Performing Amateurism: A Study of Camgirls’ Work

Abstract

Includes index. Why do ordinary people who used to engage in domestic and leisure activities for free now try to make a profit from them? How and why do people commodify their free time? This book explores the marketization of blogging, cooking, craftwork, gardening, knitting, selling second-hand items, sexcamming, and more generally the economic use of free time. It outlines how the development of web platforms, the current economic context and post-Fordist values can account for this extension of market and labor. Drawing on a range of interviews, ethnographic observations, and quantitative surveys, the contributors question the empowering effects of commodification, with a specific focus on how gender and class inequalities affect the social meanings of extra money. Ultimately, the collective findings demonstrate how commodification pervades even the most mundane social activities. This research will be invaluable to scholars and students with a focus on gender and digital sociology, the sociology of work and labour, and the marketization of leisure. 1. Introduction: The Marketization of Everyday Life; Anne Jourdain and Sidonie Naulin -- Part 1: Pin Money -- 2. Commodifying Leisure and Improving Its Social Value: Knitters' Conspicuous Production on Ravelry.com; Vinciane Zabban -- 3. Making Money Out of Leisure: The Marketization of Handicrafts and Food Blogging; Anne Jourdain and Sidonie Naulin -- 4. Selling Second-Hand Items on the Web: New Skills for Everyone?; Adrien Bailly, Renaud Garcia-Bardidia and Coralie Lallemand -- Part 2: Savings -- 5. Comorian Women at Work: Juggling Insecure Jobs with the Transnational Suitcase Trade; Abdoul-Malik Ahmad -- 6. Domesticity as Value: The Commodification of Foodstuffs in Precarious Rural Russia; Glenn Mainguy -- 7. Nonstandard Working Hours and Economic Use of Free Time in the Upper Class: The Gender Gap; Anne Lambert -- Part 3: Low Labor Income -- 8. Performing Amateurism: A Study of Camgirls' Work; Pierre Brasseur and Jean Finez -- 9. Making Money from TV Series: From Viewer to Webmaster with Financial Rewards; Anne-Sophie Béliard. -- Having or Blurring It All? Capitalism's Work at the Frontier. .