Blood, Sweat, and Oil: An Ethnographic Examination of Worker Well-being and Culture in Alberta’s Petroleum Industry
Date
2022-11-25
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
Natural resource extraction is an industry that provides crude oil, minerals, and gas for global consumption. Despite the increasing visibility of the environmental, economic, and political harm attributed to the petroleum industry writ large, each of us, in one form or another, benefits from its products and the labour of the workers invisible beyond the veil of industry. This study aimed to elucidate the human and social costs associated with working in the petroleum industry, specifically related to the relationship between workers’ well-being, the demands and challenges of work, and the culture of the petroleum industry. Using a critical ethnographic methodology, I gathered the stories of 19 oil workers who talked about how the demands and challenges of working in the petroleum industry affected their well-being. I developed three broad thematic statements from these interviews: (a) oilfield culture was a vital aspect of working in the petroleum industry that determined psychosocial enforcement of identity, norms, and expectations among workers, (b) labour superseded well-being to ensure continuity of production, and (c) surviving in a petroeconomy bred singular reliance upon the petroleum industry and necessitated increasingly adaptive and resilient workers. I conclude this dissertation with a discussion about the implications of these findings and recommendations for future research focusing on workers' lived experiences at work and home.
Description
Keywords
Citation
Wright, A. C. (2022). Blood, sweat, and oil: an ethnographic examination of worker wellbeing and culture in Alberta's petroleum industry (Doctoral thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca.