Immigrant Households and Gender Dynamics

Development of Gendered Migration Research

Patriarchy is the main reason why researchers ignored women migrants for many years. It also reflects the traditional model of households where the man is the breadwinner and the woman takes care of the children. Women were portrayed as passive, and not actively participating in the migration decision. The term tied migrants, which is commonly used in migration research to describe women migrants who move with their husbands, exemplifies this thought. Feminist research in the 1970s criticized the exclusive focus on men because it only accounted for half of the experiences so gender was added as a variable to fill the gap. However, treating gender just as a variable was not helpful in explaining the differences in the migration experience of women and men. The next step was to focus extensively on women but researchers were still unsuccessful in accounting for gender differences in migration decisions. The breakthrough happened during the 1980s and 1990s when interview-based approaches slowly started to change migration research by shedding more light on women's experiences and why women and men migrants have to be analyzed differently and comparatively.

This theoretical shift from a men-oriented economic approach to an inclusive gender approach spurred two more important developments in migration research. First, the role of the larger family, or the household:

[Page 452]Migrants often come by themselves and leave families behind in the country of origin, also called the sending country. Those family members can be spouses and children but often include extended family members such as parents, aunts, uncles, and cousins as well. By interviewing migrants about their experiences, researchers became aware of the important role of these households and their support for, or opposition to the migration of family members. For instance, families who struggle to make ends meet might select a son or daughter to find work somewhere else and then support the household through remittances. These remittances are mostly monetary and place expectations and pressure on migrants to provide for family members back home. By analyzing household migration strategies, researchers gain more conclusive insights about why and how people migrate, and the influence of extended family in the sending country.

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