ABSTRACT
The work patterns and the labour market positions of migrant/settler women have already been the subject of discussion. This paper addresses, more specifically, the impact of wages on the domestic domain.2 While I am not arguing the simple thesis that wage labour equals liberation, because it is clear that the patriarchal relations of the household and the wider socioeconomic structures remain powerful, I am arguing in the discussion that follows that women’s increased ability to develop more self-defined roles has been aided by their increased access to cash, which has allowed them to invest and consume in their own interests and for their own benefit. This is contrary to the emphasis in the existing literature on the lack of women’s control over productive resources (Sharma 1980, 1984; Brown et al. 1981), even when they themselves have generated them (Standing 1985). The reasons cited for this include the power of the patriarchy and the all-dominant men who are portrayed as definers of the very parameters of women’s existence (Brown et al. 1981) and as controllers of their property and the conditions of their lives. In such a picture, Asian women appear as passive victims unable to make any significant dents in these features of their societies, which are presented as static, oppressive, non-negotiable entities free of women’s input.
