Gendering Survival from the Margins

Research page

Gendering Survival from the Margins

Elisabeth PRÜGL

Professor, International Relations/Political Science

Luisa Lupo

PhD Researcher in International Relations & Political Science

PhD affiliate at the Gender Centre

Raksha Gopal

PhD Research in International Relations and Political Science

Research Assistant at the Gender Centre

Timeline: October 2022-September 2026

Funding institution: Swiss National Science Foundation, grant number 100017_212265

The project

This research project is concerned with everyday gendered survival practices in transnational spaces. We aim to understand i) how survival is sustained by activities of social reproduction and care, particularly in contexts where it is deliberately restricted and people are disenfranchised; ii) how survival interacts with governing structures of states and markets at local, national, regional and international levels; and iii) the openings for resistance and transformation that survival practices generate in such contexts.

We focus on care and social reproductive practices, particularly the activities and relations largely performed by women that sustain life, both daily and generationally, such as birthing and raising children, access to food, shelter and education, and challenge their taken-for-grantedness in the current neoliberal juncture. By positing survival as inherently political, we propose a theoretical and empirical examination of the way it unfolds from the margins, namely in the refugee settlements of stateless Rohingya communities in India and the shelters of migrant laborers sustaining the market of cotton in Turkey. Our methodology comprises a multi-method research design including semi-structured interviews, participant observation and document analysis.

The outputs of this project will expand and deepen current understandings of care and social reproduction that are receiving increasing attention in feminist literatures across disciplines, but are used in ambiguous and contradictory ways, by expanding dominant social reproduction approaches that focus on Western contexts and frames. We also contribute to longstanding debates in international political economy and international relations on migration and labor, by bringing to light daily acts, bonds and social structures that are foundational for survival and often neglected and unacknowledged as forms of belonging and work.