Life on the Edge: Balancing Gendered and Occupational Identities among Unauthorized Mexican Migrant Roofers

Chávez, Sergio Jorge; Edelblute, Heather; Korver‐Glenn, Elizabeth

doi:10.1007/s11133-016-9326-7

Cited by 8 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 44 publications

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“…The majority of spouses were employed as roofers in the USA, a dangerous occupation where men experienced catastrophic or fatal injuries (Chávez, et al, 2016). Migrant roofers also form part of a mobile labor force that requires extensive travel across state boundaries and living in crowded conditions with male co-workers in motels, trailers, etc.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Migrant roofers also form part of a mobile labor force that requires extensive travel across state boundaries and living in crowded conditions with male co-workers in motels, trailers, etc. As such, they live for extended periods of time away from their families and seldom have time to form ties in the US, except with their co-workers who can come to be seen as family (Chávez, Edelblute, & Korver-Glenn, 2016). Sera (age 41) said her husband “had no set place [in the U.S.]” because his income depended on chasing disaster work which made it difficult for him to have stability.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Emotion Work and Gender Inequality in Transnational Family Life

Chávez

Paige

Edelblute

2021

Journal of Family Issues

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This study examines the emotion work of non-migrant women as they seek to sustain family life across borders. We draw on in-depth interviews with 59 non-migrant women in Guanajuato, Mexico who had immigrant spouses in the USA to assess emotion work dynamics between partners. Our analysis reveals that non-migrant women do emotion work that entails imagining lives abroad and then tailoring emotional support that addresses the needs of spouses. We also discuss how the difficulties associated with prolonged separation leads women to suppress their own needs and feelings, which can lead to emotional burnout and marital conflict. Putting non-migrant women and their activities at the center of our analysis highlights the emotional costs of migration for those who remain behind and the ways in which emotion work is a highly gendered activity that reinforces inequality through communication. We highlight how women’s subordinated status in transnational Mexican families and the need to keep the remittances flowing help explain why emotion work falls largely on women.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Emotion Work and Gender Inequality in Transnational Family Life

Chávez

Paige

Edelblute

2021

Journal of Family Issues

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“…Baugher (2015) Why do male migrants return home to Mexico? Chávez et al (2016) Why do teachers with particular types of human capital decide to stay in urban teaching, while others decide to leave? Nelson (2017) Why do people maintain personal spiritual practices despite regular feelings of shortcoming, anxiety over their performance and progress, and an inability to clearly identify tangible benefits?…”

Section: Research Question Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Why do teachers promote color-blind ideologies (Teeger 2015)? What motivates migrants to return home to Mexico (Chávez, Edelblute, and Korver-Glenn 2016)? Table 1 presents all papers we identified, along with the questions they asked.…”

Section: Motivated Actionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Using Interviews to Understand Why: Challenges and Strategies in the Study of Motivated Action

Small

Cook

2021

Sociological Methods & Research

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This article examines an important and thorny problem in interview research: How to assess whether what people say motivated their actions actually did so? We ask three questions: What specific challenges are at play? How have researchers addressed them? And how should those strategies be evaluated? We argue that such research faces at least five challenges— deception, recall error, reasonableness bias, intentionality bias, and single-motive bias—that more than a dozen strategies have been deployed to address them; that the strategies have been external, internal, or interactional in nature; and that each class of strategies demands distinct evaluation criteria. Researchers will likely fail to uncover motivation if they ignore the possibility of each challenge, conflate one challenge with another, or deploy strategies unmatched to the challenge at hand. Our work helps systematize the evaluation of interview-based studies of motivated action and strengthen the scientific foundations of in-depth interview research.

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“…Montes (2013) suggested that these fathers' reflections and emotional displays run counter to some of the negative traits often associated with migrant fathers from the Global South, including aggressiveness and a lack of nurturing, and reflect performances of more varied and even positive masculinities. Similarly, Schmalzbauer (2015) and Chávez, Edelblute, and Korver-Glenn (2016) examined various dimensions of fathering among Mexican transnational fathers in the United States, including their emotional struggles as they worked to balance their family ties and obligations with experiences as exploited workers.…”

Section: Enhancing Depictions Of Latino and Mayan Men Through A Posit...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Fathering Within Transnational and Mixed-Status Mayan Families: An Exploratory Study

Hershberg

Lykes

2019

International Perspectives in Psychology

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This study explores fathering within a small sample of Mayan transnational and mixed-status families divided between the Northeastern United States and the Quiché region of Guatemala. A positive masculinities framework informs this theoretical thematic analysis of semistructured interviews with 7 migrant fathers and 2 sons-as-fathers who were caring for younger siblings in Guatemala. Analyses sought to illuminate how the performances of fathering in the context of migration depart from and sometimes challenge hegemonic conceptions of masculinities evident in much of the migration scholarship. In total, 5 themes capturing varying performances of fathering were identified: (a) staying-at-home, (b) emotionally expressing cross-border relationality, (c) communicating within the family about return and consejos (conventional wisdom), (d) sons-as-fathers caring for family members here and there, and (e) maintaining the household intergenerationally. We discuss how the transnationalizing of these Mayan families has contributed to more diverse gendered roles and relationships, with a focus on some of the potential positive influences of this process on family relationships. Implications for future research about the various ways in which fathers and sons contribute to their transnational families, especially in difficult sociopolitical contexts, are discussed.

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Life on the Edge: Balancing Gendered and Occupational Identities among Unauthorized Mexican Migrant Roofers

Cited by 8 publications

References 44 publications

Emotion Work and Gender Inequality in Transnational Family Life

Emotion Work and Gender Inequality in Transnational Family Life

Using Interviews to Understand Why: Challenges and Strategies in the Study of Motivated Action

Fathering Within Transnational and Mixed-Status Mayan Families: An Exploratory Study

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