Reprogramming femininity? The construction of gender identities in the Israeli hi-tech industry between global and local gender orders

Based on the study of gender identities in the Israeli hi-tech sector, this article sets out to explore the doing of gender in a context comprised of two cultural repertoires characterized by divergent and contradictory fundamental assumptions: the new masculine transnational economy and pro-natalist Israeli society. The article demonstrates how, by manoeuvering and moving between these global and local cultural repertoires, privileged Israeli hi-tech women enact and construct a 'new femininity' that simultaneously challenges both the discourse of the 'ideal hi-tech worker' and that of traditional Israeli femininity. This new femininity, I argue, is grounded in a local translation of the 'family friendly organization' discourse.