Spouse Workers In Half Household: A Social Construction Of Marginal Identity And Resistance Of Status

The half household and spouse workers are produced in specific historical stage of our country, and they are also the groups of Chinese national characteristics. The groups have not only made tremendous contributions to the development of our country, but also carried the pain and suffering brought about by social changes. They are gradually reduced to vulnerable groups of our society. However, whether in academic research or on the concerns of real life, the half household and spouse workers have been neglected by society. Taking spouse workers in half household as the object of study, and the social identity theory as the research angle of view, this article analyzes spouse workers' social construction of marginal identity, the process of resistance of status and its social meaning under the State-owned business vicissitude background so as to bear in mind the history and return to reality.Spouse workers are special feminine community in our country. Under the special historical background of our country's industrialization advancement in early years , the third line construction, and the Chairman Mao's May 7th path , spouse workers entered the cities along with their husbands from the countryside. They were engaged in the same productive work as the urban worker's in the state-owned enterprises, but their identity remained a peasant household. Under the background of A enterprise's life course from development to stagnation, spouse workers experienced "the urbanization"—"the temporary worker" -- "to be removed" such complex and tortuous process of identity change, their social economy status also fell into the circulation of "the difficult position—overcoming their difficulties --the difficult position". But spouse workers were not resigned to the marginal identity constructed by the exterior plan and the institutional arrangements. They made the independent response to the pursuit of identity along with recognition changes of the unit. In fact, spouse workers' pursuit of identity experienced the process from constructing identity (Worker identity), resolving identity (marginal spouse workers' identity) to pursuing new identity (identity of benefits). When spouse workers' status solidified in the society, and their daily lives were threatened, spouse workers' request on identity and status changed from "We want a better life" to "We want to live" , such a simple survival logic. They made strong independent response and started the resistance of status in order to maintain their identity demands. But spouse workers' resistance motion which integrates their daily life is not rapid and radical, but extended and tough. The resistance behavior takes the self-benefit as the principle. Spouse workers' social resistance has been defeated temporarily, but spouse workers have the possibility of turning the daily resistance to a more radical behavior at any time according to the benefit adjustment and trade-offs to continue the demands of identity. This article concludes the meaning of spouse workers' marginal identity, that is, spouse workers' social construction of identity is re-integration of the moral and institutional arrangements in the transformation of the society, and simultaneously it achieves the social transformation and relational restoration of country, organization individual in the vicissitude process.