Lexington Books
Pages: 230
Trim: 6⅛ x 9¼
978-0-7391-3296-8 • Paperback • October 2008 • $50.99 • (£39.00)
978-0-7391-3297-5 • eBook • March 2006 • $48.50 • (£37.00)
Greta Friedemann-Sánchez is assistant professor at the Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota.
Chapter 1 Introduction
Chapter 2 Flowers in the Global Assembly Line
Chapter 3 Assembling Flowers
Chapter 4 Disciplined Labor, Identity, and Gender
Chapter 5 Land, Housing, Money, and Social Networks
Chapter 6 Cultivating Homes
Chapter 7 Gendered Development
In this important contribution, Greta Friedemann-Sánchez challenges the notion that women are simply exploited by jobs in the global assembly line. Instead, she provides a nuanced analysis of how women use jobs in Colombia's flower industry to resist subordination at home and challenge traditional household structures where men control the household resources, including women's time and where domestic violence is widespread and accepted. This book will challenge us to rethink the relationships between the global economy and women's well-being.
— Cheryl Doss, Yale University
This is an important and timely book. It offers a textured account of how gendered forms of labor are not only at the heart of global competitiveness but are also an instrument for crafting new identities and options for women workers.
— Feminist Economics
Anthropologists, feminists, and many others argue that gender exploitation provides the competitive edge for off-shore production. Greta Freidemann-Sánchez insightfully challenges this common wisdom in her study of Colombia's flower industry. Women, she finds, seek work in the flower companies, find satisfaction in their jobs, and use their monetary power to refashion gender relations. Friedemann-Sánchez ingeniously blends different methodologies and theoretical approaches with feminist economics and ethnography to illuminate the contemporary situation for the reader.
— Stephen Gudeman, University of Minnesota