Gender and business: an anthropological approach of businesswomen in a company of direct sales

Abstract

Over the past decades, the number of women who leave the domestic sphere and turn to the salaried, “male-dominated” workplace has increased considerably. Even though women are employed in many work sectors and positions, they are still considered a “reserve army” of labour. In Greece, social scientists turned their interest towards studying women’s employment mainly after 1980. However, few anthropological studies have been conducted on women entrepreneurs, creating a research gap in the Greek literature. Through my ethnographic example, in a subsidiary company dealing with direct marketing and sales in Thessaloniki (Greece), firstly, I focus on the reasons articulated by female entrepreneurs regarding the obstacles they face in their careers (“glass ceiling”). Secondly, I try to highlight how gender affects entrepreneurial activity and, in turn, how this kind of activity affects and transforms gender.