Walls of Silence and Late Twentieth Century Representations of the Foreign Female Domestic Worker: The Case of Filipina and Indonesian Female Servants in Malaysia

Abstract

This article analyzes the distinct ways in which public walls of silence continue to surround the absence of labor rights and benefits for foreign female domestic workers in the receiving country of Malaysia. Key state and nonstate actors involved in regulating and/or encouraging Filipina and Indonesian female domestic workers’ migration to, and employment in, Malaysia are identified. It is argued that the actions and perceptions of labor-sending and receiving state officials, middle-class employers, and representatives from private domestic employment agencies have had the effect of representing Filipina and Indonesian female domestic workers respectively as economic soldiers, criminal-prostitutes and pariahs, girl-slaves, and/or commodities. Taken individually and collectively, such representations obscure the fact that foreign female domestic workers are workers who ought to be protected by labor legislation.