In this qualitative research work I explore how social inequalities could be reflected in the intimacies of housekeeping service. I am interested in analyzing the experiences and the social trajectories (Bourdieu, 2002) of three women that work as housekeepers in Bogotá, around the tensions that the social differences between the employers and employees imply. I approach this topic by taking into account the social suffering experiences (Kleinman, Das & Lock, 1997) of these women, within their different processes of violence (Bourgois, 2002; 2009), as representative issues that evidently demark the social distance (Bourdieu, 2002) between them and their employers. In addition, I approach relevant analytical discussions around the definitions of intimacy (Zelizer, 2009; Boris & Parreñas et. al., 2010) to comprehend the contradictions, ambiguities and power dynamics that configure different situations of intimacy in these housekeeping service relationships. The central argument of this text states that in the analyzed domestic work relationships there is a coexistence of multiple configurations of intimacy that are interwoven by the social differences that demark the distance between these employers and their employees. The housekeeping service relationships differ in between them in function of the ways to have access and transfer private information between the employees and the employers, as well as the ways to establish trust and emotional ties(Zelizer, 2009; Boris & Parreñas et. al., 2010). Likewise, I present how the illicitly “shared” or “individual” intimacies operate in the frame of the “public intimacy” of the households for which these women work for.
publication date
2016-09-14
Research
keywords
Social inequalities
emotional and affective tensions in the housekeeping service
