Shifting duties: becoming ‘good daughters’ through elder care practices in transnational families from Kerala, India

Abstract

This article investigates the influence of international migration on the filial norms of elder care in transnational families of Syrian Christian nurses from Kerala, South India. We suggest that exploring transnational elder care practices brings to light complex changes in gender dynamics within kin relations. Using the material semiotic approach, we analyze care in terms of everyday practices in which not just people, but also technologies are involved as active participants. We argue that as they are tied to international migration, money and information and communication technologies (ICTs) co-shape new norms of filial care by transforming the normative expectations of ‘good daughters’. This article reveals how among Keralite transnational nurse families, ‘good daughters’ may increase their bargaining power with their in-laws, specifically in relation to caring for their own parents, and how this may also influence the position of men as husbands and sons-in-law.

Keywords:

• Care
• gender
• ICTs
• India
• migration
• remittances

Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful to Jeannette Pols, Kristine Krause, Annemarie Mol, Sherria Ayuandini, Annekatrin Skeide, Shahana Siddiqui, and Christien Muusse for their comments on earlier drafts. Thanks also to Kanchana N. Ruwanpura and the three anonymous reviewers whose suggestions helped to improve this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Funding

European Commission’ into ‘Erasmus Mundus Joint Doctorate Fellowship, European Commission, Specific Grant Agreement 2013-1479.

Notes on contributors

Tanja Ahlin

Tanja Ahlin is a doctoral candidate at UvA, working across medical anthropology and science and technology studies. She has conducted research on care, aging and technology in India and elsewhere, and has published in several journals, including Medical Anthropology Quarterly and Medical Anthropology, as well as in The Routledge Handbook of Medical Anthropology (London: Routledge). Social media: @TanjaAhlin (twitter). Website: www.tanjaahlin.com

Kasturi Sen

Dr Kasturi Sen is a social scientist based at Wolfson College (CR), who works on global health and health policies with particular emphasis on India and selected regions of the Middle East. She helped establish the first interdisciplinary network on ageing in India in 1993. She has published widely on health policies, health financing and ageing, and held advisory positions with the WHO, the EU and UNDESA for over two decades. Her book Ageing: Debates on Demographic Transition and Social Policy was published in 1995 (Zed Books).