Kurdish migrant women negotiating the complex web of gender, class, and ethnicity in the city

Drawing on an ethnographic study of low-income Kurdish mothers’ life experiences, this chapter explores how structural factors of ethnicity, class, and gender affect the daily lives and social position of low-income Kurdish women who migrated to Istanbul from the less developed east and southeast regions of Turkey. Structural factors affect individuals’ daily lives and opportunities (Barnes 2008). The effect of structural factors is mediated through human agency, which is individuals’ capacity to act independently and make their own choices (Barnes 2008).