This project asks how women in the central valley of Oaxaca, Mexico manage their households while a male member migrates. This region of Mexico has one of the highest migration rates in the country. The project, involving an anthropologist from Agnes Scott College in Atlanta and her Mexican colleague from the University of Guadalajara, will study the nature of the families, households, and resources women in migrant households deal with. The researchers will describe the women's households of origin and ascription, compare households with migrants to those of non-migrating siblings, and describe the economic behavior of women in migrant households. The project will test hypotheses about the impact of wages on migration: that men migrate alone because their migrant wages are insufficient to support their families at their destinations; that men are able to migrate because female labor finances the trip and supports the household in the meantime; and that local conditions in Mexico can explain variations in migrant sending rates over time. The project will use a mix of methods, a survey of about 1,000 women in 20 communities (a 10% sample of central valley communities); an extensive life history interview with five women from each community to determine kinship, lineage histories, household consumer-worker ratios, and more traditional ethnographic interviewing and participant observation. This research is important because it will advance our understanding of the causes of Mexican migration to the US. By focusing on the role of women and of local conditions in the originating households the project will contribute valuable new knowledge to complement the existing surveys which focus on males. ?/Â¥Ã? ?> ¥©à ?Ã?` ??Ã??¢à Ã??Ã??_Ã>Â¥/% Â¥Ã?©>???â ?Ã????Ã? Â?? ¥©à ?>?â¥?À/Â¥??> ? ????> ©`????â
