At Sam's Club, no girls allowed: the lived experience of sex discrimination

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to provide an in‐depth understanding of the lived experience of sex discrimination from the perspective of women in the Wal‐Mart case and unravels the daily mechanisms through which sex discrimination takes place.

Design/methodology/approach

One hundred and ten in‐depth statements from women who are current and former employees of Wal‐Mart, describing in detail their work experience, were employed as the main source of data. We have carried out a detailed content analysis of these in‐depth interviews identifying the mechanisms of sex discrimination.

Findings

Findings identify the specific mechanisms through which sex discrimination takes place. In the context of the current sex discrimination case, the paper provides a rich body of evidence in unraveling the everyday mechanisms of sex discrimination. It observes that instead of individual events, at important thresholds, sex discrimination is a result of small, everyday acts and gendered assumptions, which often appear supportive and harmless.

Research limitations/implications

The richness of the data provides the unique, empirical opportunity to observe the process in detail, but this paper focuses exclusively on the process, and the end‐results remain outside the scope of the paper.

Practical implications

The paper provides a very useful source of information and practical advice for women in the labor force in identifying the supportive, nice and harmless mechanisms and everyday experience of sex discrimination.

Originality/value

This paper exclusively focuses on the process and identifies the mechanisms of sex discrimination using a rich source of qualitative data. It offers empirical evidence in identifying the daily assumptions and everyday mechanisms of sex discrimination. Sex discrimination in the everyday lives are carried out in disguise of harmless, nice and often supportive behavior; therefore this paper offers explanations as to why many women stay in these exploitative jobs as long as they do.

Citation

Besen, Y. and Kimmel, M.S. (2006), "At Sam's Club, no girls allowed: the lived experience of sex discrimination", Equal Opportunities International, Vol. 25 No. 3, pp. 172-187. https://doi.org/10.1108/02610150610687827