ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on why Filipino women are more likely to view dating a foreign man as an eventual migration strategy instead of as a supplemental income–generating activity. It examines and compares the trajectory to marriage of six couples in depth in order to unpack how men's age and financial security shape the migration and marital citizenship experiences of women. The chapter argues that women's desires for marriage migration depend upon the national and political context of the country. It defines hypergamy and marrying up for the female participants as marrying an American man who provides them with a financially stable lifestyle that does not require them to earn additional income to help support the household. The chapter adopts a transnational feminist theoretical lens in order to examine the ways in which the marriage migration and romance tourism industry operates within a framework of larger global neo-imperial histories, situated within specific geographies.
