| Description |
1 online resource (viii, 244 pages) |
| Series |
Global and comparative ethnography |
|
Global and comparative ethnography.
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| Contents |
Introduction -- One job, many lives -- Assembling a labor market -- Mediators unpacked -- Firms : seeing like a call center -- The state : making a middle path -- Labor : seeking the Philippine dream -- Three archetypes -- Responsible women -- Restless gays -- Rooted men -- Conclusion -- Gone baby gone -- The relativity of work -- Appendix : An ethnographic narrative |
| Summary |
Dial just about any toll-free number and chances are you'll be talking to a Filipino. In fact, around the year 2005, the country overtook India as the world's "voice capital." Lives on the Line argues that this has nothing to do with wages or accents. Rather, as Jeffrey J. Sallaz shows, there is a perfect match between offshored call centers and educated young Filipinos. For Filipina women and gay Filipinos in particular, call centers are veritable lifelines, and their lives tell us much about contemporary capitalism and the future of work. -- Provided by publisher |
|
"The call center industry is booming in the Philippines. Around the year 2005, the country overtook India as the world's "voice capital," while industry revenues are now the second largest contributor to national GDP. This ethnographic study traces the assemblage of a global market for voice over the past two decades. New information technologies developed during the 1990s and 2000s fed Western firms' appetite for cheap, English-speaking workers in offshore locales. An initial attempt to build a stable labor market for voice in India failed, owing in large part to gendered norms regarding work and mobility. In the Philippines, in contrast, there is a remarkable affinity between workers and firms. Decades of failed development policies have produced for educated Filipinos a dismaying choice: migrate abroad in search of prosperity or stay at home as an impoverished professional. Offshored call centers, in this context, represent a middle path. Drawing upon case studies of sixty Filipino call center workers and two years of fieldwork in Manila, this book shows how call center jobs allow Filipinos to earn a decent living and stay at home. Filipina women and transgender Filipinos in particular use their voices as strategic resources. Call centers are for them lifelines and lifestyles. Taken as a whole, this study advances debates concerning global capitalism, the future of work, and the lives of those who labor in offshored jobs."-- Provided by publisher |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index |
| Subject |
Call center agents -- Philippines
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Labor market -- Philippines
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Call center agents
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Labor market
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Social conditions
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| SUBJECT |
Philippines -- Social conditions -- 21st century
|
| Subject |
Philippines
|
| Form |
Electronic book
|
| ISBN |
9780190630690 |
|
0190630698 |
|
9780190630676 |
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0190630671 |
|
9780190630683 |
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019063068X |
|
