Culture in the borderlands: stories of Southeast Asian domestic workers in Taiwan [Elektronische Ressource] / Huey-jen Sheu

Sujets

• Soziologie
• Ethnologie

Informations

• Publié par: ruprecht-karls-universitat_heidelberg
• Publié le: 01 janvier 2008
• Nombre de lectures: 16
• Langue: English

Extrait

Culture in the Borderlands:
“Stories“ of Southeast Asian Domestic Workers in
Taiwan


Ph.D.Dissertation


Huey-jen Sheu
Department of Ethnology
Heidelberg University



July 2007Contents

INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................................................1
THE ASIA-PACIFIC VERSION OF LABOR MIGRATION .............................................................................1
PLACE, VOICE AND CULTURE ...............................................................................................................3
METHODOLOGY.....4
Methodological Considerations......................................................................................................6
FIELDWORK...........8
OVERVIEW OF CHAPTERS ...................................................................................................................13
1 APPROACH AND THEORY ...........................................................................................................16
1.1 GENDER, MIGRATION AND DOMESTIC WORK ...............................................................................16
1.1.1 On the Gender Trail in Migration Research ......................................................................16
1.1.2 A Review of the Literature on Migrant Domestic Workers ................................................20
1.2 POWER AND RESISTANCE..............................................................................................................28
1.3 THE CONCEPT OF BORDERLAND ...................................................................................................30
1.4 GENDER AND PERFORMATIVITY....................................................................................................31
2 MY PLACE OR YOURS? THE TAIWANESE AND THEIR MIGRANT WORKERS AT
TAIPEI MAIN STATION ....................................................................................................................34
2.1 INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................................................34
2.2 SUNDAYS AT TAIPEI MAIN STAT IO N...............................................................................................35
2.3 THE PROBLEMATIQUE ...................................................................................................................37
2.4 THEORIES......................................................................................................................................37
2.5 SPAT I A L STORIES OF MIGRANT WORKERS AT TAIPEI MAIN STATION .............................................48
2.6 CONCLUSION.52
3 LIFE AS A MIGRANT DOMESTIC WORKER IN TAIWAN .....................................................54
3.1 A SNAPSHOT OF THE TAIWANESE CONTEXT ..................................................................................54
3.1.1 State Policy on Migrant Workers in Taiwan.......................................................................54
3.1.2 The Social Construction of the Domestic Worker in Taiwan.............................................59
3.2 DIFFERENT ETHNIC PATHWAYS TO TAIWAN...................................................................................65
3.2.1 The Philippines....................................................................................................................67
3.2.2 Indonesia .............................................................................................................................73
3.2.3 Vietnam................................................................................................................................76
3.2.4 Thailand ..............................................................................................................................78
3.3 MIGRANT DOMESTICS’ COMMUNITY WITHIN THE CONTEXT OF THEIR MOBILITY.........................80
i3.4 CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................................82
4 POSITIONING THE SUPERMAID: TRANSNATIONAL LABOR BROKERING FROM
SOUTHEAST ASIA TO TAIWAN ......................................................................................................86
4.1 INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................................................86
4.2 MONEY MATTERS .........................................................................................................................89
4.3 TRICKS...........95
4.4 THE ROLE OF ETHNICITY IN SHAPING DOMESTIC EMPLOYMENT ..................................................99
4.5 CONCLUSION ..............................................................................................................................103
5 NEITHER VICTIMS NOR SLUTS: GENDER DISCOURSE AND MIGRANT WOMEN IN
TAIWAN ..............................................................................................................................................105
5.1 SEXUAL HARASSMENT IN THE WORKPLACE ...............................................................................106
5.1.1 The Stigmatization of “Maids“ .........................................................................................107
5.1.2 May’s Story ........................................................................................................................108
5.1.3 The Commodified Sexual Images of Southeast Asian Women........................................109
5.1.4 An Episode in the Park ......................................................................................................111
5.1.5 Of My Own Experience..................................................................................................... 112
5.2 SEXUAL HARASSMENT OF MIGRANT DOMESTICS AS INTERETHNIC GENDER CONFLICT ............. 113
5.2.1 The Influence of Religion................................................................................................. 113
5.2.2 The Force of Fatherlands 116
5.2.3 The Feminine Ideal...........................................................................................................121
5.2.4 The Creativity of the Migrant Domestic Worker’s Response ...........................................125
5.3 THE ROMANTIC RELATIONSHIPS OF FOREIGN DOMESTIC WORKERS IN TAIWAN .........................127
5.4 CONCLUSION ..............................................................................................................................137
6 CAN THE SUBALTERN SPEAK?................................................................................................139
6.1 INCIDENT ....................................................................................................................................141
6.2 THEORIES.....144
6.2.1 Austin’s View of Speech Act..............................................................................................144
6.2.2 Bourdieu’s Account of Speech Act....................................................................................145
6.2.3 Derrida’s Interpretation of Speech Act.............................................................................146
6.2.4 Butler’s Speech Act Theory...............................................................................................146
6.3 DISCUSSION.148
6.4 CONCLUSION ..............................................................................................................................154
7 CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................155
APPENDIX..........161
BIBLIOGRAPHY164
iiSOURCES ...........................................................................................................................................175
ARCHIVES..........176
iiiIntroduction

The Asia-Pacific Version of Labor Migration
Migration and mobility is not a new phenomenon in human society. Historically,
people have moved from one place to another either for reasons of survival or due to
force in terms of slavery. Towards the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,
migration began to be prompted by industrialization and urbanization. In past decades,
international migration has increased in dimension for both the sending and the
receiving communities. Compared to other types of migration, labor migration is in
pole position.
According to the United Nations, in the early 1980s, approximately 77 million
people lived outside their native countries. In 1990, international migrants were 80
million in number. At the end of the twentieth century, more than 100 million people
did not live in the nations in which they were born. The UN’s International Migration
Report 2002 estimated that there were 175 million migrants, defined as persons who
reside outside their country of birth or citizenship for 12 months or more. They are
categorized according to the duration of their migration (temporary/permanent), their
level of volition (voluntary/forced), their level of acceptance by receiving countries
(legal/illegal), etc. Sixty to sixty-five million of them were economically active, with
or without a permit. In other words, contemporary migrants are predominantly
workers moving from areas wher