At both ends of care: South Indian hindu widows living with daughters and daughters-in-law in Southern California

Abstract

Based on interviews with South Indian Hindu immigrant widows and the daughters and daughters-in-law they live with in Southern California, this article makes visible the care-giving and care-receiving roles of such widows, especially in relation to the household roles of these widows' daughters and daughters-in-law. The article explains the variability of the widows' care roles by focusing on three specific phenomena distinguishing their First World experience from that of paid, immigrant care workers: 1) a greater need for non-monetary resources than for monetary payment; 2) a ‘care shift’ from giving to receiving care as they age; and 3) an ability to move from one adopted/adoptive household to another. These phenomena suggest that the same forces of modernization, (post)industrialization, and globalization that have circumscribed many Third World women's status in First World households have simultaneously diversified the status and role of middle-class, South Indian Hindu widows living in their children's First World households.