Abstract
Abstract: In this essay I situate First World War nursing narratives by Enid Bagnold, Mary Borden, and Lesley Smith within the framework of emotional labor developed by Arlie Russell Hochschild in The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling (1983). Although Hochschild's study does not focus on wartime nursing, her model of emotional labor can effectively illuminate the ways in which nurses encountered their peers, supervisors, and patients; managed the emotions that attended those encounters; and documented those experiences in fiction and memoir. I focus on three aspects of Hochschild's framework that directly connect to the affective lives of wartime nurses: establishment of "feeling rules," strategies for emotion management, and the impact of those strategies. I explore expectations and impacts of emotional labor as revealed in a variety of sources, including recruiting and training materials from the British Red Cross Society, nursing textbooks, and literary accounts. Reading these texts through the lens of emotional labor reveals an apparent mismatch between the idealized feeling rules and the actual experiences of the role, allowing us to understand scenes of emotional estrangement in new ways.
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callMore From: Journal of the Midwest Modern Language Association
Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
