{"id":7720,"date":"2009-03-14T13:44:34","date_gmt":"2009-03-14T18:44:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/?p=7720"},"modified":"2017-09-16T17:03:43","modified_gmt":"2017-09-16T22:03:43","slug":"singapore-girls-and-emotion-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/2009\/03\/14\/singapore-girls-and-emotion-work\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;Singapore Girls&#8221; and Emotion Work"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Singapore Airlines\u00a0 is known for its &#8220;Singapore girls.&#8221; Here is a video that shows lots of images of how pretty Asian women, there to serve others, have been used in their advertising (the creator of the video claims to be a Singapore girl):<\/p>\n<p><object width=\"425\" height=\"344\"><param name=\"movie\" value=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/v\/Tqyiqalzktg&amp;hl=en&amp;fs=1\" \/><param name=\"allowFullScreen\" value=\"true\" \/><param name=\"allowscriptaccess\" value=\"always\" \/><\/object><\/p>\n<p>Apparently the Singapore Girl is such a phenomenon, she&#8217;s a figure at Madame Tussaud&#8217;s:<\/p>\n<p><object width=\"425\" height=\"344\"><param name=\"movie\" value=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/v\/P5sGKR6NJBw&amp;hl=en&amp;fs=1\" \/><param name=\"allowFullScreen\" value=\"true\" \/><param name=\"allowscriptaccess\" value=\"always\" \/><\/object><\/p>\n<p>I had no idea that when most people think of Singapore, they think of this &#8220;pretty, smiling&#8230;girl.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Anyway, I think it&#8217;s an interesting example of the way non-White women are often portrayed as exotic (the Singapore girls have become a symbol of Singapore itself) and also of what sociologists refer to as emotion work. The Singapore girls aren&#8217;t there just to bring us drinks and make sure we&#8217;re buckled in; there&#8217;s there to make us feel pampered and to warm our hearts&#8211;to do the type of emotion work (constantly smiling, being extremely attentive, being at the passengers&#8217; service and making it seem like a joy) that makes customers feel cared-for and special&#8230;and thus willing to pay high prices for those business seats. And clearly these women <em>are<\/em> part of the decor&#8211;pretty, polite, accommodating women for passengers to enjoy while they fly.<\/p>\n<span class=\"ft_signature\"><em>Gwen Sharp is an associate professor of sociology at Nevada State College. You can follow her on Twitter at @gwensharpnv.<\/em><\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Singapore Airlines\u00a0 is known for its &#8220;Singapore girls.&#8221; Here is a video that shows lots of images of how pretty Asian women, there to serve others, have been used in their advertising (the creator of the video claims to be a Singapore girl): Apparently the Singapore Girl is such a phenomenon, she&#8217;s a figure at [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":50,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[279,329,55,2089,2093,2100,778,23703,1800,285,1759,76],"class_list":["post-7720","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-objectification","tag-emotion","tag-gender","tag-gender-beauty","tag-gender-objectification","tag-gender-work","tag-intersectionality","tag-marketing","tag-nation-singapore","tag-raceethnicity","tag-raceethnicity-asianspacific-islanders","tag-work"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7720","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7720"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7720\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":70968,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7720\/revisions\/70968"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7720"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7720"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7720"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}