Fracking the Glacier: From mimicry to hybridization of professional accountantCanadian field

Abstract

In this study we draw on postcolonial theory to examine how some professionals from “diverse” backgrounds are able to overcome systemic barriers and to theorize how the success of some individuals, over time, disrupts the reproduction of both discursive and material structures that legitimize and maintain exclusion. We examine how situating migrant accounting professionals in their bodies, as well as in temporal context, provides new insights that help to explain how exclusion operates within a professional field but also, how the agency of individuals evolves over time and has longer term implications for subsequent generations of professionals. Using post-colonial analysis of the narratives of twenty four accountants migrating to Canada, we show how early migrants from the colonial margins initially confront significant barriers that force them to mimic the performances of Canadian accountants in order to re-constitute their professional identities in Canada. However, over time, as early arriving migrant accountants re-establish their professional identities, they both actively and passively facilitate entry for subsequent arrivals. We argue that this is accomplished through disrupting the routine reproduction of the seemingly natural professional identity and social structure and through the iterative hybridization of the relatively homogeneous professional identity that has dominated the Canadian profession for over a century.