Published In

Asian Migrants Body Emotion Gender and Sexuality

Document Type

Post-Print

Publication Date

1-1-2025

Subjects

Buddhist communities -- Sri Lanka

Abstract

Physical and symbolic aspects of bodies limit the migration trajectories of female domestic workers from a Buddhist community in coastal Sri Lanka. Government regulations and family decisions regarding women’s overseas labour draw upon and in turn influence discourses about gender, sexuality, age, health, and class. This ethnographic analysis illustrates that local norms task women with nurturing the brains of babies, preserving the chastity of teenage daughters, caring for frail elders, and preventing their working-class husbands from overindulging in liquor or having sex with other women. Successful social reproduction depends on the proper conjunctions of bodies in the extended family. Corporeal and symbolic dangers imagined to arise from women’s absence fuel a national-level moral panic about female migration.

Description

This is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published as: In The Asian Migrant’s Body (pp. 135–160). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.5117/9789462988668_ch06

DOI

10.5117/9789462988668_CH06

Persistent Identifier

https://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/44389

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