ABSTRACT
This chapter highlights a set of dynamics that speaks to the mobilities of domestic work but in ways that have received little focus in the literature, based on research on domestic workers in Indonesian cities. While domestic work is always embedded in the micro-geographies of the household, the global domestic labour force is highly mobile and many, often young women, cross continents to work for other families. The chapter shows that the different roles lead to contradictory discourses in particular cities, accommodating multiple moral geographies of work and exploitation. A striking observation when speaking to various informants in Kupang was the contrasting ways in which locally based and migrating domestic workers were described. Kupang is the capital of the Nusa Tenggara Timur province. Jakarta is a very different city from Kupang, not only in its capacity as the national capital of Indonesia but also as one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world.
