Concerning labour markets and the commodification of social difference in the Alberta oil sands
Abstract
In this thesis, I consider ethnographic conversations I had during fieldwork in Fort McMurray and Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, in 2016 with two sets of workers: Albertan trades-workers employed in the oil sands (pipe-fitters, welders and boilermakers) and Filipino/a Temporary Foreign Workers (TFWs) employed in the local service sector (cooks, caregivers and kitchen helpers). I analyse these workers’ self-reflections on their own work routines as providing a sightline into the ways labour market processes and regulatory frameworks are manifest in and negotiated through their lives. I suggest this is of broader significance for our understanding of the ways state-regulated labour markets re-fashion, and are re-fashioned by, the cultural identities of workers.
Notes
Gaps identified
NA
Key findings
- Broad capitalist ideologies affect the conditions of labour that TFWs experience
- The demands of ‘work’ can contradict the requirements of ‘home’, and threaten workers’ abilities to maintain important social relationships and articulate aspects of their cultural identities
- Albertan trades-workers and Filipino/a TFWs draw on different cultural idioms from different positions within regimes of market regulation in the formation and pursuit of their class interests.
- commodification of Albertan trades-workers and Filipino/a TFW labour is differently inscribed on their person, in ways that shape, and are shaped by, perceptions and performances of social difference.
Key populations
Filipino TFWs
Location
Edmonton, Alberta
Key recommendations
A more theoretical anthropological study can help understand the power relations that exist in Albertan labour market and shed light onto why Filipino/TFWs are protesting their work conditions and immigration policies in place.
Community organizations
Migrante Alberta
Integration timeline
At what point during the integration process the study was conducted?
NA
Open-access – Yes
