Autor/es
Descripción
ver mas
Colaborador
Pizarro, Cynthia
Materias
Spatial Coverage
Temporal Coverage
2015-2017
Idioma
spa
Extent
264 p.
Derechos
info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
Atribución-NoComercial-SinDerivadas 2.0 Genérica (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
Formato
application/pdf
Identificador
Cobertura
1001514
Salta (province)
2015-2017
Abstract
This doctoral thesis focuses on the migration of Bolivian people to Apolinario Saravia, a Municipality in Salta Province. From the 1960s until the end of the 1980s, Bolivian people from Camargo (Chuquisaca department) arrived to this region to join as workers in the production of tobacco. Towards the end of the eighties, the reception of Bolivian people ended because of the national crisis of the tobacco production. Then, a reconversion to the cultivation of different vegetables started and, concomitantly, a new stage of the migration process began; but, in this case, Bolivians from the rural areas of Tarija. This moment (the end of the eighties) is chosen as the starting point of this thesis.
Particularly, we were interested in the ways in which the migratory trajectories of the tarijeños and tarijeñas related to the agricultural labor market configure as well as become the result of the gender system of the society of origin and destination. To this purpose, the methodological strategy was qualitative based on the ethnographic approach. The data collection techniques were in-depth interviews andparticipant observation. Additionally, to reconstruct the migratory trajectories, biography was used as a methodological resource.
We pointed out that the Bolivian migrants built their migratory projects in terms of a historical strategy of reproduction of the farmers' household units. On the one hand, in the case of the migratory trajectories of men which started before the Law of Migrations 25871, enacted in 2004, their migratory projects were articulated to the commandments of masculinity posed by the gender system. Such commandments establish that when a men “becomes young”, approximately around fourteen years old, his moment in the life cycle changes and he has to “go fetch”, to migrate in order to work and earn his living. Some of these men mentioned different experiences of physical violence exerted by the State while crossing the border area, accounts that denote a demonstration of manliness because they were capable of migrate even in those conditions. On the other hand, women that initiated their migratory trajectories before 2004 have not described any similar experience. We consider that these situations either have not been experienced by these women or they were not recounted, precisely because it is not conceived as an appropriate situation to be experienced by a woman.
To come back to the men, the migratory projects were carried out by means of family-based masculine chains and masculine networks that connected previous migrants who became patrones (owners of the farms) to these new migrants that went to work to the farms of the former ones. These networks articulated subjects that were part of unequal power relations and promoted the ethnical segmentation in the agricultural labor market. Although some of the analyzed cases achieved an improvement in their labor positions, the socioeconomic upward mobility has not constituted a generalized situation. Moreover, the living and working conditions of all the migrants that participated in the agricultural labor market over the period under study can be described as hard, difficult, precarious and informal and, correspondingly, the possibilities of upward mobility were limited.
After some years of going from the northwest of Argentina to their places of origin and coming back from there, some of these men undertook a new migratory project with their couples, mostly of them belonging to the same place of origin, characterized by a definitive nature. In consequence, new household units were formed in the place of destination in which the division of tasks implied that men were, mainly, in the labor field and separated from household chores. Likewise these men reproduced their role of patriarch in the society of destination, holding the authority in the new household unit. In this respect, we have indicated that there was no contradiction between this male role and the gender system of the place of destination. While analyzing the projects of the sons of some of these migrants, we have noticed breaks and continuities regarding the gender commandments of their fathers.
Many of the women that started their migratory trajectories before 2004 “have followed” the men mentioned above. Women negotiated their migratory projects with the men belonging to their household units (fathers or elder brothers) who had the power to give or deny the permission to migrate. In general terms, these women question the diagnosis concerning the qualitative feminization of migratory flows. The main reason for them to migrate was the possibility of being mothers and wives within their own household units. We have also pointed out that the new household units reproduced the patriarchal system showed, in some cases, by acts of physical and psychological violence against women.
Finally, we have analyzed a series of men and women migratory trajectories that started after 2004, a moment in which the border area ceased to appear as “dangerous”. The contexts of origin as well as the ways of migration according to the gender system were not substantially altered with respect to the migrants of the previous stage. The main difference can be identified in relation to the moment of the life cycle in which these new migrants are that coincides with women entirely dedicated to a naturalized role of caregivers. However, other migratory and labor options appear in this period and drive the new generations away from migrating to join the agricultural labor in Argentina.
Particularly, we were interested in the ways in which the migratory trajectories of the tarijeños and tarijeñas related to the agricultural labor market configure as well as become the result of the gender system of the society of origin and destination. To this purpose, the methodological strategy was qualitative based on the ethnographic approach. The data collection techniques were in-depth interviews andparticipant observation. Additionally, to reconstruct the migratory trajectories, biography was used as a methodological resource.
We pointed out that the Bolivian migrants built their migratory projects in terms of a historical strategy of reproduction of the farmers' household units. On the one hand, in the case of the migratory trajectories of men which started before the Law of Migrations 25871, enacted in 2004, their migratory projects were articulated to the commandments of masculinity posed by the gender system. Such commandments establish that when a men “becomes young”, approximately around fourteen years old, his moment in the life cycle changes and he has to “go fetch”, to migrate in order to work and earn his living. Some of these men mentioned different experiences of physical violence exerted by the State while crossing the border area, accounts that denote a demonstration of manliness because they were capable of migrate even in those conditions. On the other hand, women that initiated their migratory trajectories before 2004 have not described any similar experience. We consider that these situations either have not been experienced by these women or they were not recounted, precisely because it is not conceived as an appropriate situation to be experienced by a woman.
To come back to the men, the migratory projects were carried out by means of family-based masculine chains and masculine networks that connected previous migrants who became patrones (owners of the farms) to these new migrants that went to work to the farms of the former ones. These networks articulated subjects that were part of unequal power relations and promoted the ethnical segmentation in the agricultural labor market. Although some of the analyzed cases achieved an improvement in their labor positions, the socioeconomic upward mobility has not constituted a generalized situation. Moreover, the living and working conditions of all the migrants that participated in the agricultural labor market over the period under study can be described as hard, difficult, precarious and informal and, correspondingly, the possibilities of upward mobility were limited.
After some years of going from the northwest of Argentina to their places of origin and coming back from there, some of these men undertook a new migratory project with their couples, mostly of them belonging to the same place of origin, characterized by a definitive nature. In consequence, new household units were formed in the place of destination in which the division of tasks implied that men were, mainly, in the labor field and separated from household chores. Likewise these men reproduced their role of patriarch in the society of destination, holding the authority in the new household unit. In this respect, we have indicated that there was no contradiction between this male role and the gender system of the place of destination. While analyzing the projects of the sons of some of these migrants, we have noticed breaks and continuities regarding the gender commandments of their fathers.
Many of the women that started their migratory trajectories before 2004 “have followed” the men mentioned above. Women negotiated their migratory projects with the men belonging to their household units (fathers or elder brothers) who had the power to give or deny the permission to migrate. In general terms, these women question the diagnosis concerning the qualitative feminization of migratory flows. The main reason for them to migrate was the possibility of being mothers and wives within their own household units. We have also pointed out that the new household units reproduced the patriarchal system showed, in some cases, by acts of physical and psychological violence against women.
Finally, we have analyzed a series of men and women migratory trajectories that started after 2004, a moment in which the border area ceased to appear as “dangerous”. The contexts of origin as well as the ways of migration according to the gender system were not substantially altered with respect to the migrants of the previous stage. The main difference can be identified in relation to the moment of the life cycle in which these new migrants are that coincides with women entirely dedicated to a naturalized role of caregivers. However, other migratory and labor options appear in this period and drive the new generations away from migrating to join the agricultural labor in Argentina.
Título obtenido
Doctora de la Universidad de Buenos Aires en Ciencias Sociales
Institución otorgante
Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Sociales