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In this chapter, the relations between Muslim migrant women's bodily appearances at Western workplaces, their work choices and career development are examined through the lens of embodied intersectionality. This chapter draws on exiting research reports and empirical research to also reflect on the scope of Muslim female migrants' labour market integration in the United Kingdom.

For Muslim women, wearing ethnic or religious dresses such as headscarf/‘hijab’, ‘niqaab’ or ‘burqa’ represents the quintessential identity of women belonging to their particular ethnic group or religion. These highly visible social and cultural markers are also inherently gendered. This chapter delves into understanding how Muslim migrant women wearing ethnic/religious dresses experience/encounter Western workplaces and how their embodied intersectional identities through creating barriers at the workplaces impede the process of their labour market integration, in turn, limit their work choices and further restrict their career progression/development in the long run. The discussion also shows that attention to the Muslim migrant women's workplace experiences funnelled through the process of embodied intersectionality can expose the overall racialised and gendered practices of the society, different forms of social exclusion while simultaneously indicate resistance from and agency of these Muslim women through bodily appearances in transnational contexts. This chapter also sheds lights on how these women's career and workplace experiences need to be understood outside the stereotypical Western description of gendered workplaces and how the discussion needs to be broadened in scope and encompass the spatial dynamics of migration, religion, gender and ethnicity to be able to make sense of Muslim migrant women's work choices and career in the West.

This chapter has a twofold structure – first, it looks at the relationship between self-regulating agency and voice and understanding of the embodiment of intersectional identities by the women themselves in the host country's society and labour market, and, second, how the changing time, space and contexts interact to play a role in terms of the host society and its labour market's acceptance and level of tolerance shown towards this group's embodied intersectional presence.

The case is based on interviews in 2022 with the founder of Shape, Monoshita Ayruani, supplemented by classroom testing and secondary sources such as textbooks, journals, newspapers and other pertinent sources such as reports produced by marketing and consulting firms.

Shape is a private limited company operating in Bangladesh, a country in South Asia. Bangladesh is a fast-developing country where the people (the vast majority of whom are young) are practical and forward thinking, conservative, yet also generally tolerant. Its CEO is Monoshita Ayruani, who has had several years of experience in a PR and Marketing agency before starting Shape. It produces and sells “innerwear” or undergarments, which are their staple products, as well as clothing, bath products, sleepwear and various other products targeted at women. Starting off as an online business in 2019, it was about to find its footing in the market when the COVID-19 pandemic hit. The problem faced by Shape at the beginning was that digital marketing was not resulting in word of mouth for the product, as undergarments were considered too “taboo” to talk or share about with most people. The second problem faced was the sudden protests about Westernised clothing and culture in 2022, which may potentially threaten the company.

This case would be well suited for an undergraduate or graduate-level Marketing or Strategic Management course that exposes students to the challenges of promoting a new brand and marketing taboo products imported from abroad, in a largely conservative and culturally sensitive market, and preventing a potential crisis when protests break out. The case also touches on international supply chain problems, so may also be taught in an International Business course. The level of difficulty is intermediate as the problems are nuanced.

Body positivity movement empowered plus-size women globally to speak up boldly about their clothing needs. Retailers cannot satisfy this group with some classic style offerings anymore. By taking clue from existing literature, this study aims to identify clothing preferences and problems related to ready-made plus-size clothing in India. Although many past literature pointed out about poorly fitted and size unavailability issues worldwide, very few of them addressed about clothing style preferences.

A self-administered close-ended questionnaire was used to answer a set of objectives. A pilot study with 40 plus-size women was carried out to check the reliability and validity of the instrument. Four hundred subject's data were gathered from six Indian cities with a purpose of varied geographical importance. Statistical tests like binomial distribution was used to analyze fit-related problems of 12 bodily sites such as shoulder, upper arm, lower arm, bust, waist, stomach, abdomen, hip, thigh, lower leg, armhole and elbow, and frequency charts were used to examine Likert scale data of sizing problems. The choices of 12 clothing styles were mapped through four factors which affect the purchasing decision of a plus-size woman.

Poor-fitted clothes at 10 body sites out of the 12 reflected about the fit aspect of plus-size clothing in India. Findings associated to sizing issues like unavailability of trendy clothes in appropriate sizes, which also adorn Indian curvy figure, shows synonymy to the worldwide researcher's findings related to sizing chaos. Classic silhouettes like Straight Indian kurti, A-line dresses and regular-fit trousers were majorly preferred by women. Hiding body bulges was mostly preferred while purchasing loose-fitted garments, and fitted garments were preferred only if these suits to the curvy body proportion. Appropriate fit and size availability are always a prime requisite for this class of women.

The outcomes of research will help Indian retailers/manufacturers to update their patterns in order to provide desired fit. In this lacuna of standard size chart, the study will add value in the development of Indian plus-size women's size chart. The factor mapping with clothing preferences will be useful to reduce rejections and inventories.

The prospect of Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) as an apparel-sourcing base for US fashion companies has been a growing heated debate among academia, industry practitioners and policymakers. This study aims to evaluate SSA countries’ readiness to serve as an alternative sourcing destination to Asia for US fashion companies, focusing on comparing the similarities and differences of US apparel imports from these two regions at the product level.

This study was based on a statistical analysis of detailed product features and assortment information of thousands of apparel items at the stock-keeping unit level sold by US retailers between January 2021 and December 2023.

US fashion companies seemed to leverage SSA countries as suppliers of “niche products,” such as those relatively simple and basic apparel categories containing African cultural elements and targeting the luxury and premium market segment. However, the range of apparel products available for US fashion companies to source from the SSA region remained significantly more limited than those from Asia. Also, US apparel imports from SSA countries were primarily made of cotton and polyester, with less use of other fiber types, including nylon, rayon, viscose, wool and those made from recycled textile materials.

The study’s findings provided fresh insights into why US fashion companies sourced from SSA countries and the specific types of products they were sourcing, going beyond existing studies based on macro trade statistics. The results also deepened the understanding of SSA countries’ competitiveness as an apparel-sourcing destination and their potential to serve as an alternative to sourcing from Asia, particularly from a unique product perspective.

The purpose of this study is to showcase how entrepreneurial opportunities can be contextually formed differently for women entrepreneurs concerning their relationship with religion. This article reveals the multi-level and nuanced relationship between religiosity and entrepreneurship through a contextual lens by studying the interaction in a specific national country, Turkiye.

The study uses the life stories of 10 Turkish women entrepreneurs operating in Turkiye. Data were selected purposefully to conduct an in-depth analysis. Thematic content analysis with a discursive approach and deductive and inductive coding methods were performed.

The findings suggest that the relationship between religiosity and entrepreneurial opportunities is highly contextual and nuanced. Religiosity brings trust and provides access to religious networks which can lead to entrepreneurial opportunities, while leaving people outside of this network bereft of these benefits. The creation of a closed circle for its beneficiaries is a feature of a social network, yet the results show that contextual forces of politics and gender can lead women entrepreneurs outside of this religious network to limit their possibilities of accessing public funding and facilities based on their perceptions as well as negative experiences. It is also seen that religiosity at a certain level is necessary to operate in conservative settings and traditionally masculine business environments with patriarchal practices and norms, as well as due to the religious affinity of the ruling political party. However, because of perceptions and discursive meanings attached to religion and religiosity in the country, women entrepreneurs need to be cautious in expressing their religiosity and find a balance so that they are not seen as unprofessional, incompetent and unqualified as well as do not jeopardise their business due to a controversial religious affiliation.

This paper is of value as it studies religiosity from a contextual perspective enabling and constraining women entrepreneurs in their entrepreneurship in relation to gendered and political structures. In this way, it displays the multiple ways of limitation and support that religiosity can bring for them concerning entrepreneurial opportunities. Turkiye provides a rich context with its mixed religious and secular societal norms and values and neo-liberal institutions and policies to examine the so-far underexplored issue of religiosity in the field of entrepreneurship.

A surge in demand for ethical products, including cruelty-free products, has been well documented in recent years, with direct ramifications for businesses. This trend towards ethical consumption seemed to be swiftly replicated in Eastern countries, especially in South Asian nations, as a result of westernisation. Based on the theory of planned behaviour and the concept of the attitude-behaviour gap, this study aims to investigate the impact of westernisation on the purchase intention of cruelty-free cosmetic products.

A positivist research paradigm was utilised in this study. Accordingly, an online self-administered questionnaire was shared among 242 consumers of cosmetic products in Sri Lanka in order to collect responses. The statistical techniques of correlation analysis, the Sobel test and moderator regression analysis have been utilised in this study.

It was found that there seems to be a positive impact of westernisation and the cruelty-free purchase intention of consumers. Moreover, consumer empowerment appears to mediate this relationship, while the attitude behaviour gap tends to further impact the relationship between consumer empowerment and the purchase intention of cruelty-free products.

This study seems to shed light upon the impact of westernisation on the purchase intention of consumers, especially from an ethical dimension and this study is likely to extend existing studies which have focussed on consumer empowerment, attitude-behaviour gap as well as the theory of planned behaviour, especially in the context of South Asia, where there seems to be a dearth of such investigations. Moreover, this study has attempted to contextualise the construct of “Westernisation” to the South Asian region in line with the tone set by an editorial article Dewasiri et al. (2021).

The purpose of this study is to address a significant gap in the understanding of entrepreneurship at the microfoundation level. It focuses on how individual entrepreneurs, specifically Hongbang entrepreneurs in China from 1896 to 1949, shape and transform their contexts. The aim is to provide a deeper understanding of the mechanisms that facilitate entrepreneurial success.

The study adopts a microhistorical approach, investigating the case of Hongbang entrepreneurs in China during 1896-1949. It involves an in-depth examination of historical records to explore the strategic interactions between these entrepreneurs and core stakeholders such as consumers, financial intermediaries, government regulators, and human resources. The research methodology emphasizes a process-oriented view, examining the evolution of personalized networks into extensive connections.

The research reveals that Hongbang entrepreneurs successfully reshaped their unfavorable embedded contexts by strategically collaborating with key stakeholders. They influenced consumer tastes, allied with financial intermediaries, negotiated with governments on regulation policies, and developed human resource stocks. The transformation was facilitated by the evolution of their networks from personalized to extensive connections. These findings highlight the localized strategies such as cronyism in resource acquisition within China’s private property development industry.

This study contributes to the field by offering insights into entrepreneurial contextualization and networking. It sheds light on the complex interplay between entrepreneurs and their contexts, providing a nuanced understanding of localized strategies in the Chinese context. The findings add value to the discourse on entrepreneurship by elucidating the strategic and processual acts through which entrepreneurs engage with stakeholders and reshape their environments.

As a British Muslim woman who wears the hijab, the author’s identity/identities are often questioned and none more so than in boththe professional and educational settings they occupy. This critical reflection hopes to highlight some assumptions around how the identity of the author of this chapter can be understood and challenged and foregrounds theways in which assumptions both liberate and instigate forms of oppression and opportunity. Identity theory has helped this author to understand how their identities are understood and has provided them with a lens from which to engage with others in challenging perceptions and building relationships.

Universities worldwide benefit significantly from the presence of international students although previous research has predominantly focused on their economic impact rather than acknowledging their substantial cultural and academic contributions. This chapter aims to bridge this gap by investigating the dual impact of international students on academics and culture in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, with a specific focus on two universities in Oman. The research employs semi-structured interviews conducted with both local and international students. The findings underscore a mutually beneficial exchange and contribution between local and international students, extending beyond the confines of classrooms into extracurricular activities. While positive interactions and shared learning experiences are evident, the study also sheds light on existing tensions, such as discrimination and negative perceptions of certain cultural elements. Through these insights, this chapter aims to guide both local and international universities in effectively fostering inclusive and diverse activities that promote academic and intercultural competence among students.