Together with Axel Haunschild (University of Hannover), Vanessa S. Bernauer and Barbara Sieben developed the concept of gendered class work in their study on service work in the luxury leisure and hospitality industries, particularly in first-class airlines and high-end hotels (see also the project EDI in the H&T sector). The authors combine the concepts of class work and inequality regimes with a particular focus on the intersections of class and gender within service encounters in the luxury segment. “Doing gendered class work” refers to perceptions and practices of status enhancement and status dissonance among service workers, as well as to gender practices and the meanings that come from them, such as specific feminized roles that service workers take on. The authors propose gendered class work as an empirically grounded concept that explains the reproduction of inequalities in luxury service work. From a critical management perspective, it highlights the highly gendered nature of class work in luxury service encounters and conceptualizes intersectional patterns of the enactment and reproduction of status differences between service customers and workers.
Selected contributions:
Sieben, B., Bernauer, V. S., & Haunschild, A. (2025). Gendered class work. In J. Helms Mills, A. J. Mills, K. S. Williams, & R. Bendl (Eds.), Elgar encyclopedia on gender and management (pp. 216-17). Elgar. https://doi.org/10.4337/9781803922065
Bernauer, V. S., Sieben, B., & Haunschild, A. (2023). “You can call me Susan!” Doing gendered-class work in luxury service encounters. Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal, 42(4), 494-511. https://doi.org/10.1108/EDI-10-2021-0272
Letzte Änderung: 28. March 2026