Caring Even if It Hurts

The Labor of Care ◽

10.5622/illinois/9780252041723.003.0005 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Valerie Francisco-Menchavez

Keyword(s):

Emotional Distress ◽

Care Work ◽

Transnational Family ◽

Growing Pains ◽

Emotional Strain

Chapter four tells a story of emotional strain that travels on the circuits of multidirectional care just as the care work that is undergirded with love and warmth. The emotionality in care work specifically during trying times of anger, guilt and disappointment illustrates that a care work is still attended to even through the pains of their transnational relationship. It follows families moving in and out of growing pains, some faster than others. The chapter demonstrates that while care work travels multidirectionally, strain follows those circuits of care as well. And yet, families under emotional distress or disappointment can still participate in the labor of caring. The stories here actively pull apart the idealized notion that “care work” always comes from nurturance, love and warmth rather focusing on the work of sustaining the transnational family whether members feel gratified or good about that work.

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Conclusion

The Labor of Care ◽

10.5622/illinois/9780252041723.003.0006 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Valerie Francisco-Menchavez

Keyword(s):

Family Member ◽

Migrant Workers ◽

Care Work ◽

Gender Ideologies ◽

Call To Action ◽

Transnational Family ◽

Care Workers ◽

Fictive Kin ◽

Migrant Family ◽

Institutional Actor

This chapter sums up the meaning, forms, roles and definitions of care is at the crux of proposing multidirectional care as a model of transnational care. The different actors contributing care work in the transnational family urge us to decenter the lone migrant family member as the sole provider; rather it values the care work that many people involved in transnational family arrangements contribute to sustaining familial relationships while separated and shifting gender ideologies. It urges us to think about families with an expanded view, to include biological kin and fictive kin, both at home and abroad, as care workers. Although the multidirectional care model illuminates elaborate exchanges of care work, the conclusion critically examines the invisible, institutional actor--the Philippine labor brokerage state--reified in the discussions of reorganized care work in the Filipino transnational family. Finally, the chapter ends with a call to action for the support of migrant workers globally.

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Skype Mothers and Facebook Children

The Labor of Care ◽

10.5622/illinois/9780252041723.003.0003 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Valerie Francisco-Menchavez

Keyword(s):

Family Members ◽

Communication Technologies ◽

Patterns Of Care ◽

Care Work ◽

Transnational Families ◽

Care Providers ◽

Transnational Family ◽

Technological Platforms

Chapter two examines care work and intimacy between transnational family members shaped by the advancement in communication technologies, specifically, Skype and Facebook. New care providers, patterns of care work and forms of care emerge through these particular technological platforms. Although, technology brings new possibilities of supporting relationships over long distances, it also sometimes hinders relationships through its “all seeing eye” character. Transnational family members are impressive in their ability to stay connected through technology and yet, these strategies are only possible in fact because they are necessary in a world where families are forced to be separated to sustain their livelihoods. The chapter examines multidirectional care through technology’s role in transforming the relationships in transnational families and, importantly, assessing that possibilities and challenges of this development of care under the neoliberal condition they are transformed.

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Multidirectional Care in Transnational Families

The Labor of Care ◽

10.5622/illinois/9780252041723.003.0002 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Valerie Francisco-Menchavez

Keyword(s):

The Philippines ◽

Care Work ◽

Gender Ideologies ◽

Unit Of Analysis ◽

Transnational Family ◽

Fictive Kin ◽

Migrant Family ◽

Social Reproductive Labor ◽

Political Economic

Adjusting to long-standing political economic conditions and the culture of migration in the Philippines, Filipino kin view their role of caring for their families in the Philippines as a form of care for a migrant family member, even though the migrant is not the direct receiver of care. To this end, the stories in chapter one follows the transnational care work within family kin networks to establish just how they reconfigure and make meaning of social reproductive labor in and from different places in a transnational arrangement. The unit of analysis in this chapter is the Filipino transnational family; following care work and its different permutations from the migrant abroad and from families in the Philippines. Further, the roles that extended and fictive kin play in the transnational family emerge as key contribution in shifting gender ideologies in care work.

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Introduction

The Labor of Care ◽

10.5622/illinois/9780252041723.003.0001 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Valerie Francisco-Menchavez

Keyword(s):

Social Reproduction ◽

Care Work ◽

Transnational Families ◽

Care Providers ◽

Left Behind ◽

Transnational Family ◽

The Family ◽

School Graduation ◽

Gendered Ideologies ◽

Main Intervention

The introduction chapter lays out the book’s main intervention, “multidirectional care” to examine how transnational family members from different places in the diaspora exchange care work in many different forms. Although the care work from transnational families are not similar in form (monetary remittances versus high school graduation) they generate labor nonetheless. The incommensurability of the currencies and capital of care work in transnational families is the inquiry of this work because these labors are often circulating on various political, financial and affective economies, yet some of them are valued less, or worse, invisible. By framing the laboring lives of Filipina migrants and their transnational families through the theory of social reproduction, the circulation of care work transnationally, reconceptualization of alternative care providers left behind and shifting gendered ideologies makes the unseen work of reproducing the family, particularly in a transnational arrangement, visible.

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The Labor of Care

10.5622/illinois/9780252041723.001.0001 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Valerie Francisco-Menchavez

Keyword(s):

Extended Family ◽

Forced Migration ◽

The Philippines ◽

Care Work ◽

Left Behind ◽

Technological Advances ◽

Transnational Family ◽

Fictive Kin ◽

Social Reproductive Labor ◽

And Function

Anchored in the experiences and lives of Filipina migrants and their families in the Philippines, the main objective of this book is to make visible all of the forms, roles and definitions of social reproductive labor and care work required in the maintenance of the transnational family; demonstrating just how many people are uniquely affected by migration and separation. A second aim is to critically explore current neoliberal moment under which families are forcibly separated and the reconfiguration of the functions, operations and definitions of family in and through the very neoliberal mechanisms that disperse them around the globe--labor migration and technology. Although a significant literature on transnational families exists, this book brings the scholarship up to date on the technological advances that enables intimacy for transnational family members. Additionally, the sociological analysis in this book delves into the emotionality that comes with care work in migration and separation. The transnational Filipino family, as the unit of analysis, shows that care work is shared between migrant and the family they left behind, albeit unevenly. Further, it considers the shifts in gendered work and expectations (for men and women) and it includes fictive kin and extended family to redefine the membership and function of a socially relative dynamic of “family”. Broadly, this book is about the labor of care engaged by families who are enduring and thriving in conditions of forced migration and separation.

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