects: Workplace -- encounters -- performativity -- intersectionality -- Melbourne -- Singapore; lieu de travail -- rencontres -- performance -- intersectionnalité -- Melbourne -- Singapour; lugar de trabajo -- encuentros -- performatividad -- interseccionalidad -- Melbourne -- Singapur; Human geography -- Periodicals; 304.205
• DOI: 10.1080/14649365.2018.1499040
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1464-9365

Abstract

ABSTRACT: This paper provides a theoretically driven discussion about the need to take the workplace, rather than social group identities, as the point of entry into studying encounters at work. Broadening the lens beyond these identities allows an appreciation of the multidimensional elements that constitute the work place – this being the institutional, material, social and discursive, and how they shape everyday encounters with difference at work. This understanding is vital if we are to effectively enhance the potential of workplaces to facilitate 'meaningful' contact in cities. Drawing on two case studies of professional workplaces in Melbourne and Singapore, I illustrate how the multidimensional workplace gives rise to the performance of place-based identities that intersect with ethnicity, nationality and gender, but the salient intersections and their impacts on encounters are influenced by the context in which the workplace is situated. I thus conclude that the work place as well as the broader place matters in how encounters play out at work. The paper therefore contributes to the existing literature on encounters at work specifically, and urban encounters more generally, by articulating the multidimensionality of the work place and its importance in shaping everyday contact.