This volume is focused on Asian women who migrate either globally or across the Asian continent or within their respective countries in order to seek work. The contributors cover a broad terrain of issues including the changing gender composition of migration streams; the motivations of individual migrants; the different outcomes of male and female migration; and discernible patterns in the migration of women. The distinguishing feature of this collection of original essays and case studies is that it concentrates on ‘solo’ migrant women. The contributors show that even though migration involves moving away from their homes, the family, both as an institution and an ideology, constraints and shapes the choices of migrant women. Additionally, the case studies demonstrate that gender ideologies remain highly resistant to modification even consequent to a radical alteration in the household division of labour owing to women’s migration. On the other hand, women see migration as a way of achieving greater autonomy as well as fulfilling a role as a responsible adult. Overall, the volume argues that the structural ramifications of women’s migration extend beyond the lives of the migrant women themselves in so far as their labour plays an important role in shaping gender relations in the societies of both the migrants and their hosts. An important contribution to the literature on migration, this volume will attract the attention of all social scientists but particularly those studying migration, gender, family, labour, sociology and anthropology.
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