Gendered Migration

Migration has emerged as a critical influence on the development discourse in most developing countries. In particular, India has become an important source of migrant labour. However, the gender aspect of migration has caught the fancy of researchers quite late. Given the delayed attention to female migration, the book under review fulfils a major gap in the literature. This book documents the experiences of the neglected actors of globalisation—migrant women. However, while describing in detail the structural and cultural contexts within which these women often operate, the book questions the dominant paradigms about women being the passive agents in migration and documents ways in which they take control of their lives in often difficult circumstances. With women’s increasing participation in conventional labour migration, several specifically ­female forms of migration and female-specific economic niches have emerged. These include the commercialised migration of domestic workers, also called “the maid trade,” the migration and trafficking of women in the sex industry, the organised migration of women for marriage called the “mail-order brides,” and migration for the care industry, the latter also being the focus of the book.

Female Migration