Studies on gendered business practices in the European and American airline companies have made significant contributions in theorizing discriminatory character of organizations Nevertheless, less understood is how discriminative practices and employees’ emotional labor are socially produced through the Western male gaze on Asian female workers, and became part of national identities in former colonies.
This study examines the historical processes in constructing and managing The Singapore Girl, a marketing slogan to depict Singapore Airlines’ (SIA) female cabin crew from the nation’s decolonization period in the 1970s to 2000s. In 1972, the Singapore Girl was created to stir the imagination of its customers about the young airline’s in-flight hospitality, but has since evolved to become a national cultural icon. Her narrative was tightly controlled by both foreign and local men in the advertising, airline, and fashion industries. It is mainly communicated through visual elements, namely a tight-fitting sarong kebaya—a traditional costume in floral print designed by French designer Pierre Balmain, and demure smiles captured in soft-focus photography on advertising campaigns. These elements romanticized emotional labor by characterizing the female cabin crew as naturally warm, gentle, and willing to please, and mirrored the stereotypical depictions of indigenous communities by British colonial administrators in Malaya and Singapore.
Despite repeated criticism of sexism in its marketing strategy, SIA retains much of its discriminatory practices by selecting only young, slim, and attractive females to be interviewed for the Singapore Girl positions. I argue the state-business nexus played a key role in perpetuating the idealization of the Singapore Girl not only as part of SIA’s organizational culture, but also as the nation’s work culture amidst the country’s rapid industrialization. Through national productivity movements from the 1970s to the 1990s, the Singapore Girl retained much of its essence, by embodying the state’s perceived ideal work values via her traits of subservience, obedience, and diligence.