Career meaning for Indonesian women: A case study of women employees in a food processing industry

Abstract

Having a career is not a new issue and not prohibited for the Indonesian woman. Nevertheless, what was meant by career, evidently very heterogeneous and was not only in the scope of the work in the dimension of the public's space. This article depicted the meaning of the career for the twenty female workers representing various job positions in a company of the food processing industry. The meaning and the image of the career woman had been formed and internalized based on the experience since childhood both on observation in the life of their parent's household and their neighbourhood. The career woman is not only the woman who worked in the public sector, but also the woman who worked as a housewife capable of nurturing the child and serving her husband. The career woman who was regarded as successful was the woman who was not only successful in the work of the public that was characterised with the achievement of the high-ranking position, but she must also be successful in managing her household.