CHAPTER 12 WOMEN AND GENDER IN MESOAMERICA 465The social and economic effects of migration are mixed. Although remittances
may alleviate the worst extremes of poverty, the social, emotional, and physical costs
are often great for both the migrants and their families who stay behind. Emigrants
who enter the migrant stream from throughout Mesoamerica face many dangers on
the journey across the borders into Mexico and the United States. Women risk being
raped or trafficked into prostitution by smugglers as they cross borders or try to find
jobs in cities. Although some migrants have established communities in the United
States composed of fellow villagers who have also migrated, migration tends to loosen
people’s connections to families, meaningful places, ancestral histories, and com-
munal traditions.
Once in the United States, both men and women migrants work very hard, some-
times holding two or three jobs simultaneously and living in crowded conditions.
Back home, women often work longer hours as they assume more of the responsi-
bilities of daily survival. Families are separated by migration with one or both parents
working in the United States while children are cared for by family or friends in
sending communities. Families are divided at great emotional cost. For example,
Mesoamerican domestic workers do the reproductive work of more privileged Amer-
ican women while being unable to nurture their own children (Hondagneu-Sotelo
2001). It is often difficult for migrants to return home to visit; sometimes they do not
return home for many years. In the worst case scenario for those left behind, mi-
grants establish second families abroad and stop sending remittances home.
Researchers report that both men and women migrants acknowledge that women
have become more empowered living and working in the United States because they
can earn as much money as their husbands and can contribute equally to the house-
hold economy. Women also enjoy freedom of mobility, a concomitant of employ-
ment outside the home. Although their undocumented status often prevents them
from calling the police in instances of domestic violence, the awareness of this op-
tion seems to have some restraining effect on abusive men (Hirsch 1999).
Many women whose husbands have migrated also report that they have become
empowered by transcending traditional female roles and venturing into male spheres,
for example, of planting and harvesting. Studies on migration further suggest that
the transformation of gender concepts and practices among migrants impact those
of the sending communities, as young men and women realize that there are new op-
portunities for women and different ways of organizing relationships between men
and women (Mahler 1999).
The Incorporation of the Region into the Global Economy
Many international companies have set up assembly operations (maquilas) in
Mesoamerica as part of the drive to capitalize on the abundant and inexpensive labor
supplies in Third World countries (see the discussion of maquilas in Chapter 9). Al-
though Mexican and Central American industries have traditionally employed men,
maquilas began by recruiting mainly women workers. The explanation for the dif-
ferent employment strategies is found in the prevailing gender ideology in Mesoamer-
ica: Considered the chief breadwinners, men are afforded greater opportunities for