1. Gender and Migration
By: Oriana Marsh, Vera Mirhady, and Yvonne Su

2. Outline
Introduction: What is gender?
Gender in the Migratory Process - Helma Lutz
Feminisation of Migration and the Social Dimensions
of Development: the Asian case - Nicola Piper
Short Film
Discussion Groups
Conclusion

3. Introduction: What is Gender
POP QUIZ QUESTION #1

4. Gender vs. Sex
According to the World Health
Organization:
“Sex” refers to the biological
and physiological
characteristics that define
men and women
“Gender” refers to the socially
constructed roles, behaviours,
activities, and attributes that
a given society considers
appropriate for men and
women

5. Gender in Migration
Scholarship
Until the 1970s, most research
focused exclusively on male
migrants.
In the 1970s and 1980s,
scholarship began to focus on
the experience of female
migrants.
Initially, the introduction of the
concept of gender into
migration studies meant simply
adding women to the male bias.

6. Gender as a Concept
“Gender is not simply a
variable to be measured, but a
set of social relations that
organize immigration
patterns. The task, then, is...
to begin with an examination
of how gender relations...
facilitate or constrain both
women’s and men’s
immigration and settlement.”
- Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo

7. Gendered Geographies of
Power
A framework for
examining gender
across transnational
spaces.
Composed of three
fundamental elements:
geographical scales,
social locations, and
power geometries.

8. Geographical Scales
Gender operates
simultaneously on multiple
spatial and social scales across
transnational terrains.
When looking at gender and
migration, think about the
impact on the macro-, meso-,
and micro- levels.
Ex. the body, the family, the
state

9. Social Locations
Person’s positions within
interconnected power hierarchies
created through historical,
political, economic, geographic,
kinship-based, and other socially
stratifying factors.
Imagine a social location
continuum from most
disadvantaged to most privileged
and locate people in different sites
along it, roughly identifying the
places and predicaments from
which they may take action.

10. Compare and Contrast

11. Intersectionality
POP QUIZ QUESTION #2: Define Intersectionality

12. Intersectionality
Intersectionality examines how various socially and
culturally constructed categories such as gender, race,
and class interact on multiple and often simultaneous
levels, contributing to systematic social inequality.
Intersectionality holds that the system of oppression
reflects the intersection of multiple forms of
discrimination.

13. Power Geometries
The types and degrees of agency people exert given their
social locations.
People’s social locations affect their access to resources and
mobility across transnational spaces, but also their agency as
initiators, refiners, and transformers of these locations.

14. Gender in the Migratory Process
Helma Lutz

15. Male/Female Dichotomy
and the Agency Debate
Female migrant: Victim or Agent? Voluntary or
involuntary migrant?
Male migrant: Victim or Agent? Voluntary or
involuntary migrant?

16. POP QUIZ QUESTION # 3
What are some female dominated labour markets?
What are some male dominated labour markets?

17. The Labour Market
Labour markets are gendered
“Feminized” domains of work
(domestic, entertainment,
care work, prostitution)
“Male dominated” domains or
work (trucking, construction)
Different and similar
experiences for male and
female migrants

18. Care Practices
Rich families
“outsource...the three c’s”
to migrant women
Effects of “female
breadwinners” on families
Example: Mohamed
Mansaray, 25 years old,
deported from Winnipeg
Burden of care falls on
women

19. Discourses and
Transnational Parenting
“The absence of migrated
fathers is more widely
accepted than the absence
of mothers” (Lutz, 1653)
‘“Euro-orphan”

20. Transnational Parenting
“Bhutanese children
are often left
temporarily fatherless
due to migrant work,
leaving families under
the care of mothers and
older brothers.” -
Benjamin Graham

21. Feminisation of Migration and the Social
Dimensions of Development: the Asian Case
Nicola Piper

22. Gender and Migration

23. Linking Migration &
Development
Shift from the economic to
the social
women use migration as
an escape route
Asian women migrate “for
the sake of the family”

24. Pros and Cons
Research on earlier intra-Asian migration found that:
On the one hand women benefited from higher
levels of independence and decision-making power;
but the strain of the increased workload and
responsibilities was in some cases found to have had
negative implications.

25. Feminisation of Migration
in Asia
Asia as a whole is one of the
two regions in the world
where there were still
slightly more males than
females migrants by the
year 2005.
The bulk of women comes
from Philippines, Sri
Lanka and Indonesia.

26. POP QUIZ QUESTION #4

28. Visibility
The out-going flows of
women from Indonesia,
Sri Lanka, and the
Philippines make up
65%-75% of workers
who are deployed legally
on an annual basis.
International marriages
are not included in official
statistics

29. Marriage
It was recently
impossible for a female
professional migrant to
bring her husband as
‘accompanying
spouse’ (although this
has always been possible
for male professionals).

30. Feminisation of Migration
in Asia cont.
women dominate in jobs
connected to social
reproduction (eg child
care, domestic work) or
work which requires
“nimble fingers” (eg
textiles)
women also migrate in
response to the great
demand for sexual labour

31. POP QUIZ QUESTION #5
What does “de-skilling” mean?

32. Migrant rights
“Issue of de-skilling”
well educated women doing
low-skilled work due to the
relative inability to access
legal channels
Restrictive migration policies
and legally unrecognized work
of migrants pose serious
limitationsto women’s
migrants’ chances of personal
socioeconomic empowerment.

33. Increasing trends
Aiming to improve their
livelihoods and that of
their families in the face
of rising male un- and
under- employment,
increasing numbers of
women seek work in
foreign countries in
different types of
occupations.

34. On the Move: Nepal’s
Women Migrant Workers

35. Discussion Questions
Do you think the stereotype of the ‘lone, rugged male’
migrant worker has persisted? If not, what is the
stereotype of a ‘typical’ migrant today?
How do you react to the following statement?
“Female migration seems to be seen as
unproblematic as long as it is restricted to
unmarried, young and single females, but it is seen as
a threat for social coherence where it concerns
mothers of young children.” (Lutz, 1656)

36. Discussion Questions
Are men and women different in their ability to
contribute to the local and global economy and a
country’s development?
What are the social consequences of the feminisation
of migration in receiving countries? Will their attitudes
towards migrants become less hostile as females are
seen as less threatening than men?

37. Discussion Questions
Compare and contrast the migratory experiences of the
two Nepalese women in the film. How does this relate
to the concept of social location?
Is the femnisation of migration a positive force for
women’s rights in sending countries or does it play a
negative role in reenforcing gender divisions of labour?

38. Final Thoughts
“Gender is not simply a
variable to be measures, but a
set of social relations that
organize immigration
patterns. The task, then, is...
to begin with an examination
of how gender
relations...facilitate or
constrain both women’s and
men’s immigration and
settlement.” - Pierrette
Hondagneu-Sotelo

39. Migrant Rights
Rights are one of the most
important ways in which to
address the fundamental root
causes of migration.
Restrictive migration policies
and legally unrecognized
work of migrants pose serious
limitations to female
migrants’ chances of personal
socioeconomic
empowerment.

40. Discourse and Policies
It’s important to look
at the discourse and
policies in both sending
and receiving countries
in relation to gender
and gender inequality
in migration and
migrants lives.

41. THANKS FOR COMING
TO CLASS AND
LISTENING TO US!
Gender and Migration
By: Oriana Marsh, Vera Mirhady, and Yvonne Su