“Doing it Alone”: Narratives of Lebanese Return Migrant Women

Abstract

This thesis focuses on five Lebanese women who have embarked in a long-distance marriage after return from abroad and explore their experiences and perceptions of transnational marriage and the labor it entails. Using semi-structured interviews, I elicit life histories and examine their reflective narratives regarding how they understand their own migratory stories. I use Mahler and Pessar’s gendered geographies of power framework to examine the narrative around labor among Lebanese women returnees and Suad Joseph’s concept of transnational families within the Lebanese context in navigating through their narratives around transnational marriage. My data analysis finds that narratives around transnational marriage is fraught with difficulties, tensions, doubt, ambiguity and negotiation. Notions of “being alone” and “doing it alone” as women living in long-distance marriages is based on social class, resources available or lack thereof and the existence and engagement between two – at times – distinct spheres of familial engagement and community – the nuclear family and the extended family.