Self-Entrepreneurship or Subordinated Self-Management? Tensions of Neoliberal Subjectivity in Text Editing

Abstract

Neoliberalism, as it expands globally, generalizes characteristics historically constitutive of the labor market in the Global South — informality, flexibility, and low social protection —, particularly affecting women (Antunes, 2015). This movement intensifies precariousness even in intellectual activities, such as text editing, a predominantly female profession. Considering this scenario, the article proposes an intersection between elements attributed to femininity, historically constitutive traits of text editing, and aspects of neoliberal discourse, aiming to verify whether there is resistance to neoliberal ideology in this activity. Anchored in Pêcheux (2014 [1975]) and Indursky (2008), we investigate whether text editors position themselves in relation to this discursive formation through identification, counter-identification, or disidentification. The analyses identified all these processes, contradicting the notion that contemporary workers fully adhere to the ideal of "being their own bosses". Challenges to neoliberal ideological formation occur mainly through a labor-oriented discursive formation. The observed discursive heterogeneity appears to result from the current fragmentation of the working class.