Racialised and Gendered Workplace Discrimination: The Case of Skilled Filipina Immigrants in Melbourne, Australia

Abstract

This article shows how skilled immigrant Filipinas resist gender and racial prejudices in Australian workplaces. By activating their rights, they reassert their multiple identities as Filipina immigrants, Australian citizens, and skilled workers, although many agonise for a long time before seeking redress. Experiences of discrimination affect them in various ways, ranging from stalled career progression to negative effects on their self-esteem and psychological well-being. For many, workplace prejudices have made them more aware of their cultural difference from the majority population; but for others, their health and esteem have been so dented that they have resigned from their jobs. Looking through the lenses of gender, race, and class intersectionality, this article also explores the ramifications of the stigmatisation of Filipinas as mail-order brides in the workplace, and, to some extent, in Filipino immigrants' social circles.

Skilled Migrants Employed in Developed, Mature Economies: From Newcomers to Organizational Insiders

“…For example, SM health professionals reported that management assigned them excessive workloads (Cuban, 2010), unfavorable shifts (Bobek & Devitt, 2017), and inappropriate tasks (Bobek & Devitt, 2017). SMs reported being excluded from work meetings (Bobek & Devitt, 2017; Limpangog, 2013) or subjected to racist or sexist remarks and jokes by coworkers (e.g., Limpangog, 2013). The workplace discrimination experienced by SMs can be covert and indirect (e.g., Bobek & Devitt, 2017; Syed & Pio, 2010; Turchick Hakak et al, 2010), consistent with the evidence for “selective incivility” (Cortina, 2008).…”

“…Selective incivility is common workplace conduct that is rude but subtle and disproportionately targeted at members of particular identity groups especially at the intersection of sex and race (Cortina, Kabat-Farr, Leskinen, Huerta, & Magley, 2013). In our review, female SMs’ experience of selective incivility was heightened as a function of their ethnicity (Limpangog, 2013), race (Showers, 2015), and religion (Syed & Pio, 2010).…”

“…Rarely did the empirical studies we reviewed identify strategies that could be categorized as emotion focused; SMs were most likely to report problem-focused strategies and occasionally reported appraisal-focused strategies. Some SMs, particularly female Muslim SMs, developed problem-solving strategies in which they planned behavior to display in difficult interpersonal situations at work (Murray & Ali, 2017) or in reaction to racist remarks (e.g., Limpangog, 2013) and prepared explanations of their religious beliefs they would give to non-Muslim coworkers (Murray & Ali, 2017). SMs sought support from supervisors (Murray & Ali, 2017); they worked with unions (van Riemsdijk, 2013) and accessed their employer’s antidiscrimination and antiharassment policies (Limpangog, 2013) to address workplace discrimination.…”

White Anglo patriarchal possession in organizations: Unequal vertical career progressions among Anglo White & non‐Anglo White highly skilled immigrant women

“…She also stated that she felt quite lonely in her male White Anglo dominant environment as she did not build social networks that could have been useful for her career progression. Farah, an Indian project manager in IT, asserted that she felt she was discriminated against due to her gender by her Indian The male domination of working spaces becomes a source of significant disadvantage, as highlighted by other scholars (Limpangong, 2013;Massey, 1994;Puwar, 2004). Thus, these findings confirm Moreton-Robinson's (2004 analysis about the fact that not all citizens, and I add skilled immigrants who become naturalized citizens, benefit from hetero patriarchal white sovereignty equally.…”

“…Within the Australian literature of skilled immigration and gender, only a related stream of scholarship (e.g., Alcorso & Ho, 2006; Hawthorne, 1996, 2001; Ho, 2006; Olasunkanmi‐Alim et al., 2022; Ressia et al., 2017; Short et al., 2012; van den Broek & Groutsis, 2020; Webb et al., 2013) has begun investigating aspects of the experiences of highly skilled immigrant women from a diverse range of nationalities, professions, ethnicities, and races. Furthermore, most research on career advancement has analyzed specific professions (e.g., Alcorso & Ho, 2006; Short et al., 2012) or ethnic groups (Cooke et al., 2013; Gatwiri, 2021; Limpangong, 2013). A comparison of the vertical career growth among highly skilled immigrant women from different ethnic/racial backgrounds in Australian organizations has yet to receive wider attention.…”