Domestic Workers and the Affective Dimensions of Communicative Empowerment

Abstract

This article analyzes how affect and emotion are linked to processes of voice, empowerment, and agency among a group of female domestic workers in Beijing. I explore such processes through analyzing the women’s participation in an NGO-sponsored drama club and putting this in conversation with their social media use. I argue that although such programs provide limited forms of communicative empowerment, public performances of pain present a singular view of domestic workers that contrasts with their diverse expression online. Moreover, the therapeutic mode embraced by the NGO fosters individual empowerment, yet it also potentially dampens collective resistance. Nonetheless, the mobilization of affect creates potential for agency, a bottom-up process that enables possibilities for people to pursue and achieve goals.