When we read or hear about migrant women in the media or in political debates, often the discussion focuses narrowly on a particular set of difficult issues: desperate poverty, domestic violence, human trafficking or female genital mutilation (FGM). Migrant women are often portrayed in such accounts as dependent and victims of these practices, with other members of their communities presented as more powerful perpetrators.
In this article I want to show a slightly different scenario. I want to explore some of the realities of migrant women’s lives of course, but using their own words taken from several recent studies. In doing so, I want to question this notion of victimisation by using the sociology of gender and migration. While the accounts of migrant women as victims are certainly very real, I want to suggest that they form only part of the story of migrant women’s complex realities. Instead of seeing migrant women as a single entity characterised by their status as victims, we can also begin to see them as diverse citizens: as active participants in public and private life, and people who can successfully create new forms of belonging.
Your organisation does not have access to this article.
Sign up today to give your students the edge they need to achieve their best grades with subject expertise
Subscribe
