Uncovering sexuality and gender: an intersectional examination of women’s experience in UK construction

Women's Experience of Workplace Interactions in Male‐Dominated Work: The Intersections of Gender, Sexuality and Occupational Group

“…Being open about lesbian sexuality sometimes reduced the potential for unwanted sexual interest, but lesbians also commented that men will flirt regardless of a woman's sexual orientation. While the line between acceptable sexualized interactions and sexual harassment is fluid and contingent on personal comfort and organizational context (Williams et al ., ), many interviewees in the present study had experienced behaviour they perceived as sexual or homophobic harassment (discussed in Wright, ).…”

“…While it is useful to consider women's agency and the possibility for disrupting men's dominance of gendered power relations through sexuality, or the pleasurable, consensual element of heterosexual interactions (Halford et al ., ; Pringle, ; Williams et al ., ), in the sharply gender‐divided settings of this study, very few interviewees referred to sexual pleasure in workplace interactions (although it is possible that different interview questions or emphasis might have prompted this). Instead, they talked in terms of having to ‘handle’ or ‘manage’ male sexuality and several had experienced sexual harassment (Wright, , ). Thus, considered as a whole, these findings from heavily male‐dominated environments support Wajcman's (, p. 117) contention that resisting sexual commodification is more difficult for women who are in a small minority among men.…”

“…And when I told them I was leaving, I was coming to the end of my contract, they started testing me ‘how would you wire this, how would you wire that?’ until I got it, which was quite nice as well, it really was encouraging and supportive. (Norma, heterosexual, trainee electrician, 40s)Norma and Elaine's relief at finding supportive male colleagues is significant in the context of the frequently hostile and exclusionary reactions to female entry into previously male trades (Denissen, ; Paap, ; Wright, ). Women's exclusion from male networks, including the information exchange needed for career advancement, is well known (Ibarra, ; Perriton, ).…”

‘Black Boxes’ and ‘fracture points’: the regulation of gender equality in the UK and French construction industries

“…Previous work on women working in the construction industry (c.f. Caven et al, 2012;Chadoin, 2006;Clarke, Pedersen, Michielsens, & Susman, 2005;De Graft-Johnson, Manley, & Greed, 2003;Powell, Hassan, Dainty, & Carter, 2009;Powell and Sang, 2015;Wright, 2013) provides an appropriate starting point for a study of diversity initiatives in a cross-national context. Table 2 illustrates the significance of the respective construction industries in terms of the number of organisations and numbers of those employed.…”

“…Sang, Dainty, and Ison (2014) suggest homosocial behaviour explains the exclusion of women, yet there is a tension, as Wright (2013) argues, women site workers relate more closely to their male counterparts than to female office staff. Thus, women can be accepted in the operational construction environment at the individual level, but exclusion continues to occur within organisations, or the dominant male groups.…”