Women Traders in Cross-Cultural Perspective: Mediating Identities, Marketing Wares

by Linda J. Seligmann

Overview

This innovative volume studies women as economic, political, and cultural mediators of space, gender, value, and language in informal markets. Drawing on diverse methodologies—multisited fieldwork, linguistic analysis, and archival research—the contributors demonstrate how women move between and knit together household and marketplace activities. This knitting together pivots on how household practices and economies are translated and transferred to the market, as well as how market practices and economic principles become integral to the nature and construction of the household.

Exploring the cultural identities and economic practices of women traders in ten diverse locales—Bolivia, Ghana, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Morocco, Nicaragua, Peru, and the Philippines—the authors pay special attention to the effects of global forces, national economic policies, and nongovernmental organizations on women’s participation in the market and the domestic sector. The authors also consider the impact that women’s economic and political activities—in social movements, public protests, and more hidden kinds of subversive behavior—have on state policy, on the attitudes of different sectors of society toward female traders, and on the dynamics of the market itself.

A final theme focuses on the cultural dimension of mediation. Many women traders straddle cultural spheres and move back and forth between them. Does this affect their participation in the market and their identities? How do ties of ethnicity or acts of reciprocity affect the nature of commodity exchanges? Do they create exchanges that are neither purely commodified nor wholly without calculation? Or is it more often the case that ethnic commonalities and reciprocity merely mask the commodification of social and economic exchanges? Does this straddling lead to the emergence of new kinds of hybrid identities and practices? In considering these questions, the authors specify the ways in which consumers contribute to identity formation among market women.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780804740531
Publisher:	Stanford University Press
Publication date:	03/01/2002
Edition description:	1
Pages:	328
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Linda J. Seligmann is Associate Professor of Anthropology at George Mason University. She is the author of Between Reform and Revolution: Political Struggles in the Peruvian Andes (Stanford, 1995).

Table of Contents

	Preface	ix
	About the Authors	xi
	Introduction: Mediating Identities and Marketing Wares	1
Part I.	Gender Ideologies, Household Models, and Market Dynamics
1.	Nineteenth-Century Views of Women's Participation in Mexico's Markets	27
2.	Markets as Gendered Domains: The Javanese Pasar	47
Part II.	Fields of Power
3.	Inside, Outside, and Selling on the Road: Women's Market Trading in South India	73
4.	"Nursing-Mother Work" in Ghana: Power and Frustration in Akan Market Women's Lives	103
Part III.	Identity, Economy, and Survival in the Marketplace
5.	Situating Handicraft Market Women in Ifugao, Upland Philippines: A Case for Multiplicity	129
6.	Gender on the Market in Moroccan Women's Verbal Art: Performative Spheres of Feminine Authority	161
7.	Hungarian Village Women in the Marketplace During the Late Socialist Period	185
8.	Traditional Medicines in the Marketplace: Identity and Ethnicity Among Female Vendors	209
Part IV.	Research Agendas
9.	Market/places as Gendered Spaces: Market/women's Studies over Two Decades	229
	Conclusion: Future Research Directions	241
	Notes	253
	References	271
	Index	299

Recipe

This innovative volume studies women as economic, political, and cultural mediators of space, gender, value, and language in informal markets. Drawing on diverse methodologies—multisited fieldwork, linguistic analysis, and archival research—the contributors demonstrate how women move between and knit together household and marketplace activities. This knitting together pivots on how household practices and economies are translated and transferred to the market, as well as how market practices and economic principles become integral to the nature and construction of the household.
Exploring the cultural identities and economic practices of women traders in ten diverse locales—Bolivia, Ghana, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Morocco, Nicaragua, Peru, and the Philippines—the authors pay special attention to the effects of global forces, national economic policies, and nongovernmental organizations on women’s participation in the market and the domestic sector. The authors also consider the impact that women’s economic and political activities—in social movements, public protests, and more hidden kinds of subversive behavior—have on state policy, on the attitudes of different sectors of society toward female traders, and on the dynamics of the market itself.
A final theme focuses on the cultural dimension of mediation. Many women traders straddle cultural spheres and move back and forth between them. Does this affect their participation in the market and their identities? How do ties of ethnicity or acts of reciprocity affect the nature of commodity exchanges? Do they create exchanges that are neither purely commodified nor whollywithout calculation? Or is it more often the case that ethnic commonalities and reciprocity merely mask the commodification of social and economic exchanges? Does this straddling lead to the emergence of new kinds of hybrid identities and practices? In considering these questions, the authors specify the ways in which consumers contribute to identity formation among market women.

Editorial Reviews

"A compilation which delves into new areas of ethnographic research and makes significant contributions to the anthropology of work . . . .It also opens up an interesting branch of research regarding identity creation in a globalized world where metaphoric borders are slowly fading away in previously unimaginable ways."

Anthropology of Work Review

"This book is a diverse yet surprisingly comprehensive examinationof women's experiences as traders indifferent anthropological settings. The analytic traditions used vary, but what unites the essays is that the authors' overall concernis to show how gender ideologies and women's market participationinteract in ways that wehave scarcely understood until now."

northern Illinois University - Susan Russell

"This book is a diverse yet surprisingly comprehensive examinationof women's experiences as traders indifferent anthropological settings. The analytic traditions used vary, but what unites the essays is that the authors' overall concernis to show how gender ideologies and women's market participationinteract in ways that wehave scarcely understood until now."—Susan Russell, northern Illinois University


"A compilation which delves into new areas of ethnographic research and makes significant contributions to the anthropology of work . . . .It also opens up an interesting branch of research regarding identity creation in a globalized world where metaphoric borders are slowly fading away in previously unimaginable ways."—Anthropology of Work Review

From the Publisher

Studies women as economic, political, and cultural mediators of space, gender, value, and language in informal markets in countries including Bolivia, Ghana, Hungary, and Morocco. Demonstrates how women move between household and marketplace activities, showing how household practices and economies are translated and transferred to the market and how market practices and economic principles become integral to the household, and considers the impact that women's economic and political activities have on state policy. Special attention is paid to the effects of global forces, national economic policies, and NGOs on women's participation in the market. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews

"This welcome addition to recent publications on market women, focusing on market women's identity (and ethnicity) and on how economic behaviours both shape and 'are shaped by local cultural practices and values, especially those pertaining to gender.'"

Canadian Journal of Sociology