Intersectional history: exploring intersectionality over time

Abstract

PurposeThis paper aims to outline the possibilities of intersectional history as a novel method for management history. Intersectional history combines intersectionality and the study of the past to examine discrimination in organizations over time. This paper explores the need for intersectional work in management history, outlines the vision for intersectional history and provides a brief example analyzing the treatment of Australian Aboriginal people in a historical account of Qantas Airways.Design/methodology/approachThis paper contends that intersectionality is a discursive practice, and it adopts a relational approach to the study of the past to inform the method. This paper focuses on the social construction of identities and the enduring nature of traces of the powerful in organizations over time.FindingsThe example of Qantas Airways demonstrates that intersectional history can be used to interrogate powerful traces of the past to reveal novel insights about marginalized peoples over time.Originality/valueIntersectional history is a specific and reflexive method that allows for the surfacing of identity-based marginalization over time. The paper’s concentration on identity as socially constructed allows a particular focus on notions or representations of the marginalized in traces of the past. These traces may otherwise mask the existence and importance of marginalized groups in organizations’ dominant histories.