The focus of this study is female migrants who moved from Zimbabwe to South Africa in the 1990s. The main purpose of the study is to explore the reasons for this move and the consequences of their migration. More specifically, the study has three objectives. The first objective is to examine the reasons why many women migrated from Zimbabwe to South Africa in the 1990s. The second objective is to establish ways in which the migration of Zimbabwean women has changed their lives. The third objective is to consider the impact that their migration has had on their families in Zimbabwe. Although rooted in the demographic tradition, this study uses qualitative methodology. A semi-structured in-depth method was used to interview twenty-one Black Zimbabwean women found in the Lindela repatriation camp and in the Limpopo province. The findings revealed that the economic and socio-political situation in Zimbabwe compelled women to use migration as a strategy to sustain their families. Some of the participants were actively engaged in the trading of knitted work, woodwork and other commodities in South Africa. Others were found in different occupations such as street vending, domestic services and other menial jobs. In their migration to South Africa, the Zimbabwean women redefined the stereotypes of women as inert, passive and dependent and showed the self-reliance, resourcefulness and assertiveness of women who opted to migrate. While education was perceived to be expensive, participants needed finances to educate their children. In addressing the conditions under which migration occurred, the findings showed that some participants moved on their own, and others moved as part of the family. Finally, participants had gained control over their economic, social and familial lives though they remained within the boundaries of their normative roles. / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2005. / Sociology / Unrestricted

This paper aims to investigate the relationship between remittance flows and the gender and skill characteristics of the migrants. By using annual data on bilateral migration and bilateral remittances between 20 OECD sending countries and 22 receiving countries from Europe and Central Asia over the period 2010-2012, a gravity model, incorporating the share of female- and the share of skilled migrants, is estimated. The model is extended by including a number of macroeconomic determinants of remittances. The main results show that remittances per capita decline with both share of female migrants and the share of the skilled migrants, and this relationship is more evident for receiving countries with relatively higher income levels. Skilled women are also found to remit smaller amounts of money relative to the unskilled ones. Thus, the study contradicts the widespread claim that females are more reliable remitters and that the negative effect of brain drain from developing countries could be mitigated by larger volumes of remittances sent by skilled migrants relative to unskilled ones. Furthermore, most of the macro variables are found to be significant and remittances show to be more responsive to the economic conditions in the source rather than in the recipient countries. The evidence on the motives to remit is rather mixed.

This thesis is an ethnographic study of the life of female migrants in Cape Town. The thesis is based on material gathered through informal conversations, semi-structured interviews and participant observation conducted among female migrants in Cape Town. South Africa is today the strongest economy in the Southern African region which attracts people from other poorer African countries. They migrate to South Africa for a chance to a better life or an opportunity to support themselves and their families. However, South Africa´s restrictive immigration policies make it difficult for many migrants to obtain the right documents and be able to ‘legally’ cross the South African border. Even if migrants get an asylum-seekers permit they are not allowed to legally work in the country. They are included and excluded at the same time. The constant ‘criminalization’ of migrants´ acts makes it hard for migrants to access any human rights and protection in general, which makes them more vulnerable to exploitation. More and more women are crossing the borders to South Africa to get work and physical security as a part of the global ‘feminization’ of migration. Women´s movement therefore questions the picture of the man as the sole breadwinner. Even though this is the reality women are excluded from the discourse about migration and existing immigration policies in South Africa. Female migrants are not acknowledged as important actors and are even more vulnerable in the forced and marginalized position of ‘illegality’, then male migrants. This study explores the female migrants´ own experiences of struggles like getting documented, work, secure housing and being exposed to xenophobia. The women have also developed different strategies to handle these difficulties. This thesis criticizes the ‘victimization’ of female migrants, which ascribes them with powerlessness and being without agency, and shows that they are active in seeking solutions and creating strategies to increase their scope of action.

This    qualitative research investigates the social positions of Peruvian female migrants in the Catalan labour market in Spain. It questions how social categories interactin order to determine the social positions of individuals, a nd how the positions can be related to a global  world structure.   Four unstructured life story interviews with  Peruvian women resident in  Catalonia were realized in December 2014. The interviews and two previously made studies have then been reviewed by a narrative analysis. The research formed a theoretical framework of intersectionality interpreted by Nina Yuval-Davis, and a globalization and female migration theory by Saskia Sassen.  The analysis with the  implementation of theories showed that nationality has a particularly strong influence in the intersection of social categories, though one must understand how all the identifications lay imbedded in each other in order to determine the social position of each individual. It was  also concluded that an intersection of the identifications of the individuals interacts with global structures in order to determine the  social positions of the study participants in the Catalan labour market.The city of Barcelona  could through the lives of the four Peruvian females be seen as an economic centre that demands cheap labour by migrants, and where the social positions in the labour market can show a division of core and peripheral countries.

Women worldwide carry out strategies to support themselves and their families that rely on connecting to physical resources, especially food, and to important social ties. This dissertation provides a nuanced understanding of the spatial implications of this connectivity as made visible through mobility and social networks in two cities. Everyday experiences of food security can be bolstered by access to greater mobility (e.g., access to a taxi/bus to go to the central market), which can be provided through social networks (e.g., sharing a ride with a family member or neighbor). At the same time, a lack of mobility may inhibit a person’s access to food (e.g., an inability to move beyond one’s neighborhood due to risk of violence), and is especially true when this need for mobility interferes with other social network obligations (e.g., needing to care for children). This mixed-methods research uses sketch mapping during in-depth interviews with 72 migrant women coping with food insecurity in Medellín, Colombia, and Washington, DC, USA. Based on this data, I use relational poverty’s emphasis on social relations to explain that food insecurity results from global political economic systems, especially a capitalist, corporate food regime (chapter 3). However, in moving beyond structural explanations, this dissertation also illustrates everyday survival strategies – such as relying on informal social networks – that act as resistance to these processes (chapter 4), are both social and mobile – for example, traveling with members of social networks to access emergency food providers (chapter 5), and are impacted locally by urban planning policies reflecting global norms (chapter 6). In doing so, this dissertation argues that food insecure individuals are powerful agents carrying out creative coping strategies that are constrained by political economic structures. Building on theoretical foundations from critical food studies, urban geography and feminist geography, this research contributes to these literatures through theorizing structure and agency dynamics evident in food insecurity, particularly from the perspective of those coping with food insecurity. It is important to attend to their complex, lived experience in order to better understand if strategies for alleviating food insecurity are appropriate. Additionally, focusing on different contexts of food insecurity allows illustrating how cities are similarly and differently integrated into globalized processes influencing experiences of poverty and governance in both the global north and south. It also contributes a more nuanced understanding of the food insecurity experiences of low-income women migrating into urban environments, enabling more effective scholarship as well as improved policy making and service provision by governments, relief agencies, and community organizations. For example, this dissertation provides critiques of policy approaches that singularly focus on increasing opportunities for consumption (chapters 3 and 5) and nutrition education programs emphasizing the ‘right’ kinds of consumption (chapters 4 and 5). These policy approaches ignore the structural causes of food insecurity (chapter 3) and the nutritional knowledge of food insecure migrants (chapter 4). Instead, I argue for policies and programs to be created with a better understanding of the lived experience of those they seek to support. This includes valuing their critiques of political economic systems (chapter 4), supporting their non-economic survival strategies – such as exchange in informal networks (chapters 4 and 5) and growing food (chapter 6), and increasing flexibility to accommodate ‘non-traditional’ mobility and (informal) work situations. / Geography

Key Words: migration, gender, transnational motherhood, care work, reproductive remmitences, Ukrainian female migrants in the Czech Republic Abstract: The aim of my dissertation is to analyze how gender operates in transnational spaces, and what impacts it has on the experience of motherhood and the formation of new gender identities. I will try to describe how transnational Ukrainian mothers narratively construct and emphasise their experiences with transnational motherhood. I will also focus my attention on the social practices of transnational motherhood and social conditions of female care migration in the Czech Republic.

Thesis ( M.A.( Social Work)) -- University of Limpopo, 2021 / This study presents qualitative findings on lived experiences of migrant female youth in Musina, Limpopo Province, South Africa. Studies reveal that young females, more especially those from the African continent, migrate to foreign countries in large numbers for better livelihoods. A growing number of women, African women in particular, migrate more than ever to meet their own or their families’ economic needs. Some, of course, flee from wars and mostly migrate for better living conditions. Several studies show that many of these women migrate to South Africa. This is because South Africa is amongst the continent’s most popular destinations for Africa’s female migrants. Upon their arrival in South Africa, studies reveal that migrant female youth are faced with a vast number of challenges such as poverty and exclusion from accessing basic services. It is from this background that this study sought to explore lived experiences of migrant female youth in Musina. Nine female migrant youth accommodated by a church shelter in Musina were purposively and conveniently selected to participate in the study. Semi-structured face to face interviews were used to purposefully collect data that saturated at participant number 9. Thematic data analysis was used with the assistance of the Nvivo software to manage and organise data. The narrative theory was used in the study as it allowed the researcher insight and understanding when migrant female youth narrated their experiences and challenges they encounter as migrants in a foreign country. Findings reveal that many female migrant youths illegally migrate to South Africa in search of better livelihoods that are unavailable in their countries of origin. Furthermore, findings indicated that migrant female youth find themselves living in extreme poverty in the host country. However, the female youth employ various coping strategies for their sustainable livelihoods. They also experience exclusion from accessing healthcare services and face blatant xenophobia in the hands of local South Africans. It can therefore be concluded that migrant female youth face a number of challenges in their everyday lives as migrants in South Africa. It could also be helpful to integrate South Africa’s basic service delivery to include services for female migrant youth. / National Research Foundation (NRF)

Key Words: migration, gender, transnational motherhood, care work, reproductive remmitences, Ukrainian female migrants in the Czech Republic Abstract: The aim of my dissertation is to analyze how gender operates in transnational spaces, and what impacts it has on the experience of motherhood and the formation of new gender identities. I will try to describe how transnational Ukrainian mothers narratively construct and emphasise their experiences with transnational motherhood. I will also focus my attention on the social practices of transnational motherhood and social conditions of female care migration in the Czech Republic.

Foreign-born women who migrate to a partner implies a particular vulnerability towards intimate partner violence. This is due to reasons including migration law related dependency. Little research has been made on intimate partner violence amongst this specific migrant group. This scoping review aims to investigate experiences of intimate partner violence amongst women who, as a result of their migration status, stand in a dependent position in relation to their partner. Searches were made in two databases. The initial searches resulted in 625 articles, these were all reviewed by their titles. 213 articles were reviewed by abstracts and 27 were reviewed by full text. Three articles were conducted by examining references of the articles. This resulted in 17 articles being included in this scoping review. Key findings include the women's double exposure in relation to: physical abuse, their financial situation, mental abuse, social isolation, latent abuse and exploitation. Findings also include consequences of the violence: Emotional consequences and coping. To avoid generalization and instead focus on the diversity of migration experiences this study presents an intersectional perspective on migrant women's experiences of intimate partner violence. This study analyzes how multiple factors of disadvantage including gender, class, ethnicity and migration status all intersect and create a complex and unique exposure when it comes to intimate partner violence.

This thesis deals with the topic of work-life balance in narrations of Ukrainian female migrants in the Czech Republic. Female migrants are in a difficult situation while managing these two spheres of their lives, because they are situated in an unknown milieu and lack family environment and social ties. Based on fourteen in-depth interviews I analyze how these women deal with this situation and how they feel about it. The research shows that the women's work trajectories develop in accordance with their reasons to migrate and their family situation. The family situation especially their motherhood seems to be crucial in choosing the work-life balance strategies. Thus, in my analysis I show how these strategies differs among women who brought their children with them to the Czech republic, those who brought them later, those who left them at Ukraine and those who gave birth to their first children in the Czech Republic. The main attention is paid to female migrants whose children joint them later as they go through the most distinct changes in managing their work-life balance. In my analysis I identified some problems which Ukrainian migrants have to face considering reconciliation of their work and personal life. The most crucial one is the absence of the extended family and its help with...