1. Remittances in
Transnational Family
Consumption: Compromises
Here, There, and Beyond
Lisa Peñaloza, EDHEC Business School, France
Judith Cavazos-Arroyo, UPAEP, Mexico
presented to Monterrey Tech, Queretaro, Oct. 26, 2010
2.
3. Remittances
Remittances sent by a migrant worker in the
U.S. support 1/5 families living in Mexico (Suro
2003). Decreases with global recession (BBC News
2009)
In many nations remittances 3X nation-to-nation
foreign aid (Lapper 2007)
Much of the work on remittances focuses on
labor (Goldring 2002), and yet consumption is a
vital part of migration phenomena (Üçok 2007;
Visconti 2006; Askegaard et al. 2005; Peñaloza 1994)
4.
5. Family
Meanings of family render migration
intelligible, even as remittances destabilize
families (Nolin 2006; Smith and Guarnizo
2005; Foner 2005; Schmalzbauer 2005)
Fundamental to our conceptualization of
remittances in family life consumption are
the compromisos, commitments (SP) and
tradeoffs (Eng) in what family members
consider meaningful and valuable.
7. Transnational Consumption
consumer acculturation – adaptation (Peñaloza
1994) identity (Visconti 2006; Askegaard et al. 2005)
transnational context ~ global acculturation
“agent,” (Askegaard et al. 2005; Kjeldgaard and
Askegaard 2006)
la region mas transparente (Fuentes 1958)
infused by gringolandia (Gomez-Peña 1993)
micro transcultural meaning-value calculus
market incorporation (Peñaloza and Gilly 1999)! the
liberal consuming subject who is a worker/
consumer (Bradshaw 2010; Bailey 2010; Peñaloza and
Barnhart) situated w/in the Mexican family
8.
9. Research Design
Fieldwork in Mexico, 2007 & 2010
Depth interviews
2007 Ten recipients in six families.
2010 Spring - Five recipients and three
returnees in three families.
2010 Fall – Twelve follow up and Four new
interviews, total of 22 persons in 14 families
Variation in family composition, social class,
age, gender, and rural/urban residence.
10. Interview Questions
Daily life in Mexico, consumption of
particular products and services, family
activities and relations.
Migrant’s work in the U.S., member
communication and travel, reception of
money and consumption objects,
budgeting, expenditures, family
“projects”
11. Analyses
Categories of consumption activities
(remittance forms and uses, means of
communication, gifts, day to day
provisioning, longer term projects),
agents and relations (esp. btw migrant
and nuclear and extended family
members).
Attention to movements of capital and
meanings within and across these
categories
12. Profile 1: wives with children
Laura López, 27 years old. Her husband left to
earn money to buy land and build a house. They
planned that he would be gone five years. To
date he has been gone two years, with one
return for eight months prior to the birth of their
third child. He supports the family sending $250-
$270 per month. She and the children live in a
two bedroom block house, painted white,
without plumbing. So far they have added a
room, with wood paneling she notes proudly.
13. Profile 2: mothers of adult children
Fabiola Garcia 57 years old, works as a maid
and lives alone in the city. She supplements her
$20 monthly income with the $60-70
remittances her sons send irregularly; the main
recipients are their wives and children.
“They (her two sons) left (to the U.S.) because
they wanted to do what they could to get
ahead, to buy land and (build) a house…Here
(what they earned in Mexico) was not enough
to get ahead and hardly enough to buy food. In
the U.S... There are days they work and other
days they do not, and they really suffer a lot to
achieve what they want.”
14. Profile 3: siblings
38 year old Tania Álvarez receives $350
monthly.
“If they (her brother and sister) are not
going to be here to take care of them (her
parents), then at least they should send
money for their care.
15. Profile 4 - Majordomos
Organized at the level of community
Anchored in the Catholic Church
Sponsor the fiestas de los Pueblos
A postmodern potlache redistributing
wealth, ameliorating envy
Consumption-based
Comida
Decorations
Music
16. Rebecca Salas, “all those Telephonos
days that he calls. He Publicos
calls two times a day to
know how the boy is
and later he calls in the
night to tell me how
things went at work. We
don’t always talk,
sometimes he just dials
and lets it ring twice and
hangs up. I know it’s
him. It’s the way I can
relax and be calm and
sleep.
17. Consumption compromises as
Interpellations of social-market life in
the family left behind in Mexico
Track transpositions of money and things,
efforts, materials, emotions, and meanings
over short & long term
consumption “work” in transn’l family
obligations – sacrifice – adventure
separation – reunification - intimacy
sustenance - wealth building
logics/significance in practice
18.
19. Temporal/Spatialities
remittance conversions over time
alongside, replacing tandas, prestadas
short provisioning, midterm furnishing
home/life enhancements, long term
land, houses, businesses
with “interruptions” of couple,
children, health-home-business
emergencies
20.
21. “At first they (her two brothers) brought electric
appliances, televisions or tape recorders and
clothes. The first color television (we had) was
because one of them brought it. Same with the
recorder. At that time there was much emotion
because they were going to bring clothing or we
would get a television or air conditioner or a
music recorder...Now it’s not like that...Now they
come and give money. At times they bring my
dad a coat. A lot of the things they bring now we
don’t need. They bring things for their houses,
and here the only thing they buy is food (to take
back).
22. Migration a consumption-based,
culturally sanctioned, family rite
Most informants acknowledged that the
money family members send from the
U.S. has helped them have a better life,
and actively encourage and support
migration.
improved meals, enhanced clothing, children’s
school, parents health, land, houses
obligations to family and to self not fully
paid by work earnings
23.
24. family obligations and altered roles
Rebecca Salas wants her husband to be in
charge lead the family
Gabriela Moreno resents that her husband
hasn’t helped raise their children, she’s
had to be both mom and dad
Gisela is more independent, finishing
training as a hairdresser, “never would
have seen myself living without a man”
25.
26. consumption compromises:
here, there and beyond
transnational family a nat’l boundary
spanning socio-econ system in which
family meanings are enabled and
tested as they are enacted and
economically valued in remittances
