Abstract
Research on work and gender identity is still scarce in different occupational groups. This study focuses on seafaring professions on cargo ships where women’s representation remains low globally. Various gender-related challenges associated with work on board faced by women were reported; however, it is not well understood how women seafarers cope with the transition from ship (work) to shore (home) in terms of their gender identities. Based on 36 in-depth interviews, the research found that women’s gender identities may be conflicting when moving from ship to shore. During vacations, the cases revealed negotiation of gender identities in their local communities ashore. Such extra challenges for women affected their seafaring careers. The study identified a lack of understanding and support of complex socio-cultural issues concerning women seafarers ashore.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
BIMCO, ICS: Manpower report: The global supply and demand for seafarers in 2015. London, Maritime International Secretariat Services Limited (2016)
Kitada, M.: Advancing “good practices” that promote gender equality in the maritime sector. In: Papanicolopulu, I. (ed.) Gender and the Law of the Sea. Brill, Leiden (2019)
WMU: Third WMU International Women’s Conference on Empowering Women in the Maritime Community: Conference Report. World Maritime University, Malmö (2019)
Kitada, M.: Code of behaviour at sea: women seafarers’ shipboard identity Management. WMU J. Marit. Aff. 12(2), 213–227 (2013)
McDowell, L.: Gender, Identity, and Place: Understanding Feminist Geographies. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis (1999)
Abel, G.J., Brottrager, M., Cuaresma, J.C., Muttarak, R.: Climate, conflict and forced migration. Glob. Environ. Change 54, 239–249 (2019)
Kitada, M., Langåker, L.: Women seafarers as minority organizational members. In: International Association of Maritime Universities (IAMU) General Assembly. 26–29 Oct, Haiphong, ISBN 978-604-937-120-2 (2016)
Kvande, E.: ‘In the belly of the beast’: constructing femininities in engineering organizations. Eur. J. Women’s Stud. 6, 305–328 (1999)
Maynard, M., Purvis, J. (eds.): Researching Women’s Lives from a Feminist Perspective. Taylor & Francis Ltd., London (1994)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2020 The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
Kitada, M. (2020). Negotiating Gender Identities from Ship to Shore. In: Kantola, J., Nazir, S., Salminen, V. (eds) Advances in Human Factors, Business Management and Leadership. AHFE 2020. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 1209. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50791-6_73
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50791-6_73
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-50790-9
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-50791-6
eBook Packages: EngineeringEngineering (R0)