Gender and Labor in Asian Immigrant Families

Abstract

This article explores the effects of employment patterns on gender relations among contemporary Asian immigrants. The existing data on Asian immigrant salaried professionals, self-employed entrepreneurs, and wage laborers suggest that economic constraints and opportunities have reconfigured gender relations within contemporary Asian America society. The patriarchal authority of Asian immigrant men, particularly those of the working class, has been challenged due to the social and economic losses that they suffered in their transition to the status of men of color in the United States. On the other hand, the recent growth of female-intensive industries—and the racist and sexist “preference” for the labor of immigrant women—has enhanced women's employability over that of some men. In all three groups, however, Asian women's ability to transform patriarchal family relations is often constrained by their social positions as racially subordinate women in U.S. society.