Strapping, as well as numerate: Occupational identity, masculinity and the aesthetics of nineteenth-century banking

Abstract

In nineteenth-century Australia a ‘career’ in banking depended on one's technical ability, including a way with figures, good penmanship and attention to detail. However social and cultural factors were also considered equally important. To ensure the recruitment and promotion of trustworthy, dependable and committed staff, banks recruited and promoted through internal labour markets reinforced through significant monitoring and on-going assessments. A major component of these assessments related to social and cultural factors including embodied and aesthetic attributes of middle classness as well as robust notions of masculinity. This article analyses primary data from Australia's Bank of New South Wales at the close of the nineteenth century to highlight the inter-relationship between prevailing notions of masculinity, respectability, occupation and identity.

Keywords:

• career
• masculinity
• banking
• aesthetics
• bureaucracy, occupational identity

Notes

1. List of all Officers in the Queensland Inspection District at ____1896 with Salary recommendations by the Qld inspector: remarks.

2. Archive material was collected by Heather Willis and supported by a Work and Organisational Studies research assistance grant. Also many thanks to archive personnel for their generous assistance with retrieving documents for the project.

3. Which as noted elsewhere could also allegedly lead to insanity as well as fatigue and nervous disorders (Garton, 1984).