Transnational Labour Migration and the Renegotiation of Masculinity by Left-Behind Men in Kerala

Abstract

This article explores an understudied aspect of women’s transnational labour migration, namely how left-behind men negotiate the changes in their status in the domestic and public spheres when their daughters or wives migrate for work and become primary earners in the family. A case study of Syrian Christians in a village in Central Kerala with a long history of women’s transnational labour migration demonstrates how left-behind men refashion their masculine identities by reasserting their role as family protectors when they lose their traditional role as family providers. The article illustrates how left-behind men employ diverse social and discursive practices in domestic and community spheres to reconstruct their gendered sense of self and resist the social stigma of failed masculinity. It also demonstrates how the Church, which continues to be a dominant institution influencing the personal and political lives of Syrian Christians, has become an arena for left-behind men to reassert their patriarchal status at home and in the community.