‘This is Australia, not Ethiopia’: Immigrant Ethiopian Women’s Negotiation of the Gendered Division of Domestic Work in Melbourne, Australia

ABSTRACT

Focusing on Ethiopian women in Melbourne Australia, in this article, we address the under-researched yet significant issue of navigating the division of domestic labour in the context of migration. We analyse data derived from a larger project based on 40 interviews with Ethiopian immigrant women to explore their perspectives on housework and how they seek to negotiate this in their households in a social context that differs from that in their sending nation. Arguing that migration to Australia has presented Ethiopian immigrant women with the opportunity to seek greater equality in the domestic sphere, we nevertheless note that their efforts to alter the unequal division of domestic labour are to a degree constrained by socioeconomic factors and gender norms as shaped within their cultures of origin. Our findings also elucidate the ways in which participants’ husbands selectively adhere to notions of culture in order to perform less housework. Our article contributes to the scant research that addresses how migrant women seek to renegotiate the division of labour in destination countries.

KEYWORDS:

• migrant women
• culture
• division of domestic work
• housework
• gender roles
• gender relations

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).