Title: Running in Two Worlds: Social Capital, Symbolic Boundaries and Indigenous Entrepreneurs in Toronto, Canada
Abstract: Sociology as a discipline has reflected widely on the impact of class, gender and race to group outcomes. These forms of status stratify societies in different ways, impacting individual abilities to find employment, make friends, pursue educational opportunities and even attend cultural events. Yet, when it comes to recognizing these forms of status within the structure of individual social capital, very few studies have considered the class, gender and ethno-racial composition of contacts and looked at the way different factors contribute uniquely to their diversification. Rarer yet is the consideration of ethnic entrepreneurs and the accumulation of diverse social capital as an indicator of fluid and instrumental movement across symbolic boundaries between different status groups. This paper fills that gap by marrying the literature on ethnic boundaries with that of social capital and networks, using data from a case study of Indigenous entrepreneurs in Toronto, Canada. Class, gendered and ethno-racial diversity of ties are considered here as separate but equally important forms of status. Results show that indeed different forms of social capital do exist, evidenced by the variable impact of social background predictors and participation in voluntary associations. While conclusions are made about the value of varieties of social capital in research, this paper also discusses the ability of Indigenous entrepreneurs to maintain co-ethnic social capital while developing new forms of capital consecutively – speaking directly to the nature of boundary spanning, the flexibility of symbolic boundaries and the unique case of Indigenous entrepreneurs.
Publication Year: 2011
Publication Date: 2011-01-01
Language: en
Type: article
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