Narratives of Marriage and Migration: Thai Women in Cross-Cultural Relationships in Australia

Abstract

The motivations driving international migration have often been simplified through the lens of economic imbalance between countries: this factor in turn applies to the motives for marriage of migrant women from Southeast Asian countries. Given that conjugal relationships are supposedly based upon emotional commitment and love, women who are regarded as marrying for migration, or for other material reasons, are frequently both condemned and demonised as ‘gold diggers’ or ‘marriage frauds’, out to dupe their western/foreign husbands. They are also seen as ‘mail-order brides’, women lacking personal agency. While their life experiences are posited as static and homogenous, the diversity within this group of women is largely overlooked. This thesis researches the life experiences of Southeast Asian migrant women by looking at the narratives of 20 female Thai migrants. It explores their perceptions of and attitudes towards cross-cultural relationships and cross-border mobility, and the dynamics of interpersonal relationships. An attempt is made to try to understand the heterogeneity of these women, and how they present their agency as forms of resistance and compliance in response to the specific contexts in which they exist. The accounts provided by the Thai migrant women showcase the diversities and similarities that distinguish them. The former are indicative of how they rationalise their choices of cross-cultural relationships and migration, how they interpret their love for and intimacy with their Australian partners, how they perform the roles of daughters and daughters-in-law and deal with interpersonal relations involving other Thai people. The similarities between them reflect the shared reality and layered structures they face in their lives. The thesis argues that Thai women who migrate to marry become situated in social and cultural contexts to which they either have to adhere or find ways of compromising with the prevailing social norms and cultural values.