Transnational connections and personal ties: theorizing the Philippine overseas foreign worker experience
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Date
2013-02-06
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Department
Towson University. Department of Women's and Gender Studies
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There are no restrictions on access to this document. An internet release form signed by the author to display this document online is on file with Towson University Special Collections and Archives.
There are no restrictions on access to this document. An internet release form signed by the author to display this document online is on file with Towson University Special Collections and Archives.
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Abstract
This thesis examines the Philippine overseas foreign worker (OFW) experience through a lens of connection, a new framework. A platform of connection situates the individual OFW as the authority of her experience and explores the connections she identifies as significant values and/or attachments. The framework is rooted in theories of home, travel, and a politics of location, and is employed here to examine written cultural productions by and about OFWs. Source text includes fiction from the collection Mga Hibla ng Pangarap ("Strands of Dreams") and non-fiction from bloggers who entered the Pinoy Expat Blog Awards (PEBA) competition from 2008- 2011. These cultural productions detail connections that flow across miles and throughout life changes. These connections reveal a wider migration narrative that is individuated, complex, and emotional, yet is inextricably entwined with broad forces such as globalization and the Philippine government.