Visibly Different from the Academic Norm: An Appreciation of the Scholarship and Friendship of Professor Ruth Simpson

Purpose - Professor Ruth Simpson has been a key contributor to the field of Gender and Organization Studies (GOS) over the past 25 years. She has influenced debates on women in management, the gender of management education, masculinity and management and the “doing” of gender in organizational life. In this paper I review our joint work – informed by a poststructuralist feminist perspective – which considers the complex struggles around normativity in relation to management and entrepreneurship.

Design/Methodology/approach – This review is based on a consideration of four pieces of work completed between 2005 and 2012 including (Simpson and Lewis, 2005, 2007) and (Lewis and Simpson, 2010, 2012)

Findings - Drawing on the concepts of voice and visibility, the research examines how the ability to exemplify the norm in relation to management and entrepreneurship must be constantly secured and how processes of inclusion and exclusion in relation to the norm are characterised by relentless agitation and turmoil.

Originality/value – We develop the conceptual framework of the (In)visibility Vortex as a means of connecting the individual to organizational processes, discourses and cultural norms.