Centring and Engendering Emotions in Service Work: Hochschild's Managed Heart and the Valuing of Feelings in Organisation Research

This paper explores how Arlie Hochschild's concept of emotional labour put the service sector and gender at the heart of our understanding of work in contemporary organisations. In The Managed Heart, Hochschild provides us with the means to understand the nature and commercial value of the social interactions involved in the delivery of a service. She also exposes how traditional expressions of women's gender and the emphasis on being feminine are harnessed for the commercial gain of organisations. Her scholarship has extended our understanding of what ''work'' is debunking the assumption that ''real work'' only takes place in manufacturing.