Gender and Creative Labour presents a collection of readings that reflect the latest research related to employment positions in a range of creative industries to show the gender implications of creative labour under contemporary neoliberal economic policies. Features contributions from a range of international experts Includes studies from the US, UK, Oceania and Europe Reveals the implications of contemporary femininities and masculinities for the precarious employment created under neoliberalism Addresses the additional burdens that women face in creative occupations

This book describes the early career outcomes for female creative graduates in Australia and the UK. It applies the international UNESCO model of the Cultural and Creative Industries (CCIs) to national graduate destination survey data in order to compare creative women’s employment outcomes to those of men, as well as non-creative graduates. Chapters focus on opportunities for creative and cultural work, including salaries, geographic mobility, graduate jobs, underemployment, and skills transferability. The model covers a broad range of cultural and creative domains such as heritage, the performing arts, visual arts and craft, publishing and media industries, fashion, architecture and advertising. The book’s purpose is to provide an informed discussion and empirical report to key stakeholders in the topic, such as academic researchers, teachers and students, as well as cultural sector organisations and education departments.

What is it like to work in the media? Are media jobs more âe~creativeâe(tm) than those in other sectors? To answer these questions, this book explores the creative industries, using a combination of original research and a synthesis of existing studies. Through its close analysis of key issues âe" such as tensions between commerce and creativity, the conditions and experiences of workers, alienation, autonomy, self-realization, emotional and affective labour, self-exploitation, and how possible it might be to produce âe~good workâe(tm) Creative Labour makes a major contribution to our understanding of the media, of work, and of social and cultural change. In addition, the book undertakes an extensive exploration of the creative industries, spanning numerous sectors including television, music and journalism. This book provides a comprehensive and accessible account of life in the creative industries in the twenty-first century. It is a major piece of research and a valuable study aid for both undergraduate and postgraduate students of subjects including business and management studies, sociology of work, sociology of culture, and media and communications.

An illuminating investigation into a class of enterprising women aspiring to “make it” in the social media economy but often finding only unpaid work Profound transformations in our digital society have brought many enterprising women to social media platforms—from blogs to YouTube to Instagram—in hopes of channeling their talents into fulfilling careers. In this eye-opening book, Brooke Erin Duffy draws much-needed attention to the gap between the handful who find lucrative careers and the rest, whose “passion projects” amount to free work for corporate brands. Drawing on interviews and fieldwork, Duffy offers fascinating insights into the work and lives of fashion bloggers, beauty vloggers, and designers. She connects the activities of these women to larger shifts in unpaid and gendered labor, offering a lens through which to understand, anticipate, and critique broader transformations in the creative economy. At a moment when social media offer the rousing assurance that anyone can “make it”—and stand out among freelancers, temps, and gig workers—Duffy asks us all to consider the stakes of not getting paid to do what you love.

What is it like to work as a classical musician today? How can we explain ongoing gender, racial, and class inequalities in the classical music profession? What happens when musicians become entrepreneurial and think of themselves as a product that needs to be sold and marketed? Gender, Subjectivity, and Cultural Work explores these and other questions by drawing on innovative, empirical research on the working lives of classical musicians in Germany and the UK. Indeed, Scharff examines a range of timely issues such as the gender, racial, and class inequalities that characterise the cultural and creative industries; the ways in which entrepreneurialism – as an ethos to work on and improve the self – is lived out; and the subjective experiences of precarious work in so-called ‘creative cities’. Thus, this book not only adds to our understanding of the working lives of artists and creatives, but also makes broader contributions by exploring how precarity, neoliberalism, and inequalities shape subjective experiences. Contributing to a range of contemporary debates around cultural work, Gender, Subjectivity, and Cultural Work will be of interest to scholars and students in the fields of Sociology, Gender and Cultural Studies.

Caring in Times of Precarity draws together two key cultural observations: the increase in those living a single life, and the growing attraction of creative careers. Straddling this historical juncture, the book focuses on one particular group of ‘precariat’: single women in Shanghai in various forms of creative (self-)employment. While negotiating their share of the uncanny creative work ethos, these women also find themselves interpellated as shengnü (‘left-over women’) in a society configured by a mix of Confucian values, heterosexual ideals, and global images of womanhood. Following these women’s professional, social and intimate lives, the book refuses to see their singlehood and creative labour as problematic, and them as victims. It departs from dominant thinking on precarity, which foregrounds and critiques the contemporary need to be flexible, mobile, and spontaneous to the extent of (self-)exploitation, accepting insecurity. The book seeks to understand– empirically and specifically–women’s everyday struggles and pleasures. It highlights the up-close, everyday embodied, affective, and subjective experience in a particular Chinese city, with broader, global resonances well beyond China. Exploring the limits of the politics of precarity, the book proposes an ethics of care.