Peer Feedback in Aesthetic Labour: Forms, Logics and Responses

Abstract

Research on aesthetic labour has largely been confined to studying practices and experiences of managerial control and self-discipline. However, co-workers also have an impact on the experiences and practices of aesthetic labour. This article explores peer feedback regarding personal aesthetics in work situations without clear organisational aesthetic guidelines. Testimonies of experiences of peer feedback from 28 qualitative wardrobe interviews with ‘frontstage’ and creative workers in insecure employment positions show that peer feedback (1) is often ambiguous both in content and form; (2) can contain both a commercial logic and logics of ‘belonging’; and (3) is not only accepted, but in many cases is seen as legitimate and taken very seriously by workers on the receiving end. This study illustrates how informal processes of control and distinction concerning personal appearance intensify and complicate experiences of aesthetic labour as the interplay between market logics and judgements of taste has the potential to act as a reinforcement of insecurities and inequalities

Too Smart-looking for a Waiter? – Scripting Appearance Norms at the Theatre of Working Life

“…This substantiates the point made in recent studies on aesthetic labour: getting the right looks for a job requires extra unpaid work and resources from the employees (e.g. Donaghue, 2017;Vonk, 2020). Employees often must navigate within the pressure of conflicting expectations, pondering the right choice, what to wear and in whose play to act.…”

“…The third audience category not yet addressed is that of colleagues and co-workers of the employees. They vastly participate in the formation and negotiation of appearance norms and role costumes at work (Vonk, 2020). First, the script is expressed nonverbally in the outfits of other employees that give the newcomer a hint of the aesthetic norm of the workplace.…”

The Costs of Grooming: Bodily Scrutiny and White-collar Masculinities in Japan

“…It should be specified that interview data cannot get at social interaction per se; rather they provide insight into men's perspectives as gained through the discourses men employ when talking about grooming (de Casanova 2015). Although there may be gaps and contradictions between participants' accounts and their actual interactions, I seek to understand how participants construct meaning surrounding everyday grooming experiences (Vonk 2021). While the small purposive sample is not generalisable to all Japanese white-collar men, the in-depth analysis of the interviews, I suggest, provides valuable insights into how men understand and act on their own and others' bodily practices vis-à-vis gendered workplace values.…”

Interdisciplinarity, art and immaterial labour in the creative economy: Maurizio Lazzarato and the production of value in ArtScience practice

“…Rather, it is an attempt to contribute to critical sociological efforts to analyse the changing terrain of creative culture in the face of a generalised economic demand for creativity (Boltanski & Chiapello, 2005;Brook, 2013;Casey & O'Brien, 2020;Conor et al, 2015;Hesmondhalgh & Baker, 2010). Sociological inroads into the changes taking place in the field of artistic production have been especially evident in studies of the cultural industries (Hesmondhalgh, 2019;Hesmondhalgh & Baker, 2010), DIY creativity and hobbyists (Bennett, 2018;Threadgold, 2018), and forms of 'aesthetic labour' (Elias et al, 2017;Kardelis, 2022;Vonk, 2021). The article builds on such debates, while also contributing to sociological engagement with the idea of immaterial labour (Coffey et al, 2018;Farrugia, 2019;Gielen, 2009;Gill & Pratt, 2008;Jarrett, 2003).…”