Subjectivities of women garment workers in the Gazi neighborhood

Abstract

This thesis intends to develop ways to relate the structural transformation in the organization of garment work and subjectivities of women garment workers. How women give meaning to their work experiences, and contradictions inherent in this process were handled in relation to the hegemonic gender roles and leveling consequences of capitalist work which ignores differences among people. The purpose of this thesis is to understand the experiences of women without reducing them to various disciplinary mechanisms that are effective in the totality of their life experiences. For these purposes, this thesis takes up three spheres through which work and life experiences of women can be better understood. The first one concerns the bodily consequences of working conditions, and how these influence the way women give meaning to their work and their bodily experiences, and contradictions inherent these processes. The second one concerns how daily and interpersonal encounters at the workplace embody contradictions caused by capitalist work order by influencing the processes in which women give meaning to their works and their position at work. Finally, how various patriarchal discourses and practices become effective in women’s daily lives at workplace and home in such a way to create more control over women’s acts, but at the same time to create some space for women through which they raise various demands for themselves both at home and workplace.