Journal article
"I Feel Happy that I Can be Useful to Others": Preliminary Study of East African Women and Their Remittance Behavior
Journal of family and economic issues, v 38(3), pp 315-326
01 Sep 2017
Featured in Collection : UN Sustainable Development Goals @ Drexel
Abstract
Individuals and their families often migrate for various reasons (e.g., economic wellbeing, civic unrest, medical reasons). Yet often times economic strain can cause families to migrate at different times. This separation within the family units has created the development of transnational family interactions where immigrant families remain emotionally and financially connected across international borders. Remittances, the back and forth exchange of goods and resources between people in the host nation and their counterparts in the country of origin, can often play a vital role in these interactions. Black African immigrants, Black people from the continent of Africa, are one of the fastest-growing immigrant groups in the US and also one of the highest financial remitters. Women are consistent remitters, yet little is known about the financial contributions of women from this continent to their families in their countries of origin. The current study looked at a segment of this population by exploring the remittance experiences of seven immigrant women from the East African countries of Rwanda and Kenya. In-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted and our thematic analysis revealed five themes: (1) Women felt their families made financial sacrifices for them, (2) Women took on family financial responsibilities, (3) Women felt their families in the country of origin had skewed financial expectations of them, (4) Women felt guilty about their limited finances and inability to send more to their families, and lastly (5) Women invested or had plans to invest in their country of origin.
Metrics
Details
- Title
- "I Feel Happy that I Can be Useful to Others": Preliminary Study of East African Women and Their Remittance Behavior
- Creators
- Bertranna Muruthi - Virginia TechKimberly Watkins - University of GeorgiaMegan McCoy - Firm Foundat Counseling, 1443 Highway1 S, Lugoff, SC 29078 USAJames R. Muruthi - University of GeorgiaFelisters J. Kiprono - University of Georgia
- Publication Details
- Journal of family and economic issues, v 38(3), pp 315-326
- Publisher
- SPRINGER INT PUBL AG
- Number of pages
- 12
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- Counseling and Family Therapy; Community Health and Prevention
- Web of Science ID
- WOS:000407466700002
- Scopus ID
- 2-s2.0-85021140150
- Other Identifier
- 991021866417404721
UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
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InCites Highlights
Data related to this publication, from InCites Benchmarking & Analytics tool:
- Web of Science research areas
- Economics
- Family Studies