City University of New York (CUNY) CUNY Academic Works All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects 2-2014 The intern economy: Laboring to learn in the music industry Alexandre Frenette Graduate Center, City University of New York How does access to this work benefit ou?y Let us know! More information about this work at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/39 Discover additional works at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu This work is made publicly available by the City University of New York (CUNY). Contact: [email protected] THE INTERN ECONOMY: LABORING TO LEARN IN THE MUSIC INDUSTRY by Alexandre Frenette A dissertation submitted to the Graduate Faculty in Sociology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, The City University of New York 2014 © 2014 ALEXANDRE FRENETTE All Rights Reserved ii This manuscript has been read and accepted for the Graduate Faculty in Sociology in satisfaction of the dissertation requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Paul Attewell __________________ __________________________________________ Date Chair of Examining Committee Philip Kasinitz __________________ __________________________________________ Date Executive Officer Paul Attewell _________________________________________________ Sharon Zukin _________________________________________________ William Kornblum _________________________________________________ Supervisory Committee THE CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK iii Abstract THE INTERN ECONOMY by Alexandre Frenette Adviser: Paul Attewell As internships become an increasingly normal part of early careers, there is a need to examine how internships really function, if—and how—they benefit interns and companies. Through participant observation at two firms and semi-structured interviews, I focus on one of the major users of unpaid intern labor—the music industry—to analyze the meanings of intern work, both for the interns themselves and their supervisors. Consequently, this research provides an account of how aspiring and current workers in a competitive industry make sense of and reproduce precarious work conditions. By focusing on how interns and employees construct the importance of the music business within a context of routinized work, I analyze how the “charisma” of artistic production generates a powerful, but short-lived source of commitment for workers. I show how the lure of the music industry attracts people who want to do “important” work, though participants must learn to convey their excitement according to an informal code of conduct. Moreover, I show how music industry personnel generally devalue formal educational pathways to music industry employment, instead privileging on-site learning as an ennobling rite of passage. Aspiring and paid employees interpret and accept what I call the mailroom model for training. The responsibility for training thus falls on the intern and occurs under challenging circumstances. I find that interns perform provisional labor – work that is temporary, conditional, and ambiguous (“what you make of it”). Interns embody a flexible pool of labor for a host company, allowing for a range of formal and informal benefits for all parties concerned. iv Analyzing how people do succeed within the intern economy, I find that it is possible for interns to elevate their status and move beyond the characteristics and constraints of the role, though notions of race, class, age, and gender inform the selection and evaluation of interns. Taken together, the above suggests how the intern economy exacerbates class and other forms of inequality while nonetheless allowing some especially skilled interns to secure advancement. I conclude with an analysis of current intern activism and legal challenges to unpaid work. v Acknowledgments I would like to thank the interns, employees, and various key informants who generously offered their time and insights throughout this project. In particular, Abby, Greg, Hank, Isabel, Nate, and Susan were exceedingly helpful and kind. Although my time as an intern included filing expense reports at Indie Distribution and stocking refrigerators at Major Records USA, every moment was beneficial for this study and I am grateful that everyone I met at least pretended to tolerate even my most obtuse questions. Since my first day as a graduate student, I consistently benefitted from my frequent conversations with Paul Attewell. His impressive breadth, inordinate productivity, and reassuringly calm demeanor are paired – quite exceptionally – with sustained, careful attention to his students’ progress and wellbeing. I am thankful for his guidance and aspire to replicate his adept form of mentorship during the decades to come. Like Paul, Sharon Zukin was among those who saw the early promise of this project and helped me formulate some initial research questions; her later guidance and detailed notes helped strengthen this dissertation considerably. Bill Kornblum and Mitch Duneier taught me how to do fieldwork and inspired me to read works from the Chicago School tradition. This project came out of an ethnography class with Mitch, and I am grateful that he insisted (quite vigorously) that I continue this research for my dissertation. Throughout the years, I was also lucky to receive helpful insights from scholars including Stanley Aronowitz, Max Besbris, Dan Cornfield, Sarah Daynes, Tim Dowd, Cynthia Fuchs Epstein, Stuart Ewen, Richard Lloyd, Ashley Mears, Vicki Smith, and Steven Tepper. I am thankful for the support, professionalism, and grace of Rati Kashyap and Urania Wills from the CUNY Graduate Center’s Sociology Department. My Graduate Center vi colleagues’ friendships and critical comments improved every page of this dissertation, particularly the contributions of Jon Wynn, Rich Ocejo, Jeff London, Ervin Kosta, Colin Jerolmack, Patrick Inglis, and Josh Howard. I want to thank my friends and family for their encouragement during every step of my academic career. My brothers, Nick and Marc, and my almost-brothers, Anshu, Phil, Fred, JS, and Stephen, helped me stay grounded. The camaraderie of my colleagues at the French- American Chamber of Commerce, notably Martin, Philippe, Véronique, and Elliot, kept me intellectually stimulated while paying the bills and taught me a great deal about the world of work. Maggie, my fiancée, enabled this endeavor the most – her patience, reassurance, and insights were crucial. Lastly, from my early childhood, my parents and grandparents helped nurture my deep belief in the value of education. I would like to dedicate this dissertation to them and especially to my mother; while growing up in Québec, she taught me how to write in the English language and she still points out my grammatical errors, though hopefully less frequently. vii Table of Contents Abstract iv Acknowledgments vi Introduction: Laboring to Learn in the Music Industry 1 Chapter 1: The Charisma of Music Industry Work 35 Chapter 2: Training and In-between Days for Music Industry Interns 82 Chapter 3: The Intern as an Elastic Role 117 Chapter 4: The Chosen, the Choosers, and the Others 152 Conclusion: Back to the Future? 197 References 220 viii List of Tables Table 1. List of Participants 29 Table 2. Supreme Court & Circuit Court Decisions related to 209 Work & Hours Division’s Six-Factor Test ix Introduction: Laboring to Learn in the Music Industry “Greg”1 has just finished his first day of paid work in the record industry. As we sit at a fast-food restaurant in Midtown Manhattan he recounts the path leading him to this job. In the summer of 2006 he held an unpaid internship at a “major” record label. He completed unpaid internships at two more major record labels in the summer of 2007 and spring of 2008. After graduating from a prestigious southern college with a bachelor’s degree in May 2008 he moved back to his native New York City and started his fourth unpaid internship in September 2008, at Major Records USA. Of the four major record companies [then] in existence, Greg interned for each one. On this day, after seven months at the fourth internship, he transitioned to a part-time, temporary, but paid position at a different part of Major Records USA. I congratulate him on the accomplishment, to which he responds soberly: “I have a small amount of my foot in the door.” Greg’s moderate response is understandable. He describes his ascent as a “slow build” and after four internships his new position is far from ideal. Greg does administrative work in the Legal Department and describes spending part of this day punching holes in “a thousand” pages. He says they hired him to work 20 hours a week for a few months, but assured him he might stay on longer if things work out. (Interview note) Despite the banality of his job, by industry standards Greg’s path from intern to paid employee is a rare and successful one. Most music industry interns never make a transition to paid employment. As Becker (1982) and Faulkner (1983) showed decades ago, all artistic fields are characterized by a considerable surplus of potential workers. Miège describes artistic labor markets as marked by a “reservoir of workers ready to work without the need to pay them wages” (1989, p. 30). While many aspirants compete for the few positions in artistic labor markets, the extra workforce is accommodated in less desirable art-related positions such as teaching (Menger, 1999; 2006). A similar dynamic exists among aspirants on the business side of the cultural industries (Hesmondhalgh & Baker, 2008, 2011; Neff & Arata, 2007; Ursell, 2000). There is no guaranteed path for entry on the business side of the music industry, though internships are currently described as one of the few paths for workers to enter the field and 1 To protect confidentiality, I changed all respondents’ and company names to pseudonyms. 1 hopefully get hired. This is even (or perhaps especially) the case for college students pursuing a specialized college degree in Music Business (Rolston & Herrera, 2000). An internship is a practical educational experience whereby an intern learns by working at a host firm under varying degrees of supervision.