Académique Documents
Professionnel Documents
Culture Documents
ANNUAL
REVIEWS Further The Commodication of
Intimacy: Marriage, Sex,
Click here for quick links to
Annual Reviews content online,
including:
Other articles in this volume
Top cited articles
Top downloaded articles
and Reproductive Labor
Our comprehensive search
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
Nicole Constable
Department of Anthropology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15260;
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
email: constabl@pitt.edu
49
ANRV388-AN38-04 ARI 14 August 2009 18:8
50 Constable
ANRV388-AN38-04 ARI 14 August 2009 18:8
problematizes, and theorizes the commodica- Hochschild 2003). The articles in Global Woman
tion and consumption of intimate reproductive illustrate how globalization has resulted in in-
labor, especially within an increasingly global creased opportunities for intimacy across and
or transnational context since the 1980s and despite vast geographic distances.
concludes with a discussion of possible future Numerous studies and analyses of global
directions.1 relationships and processes point to wide
variations in gendered patterns of mobility
that involve men as well as women. Men
GENDERED MIGRATION from poorer regions of the so-called Global
Gender is a central topic and primary subject South migrate for workas in the case of
of criticism in the literature on transnational construction workers and seamen from the
marriage migration, sex work, and care work. Philippines and Indonesiato the oil-rich
Since the 1970s, studies of migration were crit- countries of the Middle East. Immigrant male
doctors provide intimate care, and men are also
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
simply appendages of migrant men (Brettell Espiritu 2002; Margold 1995; Padilla 2007a,b),
& deBerjeois 1992; Hondagneu-Sotelo 1994; are rarely approached as a gendered topic of
Morokvasic 1983, 1984; Piper 2006). Since study. The issue of intimacy is far more often
then, many inuential studies have focused on applied to the physical and emotional labor of
the feminization of migrant labor (Ehrenreich women (Augustn 2007a,b; Donato et al. 2006;
& Hochschild 2003, Parrenas 2001, Sassen Ehrenreich & Hochschild 2003).
2000). More recently, the scholarly focus on mi- Scholars have attempted to shift the analyt-
grant women (instead of gender) as well as the ical focus away from women per se toward
heteronormative focus of most migrant studies gendered analyses more broadly. Building on
have also been subject to criticism, pointing in cultural geographer Masseys notion of power
new directions for future research (Babb 2006, geometry (Massey 1994), in which some peo-
Donato et al. 2006, Mahler & Pessar 2006, ple are in charge of mobility (their own and
Manalansan 2006). that of others), Pessar & Mahler (2001) call for
In her inuential essay entitled Love and attention to gendered geographies of power
Gold, Hochschild argues that the care and love in which ones social location relative to power
provided by third world women is a resource inuences opportunities for geographic mobil-
that is not unlike the nineteenth-century ex- ity. Massey, Pessar & Mahler, and others query
traction of gold, ivory, and rubber from the the variety of factors that determine who moves
Third World (2003a, p. 26; 2003b). In the con- and who controls or inuences the move-
temporary version of imperialist extraction, she ments of others. Following Appadurais notion
argues, love and care are the new gold because of global ethnoscapes (1996), scholars have ex-
emotional labor is extracted from poorer re- amined a variety of marriage-scapes (e.g.,
gions of the world to benet richer ones at a low Abelmann & Kim 2005; Chao 2005; Constable
cost (2003a). The edited volume Global Woman 2005a,b; Freeman 2005; Oxfeld 2005; Schein
focuses primarily on such feminized labor and 2005; Suzuki 2005; Thai 2005) and sex-scapes
is aptly subtitled Nannies, Maids, and Sex (Brennan 2004, 2007).
Workers in the New Economy (Ehrenreich & Ethnographic research thus describes var-
ied patterns of gendered marital mobility and
gendered sex and care work in a global con-
1
Drawing from Hochschilds work on emotional labor text, illustrating new gendered geographies of
(1983), Frank uses the term commodication of intimacy to
refer to the authentic experience that is created for regular power in which certain women have opportu-
male customers at a U.S. strip club (2002). nities for mobility that are unavailable to men,
and certain classes of men and women have their U.S. working-class husbands, and in the
the ability to determine their own mobility and gendered desires of men who seek traditional
that of others. Despite the burgeoning num- wives abroad and women who seek modern
ber of studies of caregivers, domestic workers, husbands (Constable 2003, 2005b; Thai
and cross-border marriages, studies of migrant 2005, 2008). In a fascinating study of Brazilian
sex workers, particularly of male sex workers, erotic dancers in New York City, Maia (2007)
male care givers, and same sex-intimacy, have illustrates the class/gender complexities of the
been slower to appear (Augustn 2007a; Cheng situation as educated middle-class Brazilian
2005, 2007, 2010; Constable 2000; Manalansan women opt to work as dancers in nightclubs
2003; Padilla 2007a,b; Sim 2007, 2009). (as opposed to working as maids) where they
Gendered geographies of mobility point to provide intimate labor for working-classor
different class ends of the migratory spectrum. less-educated middle-classU.S. men. In
On one end are elite astronaut families (in such cases, class identity is an important
which the family members are divided across re- mediating factor in constructing and resisting
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
gions; for example, the male breadwinner may commodied migrant subjectivities.
go work in one country and the wife accompa- Ethnographies of migrant workers have ex-
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
nies the children to another country to facilitate amined a single ethnic group/nationality of
their education) and immigrant professionals workers in one location, for example, Filipina
(Ong 1999; Piper & Roces 2003; Shen 2005, domestic workers in Hong Kong (Constable
2008; Shih 1999; Yeoh et al. 2005), many of 1997) or Mexican and Central American maids
whom have the privilege to choose to remain at in Los Angeles (Hondagneu-Sotelo 2001).
home or whose home becomes multiple and More recent studies have adopted more ambi-
exible. On the other end of the spectrum are tious multisited research methodologies includ-
growing numbers of documented and undocu- ing multiple destinations, sending and receiving
mented women and men from poorer countries countries, and migrant workers as well as fam-
who provide benets for the more privileged ily members who are left behind (Cheng 2007,
residents of wealthier regions (Ong 2006) as 2010; Frantz 2008; Gamburd 2000; Parrenas
maids (Anderson 2000, Adams & Dickey 2000, 2001, 2005a,b; Sim & Wee 2009). As Liebelt
Lan 2006, Parrenas 2001, Sim & Wee 2009), sex (2008) argues, migrant maids and caregivers of-
workers (Augustn 2007a,b; Cheng 2007, 2010; ten do not simply move back and forth from
2008), wives (Constable 2003, 2005a;
Parrenas home to a single migrant destination and back
Oxfeld 2005; Roces 2003; Thai 2005, 2008), or again, but rather on and on from one destina-
adoptees (Cohen 2007, Dorow 2006, Volkman tion to another that is higher on the global hier-
2005), all of whom contribute to what Parrenas archy of employment possibilities, thus requir-
has called a chain of love. ing mobile research methodologies.
Studies of contemporary global migra- Clearly not all geographic mobility involves
tory processes point to the importance of travel or migration of women or men from
socioeconomic class transformations and poorer countries to wealthier ones for work.
related conicts for workers and employers or A rich area of research examines movements
clients. The middle-class educated identity of of residents of richer countries, as in the case
Filipina maids, for example, may be threatening of tourists (Brennan 2004; Padilla 2007a,b;
to Taiwan or Hong Kong employers when the Wilson 2004) and astronaut families described
home is also an intimate workplace (Constable above (Ong 1999, 2006; Piper & Roces 2003;
2007b, Lan 2006) or can increase their per- Yeoh et al. 2005). Men and women tourists
ceived value relative to other nationalities of from wealthy countries of Asia-Pacic, Western
workers (de Regt 2008, Lan 2006). Conicts Europe, North America, and elsewhere travel
exist between the class and educational identity to regions of Southeast Asia, the Caribbean,
of migrant Vietnamese or Chinese wives and Latin America, Eastern Europe, the former
52 Constable
ANRV388-AN38-04 ARI 14 August 2009 18:8
Soviet Union, and elsewhere for sex and in prospective spouses to develop online intimacy
search of spouses. Whereas women also partake before they meet face to face (Constable 2007a).
in sex tourism, and local men provide sexual in- Since the early 1990s when so-called mail
timacy to men and women, men from wealthy order bride catalogs began to be published and
regions of the globe are widely depicted as the accessible online, the number of introduction
main beneciaries and the consumers of such agencies geared toward English speakers has
global intimacies (Brennan 2004; Cheng 2010; rapidly proliferated (Constable 2005b). Recent
Frohlick 2007; Kelsky 2001; Padilla 2007a,b). studies of cross-border marriages, courtships,
Such studies increasingly consider new mobil- dating, and sexual partnerships of various sorts
ity patterns of elites and nonelites, the costs have pointed to new patterns of commodica-
and benets both to those who move and those tion and to rapid growth of prot-oriented and
who remain at home (Gamburd 2000, Parrenas electronically mediated forms of matchmak-
2005a), and, as discussed below, the role of new ing or marital introduction that facilitate wider
technologies in patterns, and the notions of love global patterns of cross-border relationships
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
and authenticity that such relationships entail. ( Johnson 2007, Johnson-Hanks 2007). Some
marriage brokers promote international mar-
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
introduction services, the success of the busi- or sperm donation, and local and international
ness is based on creating and anticipating the adoption that aim at facilitating the creation
desires of consumers or clients. The more high of families (Bharadwaj 2003; Franklin 1995;
quality products or services they offer, the bet- Ginsburg & Rapp 1995; Inhorn & Birenbaum-
ter the chance of selling the agencys services. Carmeli 2008; Modell 1994; Nahman 2006;
A number of scholars have examined the role Ragone 1994, 1996; Sharp 2001; Strathern
of domestic worker recruitment and employ- 1985, 1992a,b). Work remains to be done to
ment agencies in marketing and selling prod- link the insights relating to the reproductive
ucts, distinguishing among different nationali- technologies with technologically mediated
ties of workers, objectifying workers by offering and transnational intimacies.
specials, sales, markdowns, free replacements,
and guaranteesin short, using the language
of commodity markets to refer to workers LOVE, PERFORMANCE,
but less has been done in terms of analyzing its AND AUTHENTICITY
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
importance in creating new markets and trans- The commodication of social relations in the
forming the spaces of labor. Unlike Bernsteins era of industrial capitalism stands in supposed
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
study of the spaces of sex work and the histori- contrast to Marxs nostalgic ideal of the social
cal impact of technological change on both the character of familial labor in precapitalist
meaning and consumption of sexual services, peasant families (Marx 1978, p. 326). Yet
parallel analyses have yet to be produced in despite common idealization of precapitalist
relation to domestic labor and the terrain of social relations, social relationships that are
marriage. represented and dened by gifts, bride wealth,
An intellectual bridge is also needed to dowry, and payments are not unambiguous, free
connect the technology of marriage, domestic of conict, or unmarked by inequality or in-
work, and sex work to transformations and strumentalism (Bloch & Parry 1989, Comaroff
redenitions of the meaning of family, drawing 1979, Mauss 1967). Commodication is
from the many insights of studies of technolog- likewise rarely simply given, unambiguous, or
ically assisted parenting and the reproduction complete, as illustrated by Zelizers analysis
of children. Adoption and new reproductive of monetary exchanges, intimate social rela-
technologies have provided a rich arena for tions, and legal disputes in the West (2000,
anthropologists to revisit older theories of 2005). The social science perspective that
kinship and denitions of family (Edwards places moral boundaries between market and
et al. 1993; Franklin & McKinnon 2000, 2002; domestic spheres has been labeled the hostile
Franklin & Ragone 1998; Schneider 1968). worlds view (Zelizer 2000). The conation of
Commodied processes of reproductive labor intimate social relations with monetary value
have led to important studies of diverse family is criticized by those who imagine a more
forms that challenge prevailing patterns of altruistic or authentic precapitalist past or who
heteronormativity (Lewin 1993, Weston 1991). view the domestic sphere as a proper shelter
New critiques of biologically deterministic from the harsh and impersonal world of market
theories of kinship have offered insights capitalism. Yet the question remains of how
about commodied global and transnational the commodication of intimate relations is
processes (Bowie 2005, Cohen 2007, Dorow understood and experienced by those involved
2006, Howell 2003, McKinnon 2005, Orobitg in such relationships and processes. A key con-
& Salazar 2005, Padilla et al. 2007, Volkman cern isas the title of Brennans (2004) study of
2005). Anthropologists have examined the so- sex workers in the Dominican Republic aptly
ciocultural and political-economic implications puts itWhats Love Got to do With It?
of new procreative or reproductive services and The historical meaning and construction
mechanisms such as surrogate parenthood, egg of love, its performance and authenticity, are
54 Constable
ANRV388-AN38-04 ARI 14 August 2009 18:8
rich and promising areas of inquiry, as the These examples suggest that commodi-
following diverse examples illustrate. Whereas cation of intimacy is not an analytical end
Brennan (2004, 2007) approaches Dominican in itself, but instead offers a valuable start-
womens relationships with foreign men, some ing point for analyses of gendered social rela-
of which result in marriage, as performances tions, cultural meanings, social inequalities, and
in which sex workers feign love to mask the capitalist transformations (Appadurai 1986).
economic exchange and the benets they re- In a provocative volume on modernity, com-
ceive, other scholars dene them in terms of panionate marriage, and romantic courtship,
bounded authenticity (Bernstein 2007a,b) or Hirsch & Wardlow illustrate the promise
in terms of historical constructions of romantic of such comparative ethnographic analyses
intimacy (Giddens 1992, Hirsch 2007, Padilla (Hirsch & Wardlow 2006). In her study of the
et al. 2007). Huli of Papua New Guinea, Wardlow notes
Numerous studies examine cultural con- that Seventh-Day Adventist missionaries crit-
structions of love and romance in a variety of icized the Huli (as other Christian missionar-
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
geographic settings ( Jankowiak 1995), consid- ies did of other groups) for the exchange of
ering how they are commodied in terms of bride wealth, which they argued commoditizes
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
material expectations, gift exchanges, and mass- women and weakens the proper bonds of mar-
mediated images of modern romance (Ahearn riage (Wardlow 2006, p. 66). Yet the decline
2001, Hirsch 2004, Hirsch & Wardlow 2006, of bride wealth among the Huli and in other
Illouz 1997, Jankowiak 1995, Padilla et al. 2007, societies has not meant that within the con-
Rebhun 1999). Commodication may be hid- text of capitalism, the home becomes ideologi-
den, disguised, mystied, denied, or reinter- cally demarcated as the safe haven of emotional
preted as a gift or experienced as liberating intimacy, a place where one recovers from the
and modern (Russ 2005). In the context of alienation of the marketplace (Wardlow 2006,
Europe and the United States, Bernstein ar- p. 74). Instead, the meanings and importance of
gues that traditional procreative and mod- commodities are transformed in relation to par-
ern companionate models of sexuality are in- ticular local understandings of modernity as re-
creasingly being supplanted by a recreational lated to subjectivity and intimate relationships
sexual ethic that differs from marital or on- (Ahearn 2001, Chao 2005, Rebhun 1999).
going relationships and is dened by physical Faiers work on professions of love among
sensation and from emotionally bounded erotic Filipina entertainers who marry Japanese men
exchanges (2007b, p. 6). She argues that the is groundbreaking. Instead of questioning the
girlfriend experience increasingly offered by authenticity of womens professions of love for
sex workers and often located via the Internet is their husbands, or treating them as feigned per-
an example of bounded authenticity in which formances, Faier asks how such declarations are
not only eroticism but also an authentic rela- made meaningful through global processes
tionship (albeit within a bounded frame) is for (2007, p. 148). Faier argues that Filipinas pro-
sale in the marketplace (Bernstein 2007b, p.7). fessions of love serve to counteract the stigma
Allisons research among Japanese salary men of their work and to dene their transnational
who frequent hostess clubs and engage prosti- subjectivities. Love is also associated with the
tutes focuses on how hostesses serve to make care (including gifts and monetary remittances
men feel like men and that men gain satis- for their families) and understanding offered to
faction from care they receive and the lack of women by their husbands. Following Rebhuns
ongoing responsibility that accompanies pay- view of Christian love in opposition to nancial
ment for sexual and intimate attention in host- gain, Faier stresses womens constructions of
ess clubs and on sex tours abroad, in contrast new gendered and sexualized subjectivities
with their domestic lives and relationships with in relation to modernity, Christianity, and
their wives (Allison 1994). Philippine notions of utang ng loob (a debt of
gratitude) that encompass the meaning of love migrant womens activism, their subtle or ex-
(Faier 2007, p. 156) in relation to the notion of plicit protests, and their resistance and agency
shame, which results from a failure to respect within the context of structural factors that limit
and repay one to whom it is owed. As discussed the opportunities and often disempower for-
below, Faiers analytical approach to love also eign brides, migrant domestic workers, and sex
has important implications for the debate workers (Brennan 2004; Constable 1997, 2009;
about migrant women as agents or victims of Kempadoo 2005; Kempadoo & Doezema 1998;
trafcking. Parker 2005; Parrenas 2008).
As scholarship on transnational intimacies Unlike popular media depictions of traf-
illustrates, relationships assumed to be based cked women as commodities devoid of agency,
primarily on paid work for money are often un- anthropologists point to subtle and complex
derstood to involve complex forms of intimacy, forms of power and agency within the house-
love, or emotion, and those assumed to be based hold, in public spaces, and in the wider global
on love are linked in new and evolving ways to context. Studies of care workers reposition
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
commercial practices and material desires. older arguments about emotional labor as a
gift or commodity in terms of, for example,
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
56 Constable
ANRV388-AN38-04 ARI 14 August 2009 18:8
of intimacy and those that are assumed to Japanese brides in rural regions of Japan illus-
be free (Bernstein 2007a,b; Brennan 2004; trate ways in which capitalist processes promote
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
Cabezas 2004; Cheng 2007; Cohen 1982, 1986; new opportunities for intimacy and marriage
Liechty 2005; Padilla 2007a,b; Piper & Roces that are inuenced by, but not entirely dened
2003; Zelizer 2000). by, the entertainment or sex work industry.
The agent-victim binary has proven to be
a dead end of sorts. Whereas certain feminist
scholars and activists argue that all sex workers CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE
are victims, other scholars and feminists can DIRECTIONS
respond with endless examples of agency and Recent studies of the changing local and
choice. Instead, scholars such as Augustn global patterns, processes, and relations of
(2007a,b), Bernstein (2007a,b), Vance (2005), intimacy build on and borrow from older
and others take on a critical analysis of the critiques of overly binary models of public
notion of trafcking, considering its historical and private, intimate and impersonal, mate-
specicity and the parallels between late- rial and emotional, love and money, local
twentieth-century anxiety about trafcking and global, nature and culture (Franklin 2003;
and nineteenth-century hysteria about white Franklin & McKinnon 2000, 2002; Levine
slavery. Several scholars have drawn attention 2003; McKinnon & Silverman 2005; Zelizer
to both sex workers and their middle-class so- 2000). Some such studies rene older Marx-
cial helpers or nongovernmental workers and ist notions of commodication and reproduc-
volunteers who often aim to help or rescue sex tive labor or point to the ongoing importance
workers in misguided ways (Augustn 2007a, of Maussian insights about gift exchange and
Bloch 2003, Cheng 2005). Anthropologists the intimacy of social relationships. Collectively
have also addressed methodological challenges they draw on symbolic and interpretive anal-
associated with research on trafcking and have yses, critical global and feminist perspectives,
criticized rhetorical conations of trafcking and new anthropological insights that are linked
with prostitution (Brennan 2005, 2008; Vance to wider multisited and transnational ethno-
2005). graphic research that looks beyond local-global
Faiers work (2007) discussed above offers dichotomies, yet draws insight from older as-
a valuable alternative to the victim-agent bi- sumptions about kinship and social relations
nary. She focuses on the transnational gendered within increasingly global, mobile, and techno-
and sexual subjectivities of migrant women and logically mediated contexts.
successfully steers an analytical course away Current anthropological studies demon-
from the question of true love versus material strate that in some contexts commodication
of social relations are welcomed and interpreted reexamining assumptions about domesticity,
as modern progress, as in the cases of child care marriage, and gender that are deeply held by
and elderly care, which were once the responsi- research subjects and researchers. Berlants call
bility of family members but can now be del- for cataloging intimacys norms, forms and
egated to paid service providers. Yet even in crimes, asking how public institutions use
such cases, commodication, or the purchase issues of intimate life to normalize particular
of intimacy (Zelizer 2000, 2005), is not the forms of knowledge and practice and to create
end point of the analysis nor is it devoid of compliant subjects (1998, p. 188) is well worth
countervailing personalized processes, assump- considering.
tions, and anxieties. Instead, commodication The value of future research therefore lies
and the accompanying notions of impersonal not in bemoaning the downfall of the sanctity
pragmatic market relations are often denied, of the domestic sphere or the demise of authen-
mystied, mediated, transformed, or disguised. tic relations outside the realm of capital, but in-
As the scope of commodication expands more stead, in continuing to attend to the multiple,
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
deeply into various realms of intimacy, it in- complex, transnational, and also transgressive
volves a range of countervailing discourses and and transformative ways in which emotional
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
actions involving reciprocity and gift giving, ties and relationships are understood, formu-
claims to altruism, assertions of love, and claims lated, or prohibited within and beyond local and
to bounded authenticity. global spaces. Studies such as those of Bernstein
This review has outlined some of the (2007a,b) and Faier (2007) point to the impor-
key contributions of the literature on cross- tance of ne-grained historically and cultur-
border marriages, domestic work, and sex work ally specic studies of intimacy in relation to
that addresses the commodication of inti- new technologies and opportunities for mobil-
macy. Methodologically, there is a marked shift ity. Such studies continue to ask how authentic-
toward multisited research away from nar- ity is understood and experienced, offering op-
row area studies approaches, toward border- portunities as well as constraints. Globalization
crossing topics that require mobility as well as does not simply result in greater commodica-
online and deterritorialized research (Gupta tion of intimate sexual, marital, and reproduc-
& Ferguson 1992). Promising new research has tive relationships; it also offers opportunities for
shifted from single nationalities and single lo- dening new sorts of relationships and for re-
cations, moving beyond binary constructions of dening spaces, meanings, and expressions of
sending and receiving locations to multiple hi- intimacy that can transform and transgress con-
erarchies of sites and subjectivities. ventional gendered spaces and norms.
Another key issue has been and continues Future research would benet by further ex-
to be gender and sexuality. Studies of transna- amining the pairing of commodication and in-
tional intimacies echo the shift in anthropology timacy, casting them as the main topic rather
and migration studies more broadly, from the than separating out topical foci on marriage,
earliest topics of men as unexamined gendered household work, sex work, nursing, adoption,
subjects, to women, to gender more broadly. etc. We must ask not only what differenti-
Still lacking are studies of men as intimate gen- ates erotic dance and hospice care, but also
dered subjects, as providers of care work and what such multiple and varied examples can
intimacy, and not just as consumers of sexual tell us about the meaning of intimacy for all
services. A fruitful direction for future research involved. The focus on transnational mobility
is also to question and move beyond the frames of both elites and nonelites within neoliberal
and assumptions of heteronormativity that are globalization and the ongoing tension between
inherent in much of the research on transna- more complex microlevel patterns of power and
tional intimacies. As Babb (2006) proposes, agency and broader macro patterns of global in-
queering love and globalization requires equality are also key. Research on the structural
58 Constable
ANRV388-AN38-04 ARI 14 August 2009 18:8
factors and the experiences and meanings of mi- the notion of commodication. This notion
grant work and marriage have made important both offers a way to illuminate power relations
inroads, allowing us to avoid the pitfalls of inherent in a variety of intimate relations but
overly binary notions of victim and agent, pub- also can overdetermine the political-economic
lic and private, or the trap of dening all women frame, thus masking the multiplicity of power
migrants or sex workers as trafcked victims. and the potentially liberating and transforma-
Yet there are risks and benets associated with tive aspects of intimate subjectivities.
DISCLOSURE STATEMENT
The author is not aware of any afliations, memberships, funding, or nancial holdings that might
be perceived as affecting the objectivity of this review.
LITERATURE CITED
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
Abelmann N, Kim H. 2005. A failed attempt at transnational marriage: maternal citizenship in globalizing
South Korea. See Constable 2005a, pp. 10123
Adams KM, Dickey S, eds. 2000. Home and Hegemony: Domestic Service and Identity Politics in South and Southeast
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
Brettell CB, deBerjeois PA. 1992. Anthropology and the study of immigrant women. In Seeking Common
Ground, ed. D Gabaccia, pp. 4163. Westport, CT: Greenwood
Cabezas AL. 2004. Between love and money: sex, tourism, and citizenship in Cuba and the Dominican Re-
public. Signs 29:9871015
Chao E. 2005. Cautionary tales: marriage strategies, state discourse, and womens agency in a Naxi village in
southwestern China. See Constable 2005a, pp. 3452
Cheng S. 2005. The success of anti-trafcking policy: womens human rights and womens sexuality in South
Korea. Presented at Ethnography and Policy: What Do We Know About Trafcking? CS Vance, organizer.
Santa Fe, NM: Sch. Adv. Res.
Cheng S. 2007. Romancing the club: love dynamics between Filipina entertainers and GIs in US military
camp towns in South Korea. See Padilla et al. 2007, pp. 22651
Cheng S. 2010. Dreams of Flight: Sex, Love, and Labor of Migrant Entertainers. Ithaca, NY: Cornell Univ. Press
Cohen E. 1982. Thai girls and farang menthe edge of ambiguity. Ann. Tour. Res. 9:40328
Cohen E. 1986. Lovelorn farangs: the correspondence between foreign men and Thai girls. Anthropol. Q.
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
59:11528
Cohen F. 2007. Tracing the red thread: an ethnography of ChineseU.S. transnational adoptions. PhD thesis. Univ.
Pittsburgh, 214 pp.
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
Comaroff JL. 1979. The Meaning of Marriage Payments. New York: Academic
Constable N. 1997. Maid to Order in Hong Kong: Stories of Filipina Workers. Ithaca, NY: Cornell Univ. Press
Constable N. 2000. Dolls, t-birds, and ideal workers: the negotiation of Filipino identity in Hong Kong. See
Adams & Dickey 2000, pp. 22148
Constable N. 2003. Romance on a Global Stage: Pen Pals, Virtual Ethnography, and Mail Order Marriages.
Berkeley: Univ. Calif. Press
Constable N, ed. 2005a. Cross-Border Marriages: Gender and Mobility in Transnational Asia. Philadelphia: Univ.
Penn. Press
Constable N. 2005b. A tale of two marriages: international matchmaking and gendered mobility. See Constable
2005a, pp. 16686
Constable N. 2005c. The International Marriage Broker Regulation Act: What does it have to do with
trafcking? Presented at Ethnography and Policy: What Do We Know About Trafcking? CS Vance, organizer.
Santa Fe, NM: Sch. Adv. Res.
Constable N. 2006. Brides, maids, and prostitutes: reections on the study of trafcked women. PORTAL:
J. Multidiscip. Int. Stud. 3(2). Special Issue: Women in Asia, ed. D Ghosh. http://epress.lib.uts.
edu.au/ojs/index.php/portal
Constable N. 2007a. Love at rst sight? Visual images and virtual encounters with bodies. See Padilla et al.
2007, pp. 25269
Constable N. 2007b. Maid to Order in Hong Kong: Stories of Migrant Workers. Ithaca, NY: Cornell Univ. Press
Constable N. 2009. Migrant workers and the many states of protest in Hong Kong. Crit. Asian Stud. 41:14364
de Regt M. 2008. High in the hierarchy, rich in diversity: Asian domestic workers, their networks and em-
ployers preferences in Yemen. Crit. Asian Stud. 40:587608
Donato KM, Gabaccia D, Holdaway J, Manalansan M, Pessar PR. 2006. A glass half full? Gender in migration
studies. Int. Migr. Rev. 40:326
Dorow SK. 2006. Transnational Adoption: A Cultural Economy of Race, Gender, and Kinship. New York: NY Univ.
Press
Edwards J, Franklin S, Hirsch E, Price F, Strathern M. 1993. Technologies of Procreation: Kinship in the Age of
Assisted Conception. Manchester, UK: Manchester Univ. Press
Ehrenreich B, Hochschild AR, eds. 2003. Global Woman: Nannies, Maids and Sex Workers in the New Economy.
New York: Holt/Metropolitan Books
Espiritu Y. 2002. Filipino navy stewards and Filipino health care professionals: immigration, work and family
relations. Asia Pac. Migr. J. 11:4766
Faier L. 2007. Filipina migrants in rural Japan and their professions of love. Am. Ethnol. 34:14862
Frank K. 2002. G-Strings and Sympathy: Strip Club Regulars and Male Desire. Durham, NC: Duke Univ. Press
60 Constable
ANRV388-AN38-04 ARI 14 August 2009 18:8
Franklin S. 1995. Postmodern procreation: a cultural account of assisted reproduction. In Conceiving the New
World Order: The Global Politics of Reproduction, ed. FD Ginsburg, R Rapp, pp. 32345. Berkeley: Univ.
Calif. Press
Franklin S. 2003. Rethinking nature-culture: anthropology and the new genetics. Anthropol. Theory 3:6585
Franklin S, McKinnon S. 2000. New directions in kinship study: a core concept revisited. Curr. Anthropol.
41:27579
Franklin S, McKinnon S. 2002. Relative Values: Reconguring Kinship Studies. Durham, NC: Duke Univ. Press
Franklin S, Ragone H. 1998. Reproducing Reproduction: Kinship, Power, and Technological Innovation. Philadelphia:
Univ. Penn. Press
Frantz E. 2008. Of maids and madams: Sri Lankan domestic workers and their employers in Jordan. Crit.
Asian Stud. 40:60938
Freeman C. 2005. Marrying up and marrying down: the paradoxes of marital mobility for Chosonjok brides
in South Korea. See Constable 2005, pp. 80100
Freeman C. 2006. Forging kinship across borders: paradoxes of gender, kinship, and nation between China and South
Korea. PhD thesis. Univ. Va. 288 pp.
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
Frohlick S. 2007. Fluid exchanges: the negotiation of intimacy between tourist women and local men in a
transnational town in Caribbean Costa Rica. City Soc. 19(1):13968
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
Gamburd M. 2000. The Kitchen Spoons Handle: Transnationalism and Sri Lankas Migrant Housemaids. Ithaca,
NY: Cornell Univ. Press
Giddens A. 1992. The Transformation of Intimacy: Sexuality, Love, and Eroticism in Modern Societies. Cambridge,
UK: Polity
Ginsburg FD, Rapp R. 1995. Conceiving the New World Order: The Global Politics of Reproduction. Berkeley: Univ.
Calif. Press
Gupta A, Ferguson J. 1992. Space, identity and the politics of difference. Cult. Anthropol. 7(1):623
Hirsch JS. 2004. A Courtship after Marriage: Sexuality and Love in Mexican Transnational Families. Berkeley:
Univ. Calif. Press
Hirsch JS. 2007. Love makes a family: globalization, companionate marriage, and the modernization of
gender inequality. See Padilla et al. 2007, pp. 93106
Hirsch JS, Wardlow H, eds. 2006. Modern Loves: The Anthropology of Romantic Courtship and Companionate
Marriage. Ann Arbor: Univ. Mich. Press
Hochschild AR. 1983. The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling. Berkeley: Univ. Calif. Press
Hochschild AR. 2003a. Love and gold. See Ehrenreich & Hochschild 2003, pp. 1530
Hochschild AR. 2003b. The Commercialization of Intimate Life: Notes from Home and Work. Berkeley: Univ.
Calif. Press
Hondagneu-Sotelo P. 1994. Gendered Transitions: Mexican Experiences of Immigration. Berkeley: Univ. Calif.
Press
Hondagneu-Sotelo P. 2001. Domestica: Immigrant Workers Cleaning and Caring in the Shadows of Afuence.
Berkeley: Univ. Calif. Press
Howell S. 2003. Kinning: the creation of life trajectories in transnational adoptive families. J. R. Anthropol.
Inst. 9:46584
Illouz E. 1997. Consuming the Romantic Utopia: Love and the Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism. Berkeley: Univ.
Calif. Press
Inhorn MC, Birenbaum-Carmeli D. 2008. Assisted reproductive technologies and culture change. Annu. Rev.
Anthropol. 37:17796
Jankowiak W, ed. 1995. Romantic Passion: A Universal Experience? New York: Columbia Univ. Press
Johnson E. 2007. Dreaming of a Mail Order Husband: Russian-American Internet Romance. Durham, NC: Duke
Univ. Press
Johnson-Hanks J. 2007. Women on the market: marriage, consumption, and the Internet in urban Cameroon.
Am. Ethnol. 34:64258
Julag-Ay C. 1997. Correspondence marriages between Filipinas and United States men. PhD thesis. Univ. Calif.,
Irvine. 206 pp.
Kelsky K. 2001. Women on the Verge: Japanese Women, Western Dreams. Durham, NC: Duke Univ. Press
Kempadoo K, ed. 2005. Trafcking and Prostitution Reconsidered: New Perspectives on Migration, Sex Work, and
Human Rights. Boulder, CO: Paradigm
Kempadoo K, Doezema J, eds. 1998. Global Sex Workers: Rights, Resistance, and Redenition. New York:
Routledge
Kopytoff I. 1986. The cultural biography of things: commoditization as process. See Appadurai 1986,
pp. 6491
Lan PC. 2006. Global Cinderellas: Migrant Domestic and Newly Rich Employers in Taiwan. Durham, NC: Duke
Univ. Press
Levine HB. 2003. Gestational surrogacy: nature and culture in kinship. Ethnology 42:17385
Lewin E. 1993. Lesbian Mothers: Accounts of Gender in American Culture. Ithaca, NY: Cornell Univ. Press
Liebelt C. 2008. On sentimental orientalists, Christian Zionists, and working class cosmopolitans: Filipino
domestic workers journeys to Israel and beyond. Crit. Asian Stud. 40:56785
Liechty M. 2005. Carnal economies: the commodication of food and sex in Kathmandu. Cult. Anthropol.
20:138
MacCormack C, Strathern M, eds. 1980. Nature, Culture and Gender. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
Mahler SJ, Pessar PR. 2006. Gender matters: ethnographers bring gender from the periphery toward the
center of migration studies. Int. Migr. Rev. 40(1):2763
Maia SM. 2007. Brazilian erotic dancers in New York: desire and national identity. PhD thesis. The Graduate
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
62 Constable
ANRV388-AN38-04 ARI 14 August 2009 18:8
Padilla M. 2007b. Tourism and tigueraje: the structures of love and silence among Dominican male sex workers.
See Padilla et al. 2007, pp. 3869
Padilla M, Hirsch JS, Munoz-Laboy M, Sember RE, Parker RG, eds. 2007. Love and Globalization: Transfor-
mations of Intimacy in the Contemporary World. Nashville, TN: Vanderbilt Univ. Press
Parker L, ed. 2005. The Agency of Women in Asia. Singapore: Marshall Cavendish
RS. 2001. Servants of Globalization: Women, Migration and Domestic Work. Stanford, CA: Stanford
Parrenas
Univ. Press
RS. 2005a. Children of Global Migration: Transnational Families and Gendered Woes. Stanford, CA:
Parrenas
Stanford Univ. Press
RS. 2005b. Long distance intimacy: class, gender and intergenerational relations between mothers
Parrenas
and children in Filipino transnational families. Glob. Netw. 5(4):31736
RS. 2008. The Force of Domesticity: Filipina Migrants and Domesticity. New York: NY Univ. Press
Parrenas
Pessar PR, Mahler SJ. 2001. Gender and transnational migration. Transnatl. Communities Program Work. Pap.
Ser. WPTC-01-20. http://www.transcomm.ox.ac.uk/working papers.htm
Piper N. 2006. Gendering the politics of migration. Int. Migr. Rev. 40:13364
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
Piper N, Roces M, eds. 2003. Wife or Worker? Asian Women and Migration. New York: Rowman & Littleeld
Ragone H. 1994. Surrogate Motherhood: Conception in the Heart. Boulder, CO: Westview
Ragone H. 1996. Chasing the blood tie: surrogate mothers, adoptive mothers and fathers. Am. Ethnol. 23:352
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
65
Rebhun LA. 1999. The Heart Is an Unknown Country: Love and the Changing Economy of Northeast Brazil.
Stanford, CA: Stanford Univ. Press
Roces M. 2003. Sisterhood is local: Filipino women in Mount Isa. See Piper & Roces 2003, pp. 73100
Rubin G. 1975. The trafc in women: notes on the political economy of sex. In Toward an Anthropology of
Women, ed. R Reiter, pp. 157210. New York: Mon. Rev.
Russ AJ. 2005. Loves labor paid for: gift and commodity at the threshold of death. Cult. Anthropol. 20:12855
Sassen S. 2000. Countergeographies of globalization: the feminization of survival. J. Int. Aff. 53(2):50324
Schein L. 2005. Marrying out of place: Hmong/Miao women across and beyond China. See Constable 2005a,
pp. 5379
Schneider DM. 1968. American Kinship: A Cultural Account. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall
Sharp LA. 2001. Commodied kin: death, mourning, and competing claims on the bodies of organ donors in
the United States. Am. Anthropol. 103:11233
Shen HH. 2005. The rst Taiwanese wives and the Chinese mistresses: the international division of labor
in familial and intimate relations across the Taiwan Strait. Glob. Netw. 5(4):41937
Shen SS. 2008. The purchase of transnational intimacy: womens bodies, transnational masculine privileges in
Chinese economic zones. Asian Stud. Rev. 32:5775
Shih SM. 1999. Gender and the geopolitics of desire: the seduction of Mainland women in Taiwan and Hong
Kong media. In Spaces of Their Own, ed. MM Yang, pp. 278307. Minneapolis: Univ. Minn. Press
Shumway DR. 2003. Modern Love: Romance, Intimacy and the Marriage Crisis. New York: New York Univ. Press
Sim ASC. 2007. Women in transition: Indonesian domestic workers. PhD thesis. Univ. Hong Kong, 352 pp.
Sim ASC. 2009. Transitional sexuality among women migrant workers: Indonesians in Hong Kong. In As
Normal as Possible: Negotiating Sexuality in Hong Kong and China, ed. C Yau. Hong Kong: Univ. Hong
Kong Press. In press
Sim ASC, Wee V. 2009. Undocumented Indonesian workers: the human outcome of colluding interests. Crit.
Asian Stud. 41:16588
Simons LA. 2001. Marriage, migration, and markets: international matchmaking and international feminism. PhD
thesis. Univ. Denver, 344 pp.
Strathern M. 1985. Kinship and economy: constitutive orders of a provisional kind. Am. Ethnol. 12:191209
Strathern M. 1992a. The meaning of assisted kinship. In Changing Human Reproduction: Social Science Perspec-
tives, ed. M Stacey, pp. 14869. London: Sage
Strathern M. 1992b. Reproducing the Future: Essays on Anthropology, Kinship and the New Reproductive Technologies.
New York: Routledge
Suzuki N. 2005. Tripartite desires: Filipina-Japanese marriages and fantasies of transnational traversal. See
Constable 2005a, pp. 12444
Thai HC. 2005. Clashing dreams in the Vietnamese diaspora: highly educated overseas brides and low-wage
U.S. husbands. See Constable 2005a, pp. 14565
Thai HC. 2008. For Better or Worse: Vietnamese International Marriages in the New Global Economy. New
Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers Univ. Press
Tyner JA. 2009. The Philippines: Mobilities, Identities, Globalization. New York: Routledge
Valeri V. 1994. Buying women but not selling them: gift and commodity exchange in Huaulu alliance. Man
29:126
Vance CS, ed. 2005. Ethnography and policy: What do we know about trafcking? Presented at Ethnography
and Policy: What Do We Know About Trafcking? CS Vance, organizer. Santa Fe, NM: Sch. Adv. Res.
Volkman TA, ed. 2005. Cultures of Transnational Adoption. Durham, NC: Duke Univ. Press
Wang HZ, Chang SM. 2002. The commodication of international marriages: cross-border marriage business
between Taiwan and Viet Nam. Int. Migr. 40:93116
Wardlow H. 2006. Alls fair when love is war: romantic passion and companionate marriage among the Huli
of Papua New Guinea. See Hirsch & Wardlow 2006, pp. 5177
Weston K. 1991. Families We Choose: Lesbians, Gays, Kinship. New York: Columbia Univ. Press
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
Wilson A. 2004. The Intimate Economies of Bangkok: Tomboys, Tycoons, and Avon Ladies in the Global City. Berkeley:
Univ. Calif. Press
Yeoh BSA, Huang S, Lam T. 2005. Transnationalizing the Asian family: imaginaries, intimacies, and strategic
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
64 Constable
AR388-FM ARI 22 August 2009 10:52
Annual Review of
Anthropology
Prefatory Chapter
Archaeology and Anthropology: A Personal Overview of the Past
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
Half-Century
Patty Jo Watson p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 1
by University of Pittsburgh on 01/14/14. For personal use only.
Archaeology
Identity and Difference: Complicating Gender in Archaeology
Pamela L. Geller p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p65
State Emergence in Early China
Li Liu p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 217
Amazonian Archaeology
Michael Heckenberger and Eduardo Goes Neves p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 251
The Oldowan: The Tool Making of Early Hominins
and Chimpanzees Compared
Nicholas Toth and Kathy Schick p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 289
Biological Anthropology
The Early Development of Gender Differences
Matthew H. McIntyre and Carolyn Pope Edwards p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p83
The Biology of Paternal Care in Human and Nonhuman Primates
Eduardo Fernandez-Duque, Claudia R. Valeggia, and Sally P. Mendoza p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 115
Developmental Origins of Adult Function and Health: Evolutionary
Hypotheses
Christopher W. Kuzawa and Elizabeth A. Quinn p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 131
Interdisciplinary Translational Research in Anthropology, Nutrition,
and Public Health
Stephen T. McGarvey p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 233
vii
AR388-FM ARI 22 August 2009 10:52
Sociocultural Anthropology
The Commodication of Intimacy: Marriage, Sex,
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
viii Contents
AR388-FM ARI 22 August 2009 10:52
Medical Discourse
James M. Wilce p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 199
Interdisciplinary Translational Research in Anthropology, Nutrition,
and Public Health
Stephen T. McGarvey p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 233
Symptom: Subjectivities, Social Ills, Technologies
Joao Biehl and Amy Moran-Thomas p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p 267
Indexes
Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2009.38:49-64. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org
Errata
Contents ix