REVIEWS

(Not) Getting Paid To Do What You Love

GENDER, SOCIAL MEDIA, AND ASPIRATIONAL WORK

(Yale University Press, 2017)

Duffy’s exploration of sexism, as well as her probe of the gig economy, makes this an interesting and informative read for anyone—even those who aren’t following Instagram’s foodies and fashionistas.”—Wired.com

“Duffy refutes the idea that anyone can make a living doing what they love online—whether they’re a food or fashion influencer or any other kind of gig worker. Women, especially, get exploited as the line blurs between hobby and career, she explains.”—Entrepreneur

“Duffy’s book skilfully casts light on what drives people to push themselves so hard to make it in online worlds of ‘content creation’ – and she provides a convincing feminist analysis of how this ‘aspirational labor’ is deeply gendered.” — David Hesmondhalgh, co-author of Creative Labour: Media Work in Three Cultural Industries

"Duffy chronicles, with clarity and compassion, what she calls “aspirational labor”—an intoxicating desire to forego the realities of today’s soulless and uncertain labor market for the allure of a more soulful connection to meaningful work. Using today’s dizzying world of social media microcelebrity to make her case, Duffy accomplishes that rare thing: advances theory with elegance, challenging all easy reads of late capitalism, while helping readers see themselves in the book’s careful, detailed accounts of people’s lives."—Mary L. Gray, Indiana University and Microsoft Research

“A fascinating, meticulously researched study that shows how these creative women exemplify modern workers. Her lessons are essential for all those interested in fashion studies, gender studies, and the creative economy.”—Angela McRobbie, author of Be Creative: Making a Living in the New Culture Industries

“Duffy shows, in one of the most teachable books I have read this year, how much we can learn about the hazards of contemporary capitalism by analyzing the quandaries these digital workers face when they try to make a living letting others know about the commodities they love.” -Ilana Gershon, ILR Review

“Duffy is an excellent guide to the contemporary anxieties of aspirational labor, showing both the very calculated nature of investments these women are trying to make in their futures, while pointing to the larger social forces that shape and constrict their possibilities.”—Gina Neff, author of Venture Labor

"A necessary antidote. Duffy deftly reveals the sweat of young women content creators, offering a new perspective on gender and the digital economy."—Leslie Regan Shade, University of Toronto

“Duffy’s seminal work unearths once and for all what it’s truly like to work in the influencer economy of blogging and social media.”—Julia DiNardo, FashionPulseDaily.com

“This rich, original, and insightful book introduces a new concept—aspirational labor—for thinking about contemporary creative work and shows how gender and social media are intimately entangled with it. Highly recommended!”—Rosalind Gill, author of Gender and the Media

“This immensely valuable book reveals the trapdoor for female workers who pursue their talents on social media. Duffy expertly dissects a system which attracts many, rewards a few, and exploits the rest.”— Andrew Ross, author of Nice Work If You Can Get It: Life and Labor in Precarious Times

“Contrary to optimists who hoped that the internet would bail women out of the family-career bind, Duffy finds that female ‘digital-media hopefuls’ rarely get paid for their work. The phenomenon Duffy describes is fascinating.”—Frances McCall Rosenbluth, coauthor of both Forged Through Fire and Women, Work, and Politics

"Smart and original. Drawing on fieldwork and interviews with fashion bloggers and vloggers, Duffy unpacks the pressures of self-branding, status-seeking, and audience-building inherent in the gendered struggle to get paid doing what you love."—Laura Grindstaff, author of The Money Shot

“Duffy's critically astute study reveals the intersection of pleasure and power in contemporary capitalism and clearly articulates an essential new perspective on digital labor.”— Kylie Jarrett, author of The Digital Housewife

“This insightful account will resonate with anyone who has ever sought to turn personal passions into wage-earning employment, juggled multiple part-time gigs, or struggled to fit pleasurable hobbies around a ‘real’ job or jobs.”—Library Journal, starred review

“[A] thoroughly researched and considered work.”—Choice

 "This book is particularly helpful for those studying social media, gender, and the digital economy, and opens up many questions about media industries, aspirational labor, and the merging of creative expression and entrepreneurial ideologies."—Zoetanya Sujon, International Journal of Communication