Margins and centres: Gender and feminism in business history

Abstract

Gender and feminism are often described as being marginal to the preoccupations that define the core of business history. Here we explore three possibilities that this framing suggests: first, that scholars of gender and feminism in business history are responsible for moving their work from margins to centre, becoming part of and perhaps changing the mainstream; second, that those working in the centre ought to expand their horizons to become more cognisant of feminism and gender; and third, the interpretation that we examine in detail here, that all working on historical analysis of business can rethink the distinction between the construction of core and periphery. This latter approach means actively challenging the maintenance of the centre/margin metaphor and its effects. We argue that this third approach would benefit all working in the field. Envisioning a more heterodox business history enables critical analysis of white, male, Anglocentric norms and values that have framed historical thinking in ways that exclude and produce partial, unsatisfactory, histories.