Mapping the Boundaries of Belonging for Filipino Caregivers in Israel
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HEALTH, WELL-BEING, AND RIGHTS: MAPPING THE BOUNDARIES OF BELONGING FOR FILIPINO CAREGIVERS IN ISRAEL Laurel Bradley A dissertation submitted to the faculty at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Anthropology Department. Chapel Hill 2014 Approved by: Michele Rivkin-Fish Jocelyn Lim Chua Christopher T. Nelson James L. Peacock, III Peter Redfield Rebecca L. Stein © 2014 Laurel Bradley ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ii ABSTRACT Laurel Bradley: Health, Well Being, and Rights: Mapping the Boundaries of Belonging for Filipino Caregivers in Israel (Under the direction of Michele Rivkin-Fish) This study explores claims made by Filipino migrant caregivers in a northern Israeli city to assert their perceived right to increased forms of social integration, including access to permanent residency and citizenship. Caregivers formulate their claims through their belief that marginalized social status and sociolegal closures prevent them from experiencing good health. They rework the category health to denote a broad, nuanced category of physical, mental, and social well-being. In their configuration, contexts of discrimination, unstable visa conditions, and narrow avenues through which to express their social and political personhood limits their actualization of good health. Furthermore, Filipino migrant caregivers negotiate and author vernacular narratives of health rights, democracy, and religious precepts to frame the ethical legitimacy of their health-based claims. This dissertation shows how Filipino migrant caregivers in my research constructed a series of cross-cultural logics through which to demand formal inclusion and recognition in the Israeli body politic. These logics called upon Israel’s status as a democratic nation, its participation in international human rights communities, the Jewish religious ethics that are central to national understandings of moral behavior, caregivers’ assertions that they successfully adopted an embodied “Israeli” identity, and notions of reciprocity of care. This research iii articulates with global concerns over the rising care crisis in coordination with nation states in the global north steadily enforcing social closures to exclude migrant workers’ continued presence in these European and American countries. As nation states rhetorically assert their intended reduction of global migrant labor and implement programs to exclude migrant workers from labor markets and social bodies, a pressing question emerges regarding who will provide care for the elderly in the coming decades. iv To the Filipino caregivers who gave their time, friendship, and insights to this research, you have my humble thanks and gratitude. To WLP, in memory and with love. v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I have benefited from a number of grants and fellowships that supported my research and writing process. I received a grant from the Foreign Language and Area Studies program to study Tagalog at the Southeast Asian Studies Summer Institute (SEASSI), hosted by the University of Wisconsin – Madison in 2009. A Fulbright Hays Fellowship funded twelve months of my dissertation research, with an additional four months of funding received from the UNC Graduate School’s Off Campus Research Grant. I received two semesters of tuition support from UNC’s Graduate Tuition Incentive Scholarship in 2011. During the 2013-2014 academic year the UNC Dissertation Completion Fellowship granted me a year of funding to write. I owe my largest acknowledgement of thanks to the Filipino caregivers and Israelis who participated in my research, and all the people in Israel who supported my months of fieldwork. They graciously welcomed me into their lives and made me part of their communities, forging relationships that have lasted beyond the conclusion of my fieldwork. My dissertation is about them, and I am deeply humbled and grateful for the trust they put in me to represent their lives. Additionally, I must thank the NGOs, organizations, clergy, and other public figures who gave me insights into the realities of migrant caregiving in Israel that have proven invaluable. Over the years friends and family have offered encouragement, conversation, editing services, IT support, childcare, laughter, welcome distractions, and the steadfast belief that one day I would complete my PhD. Thus, I express my gratitude to the Abramsons, Bradleys, vi Bradley-Smiths, Derbys, Derby-Wrights, Glenns, Hammonds, Littlewoods, and Parkers who have demonstrated the workings of kinship in the most positive ways. The Abramson-Glenns deserve especial thanks for their familial warmth and inclusion, which I have appreciated beyond measure. My mother, father, step-mother, and my sister’s family have been there through and through, always interested in what would come next in my journey through graduate school. My dad, Gene Bradley, invested his formidable trust in the idea that I could do this, always making himself available when needed, and quietly insisting that I could meet the challenge even on the bleakest of days. My community of friends have proven expert at driving away gloom and bringing forth the sun. I offer my loving thanks to Danae Greene and Sari Johnston Raducanu, as there are no two better friends in all the world. My thanks also to Matt Mirarchi, Alyssa Stalsberg Canelli, Hagar Moses, Laura Wagner, Suzanne Derby-Wright, Angela Derby-Wright, Maria Klein, and so many others for the coffee, unexpected laughter, and their constant compassionate understanding. The UNC Anthropology graduate students created a warm and supportive community that I have been glad to be a part of, especially the 2006 cohort of which I am lucky to be a member. I benefited from my participation in a writing group during 2012-2013 that included Martha King, Claire Novotny, Caela O’Connell, Erin Stevens Nelson, Laura Wagner, and Bill Westermeyer. Additionally, I am forever thankful to Alyssa Stalsberg Canelli for the conversations, debates, and swapped reading lists that have maintained our connection long past our graduation from Smith College. Over the years I learned that bureaucracy marks the life of a graduate student. The administrative team that keeps the Anthropology department running, in particular Ms. Suphronia Cheek, deserves acknowledgement larger than I can express for answering my endless vii questions and making sure I stayed on track. Ms. Suphronia’s good cheer, smiles, and deep institutional knowledge guided me with patience and composure. I extend heartfelt thanks to Su and Ofra, who fell naturally into the role of surrogate parents during my 16 months in Israel, taking me in for “weekends away” from my research, inviting me to protests and rallies, showing me Israel from their (many) perspectives, and keeping the invitation open even after my return to the US. Additionally, the extended Moses and Lustig families invited me for dinners and holidays, warmly opening their homes to me. Hagar Moses and Ariel Lustig became dear friends and close companions in the city where I did research, infusing my few free moments with long talks in cafes, wandering walks, explanations of Israel’s pop culture, and touring me all around Israel while displaying their incredible generosity. I owe a debt of gratitude to Mary Crane and the teachers at the Lerner School where my spouse, Arielle, has worked for the past seven years. They exemplify the meaning of community in the support they extend to Arielle and our family. They have been especially understanding of our efforts to learn the rhythms of being new parents, both of whom work. Even more so, Mary and the Lerner staff have maintained a belief that my research is important, which means more to me than I think they will ever know. I give endless thanks for, and to, my dynamic and supportive dissertation committee. Michele Rivkin-Fish, Peter Redfield, Rebecca Stein, Chris Nelson, Jim Peacock, and Jocelyn Lim Chua provided invaluable insights and reflections on my ideas and writing, guiding me through every bend in the road with intellect, patience, and compassion. They made time for meetings in their busy schedules, gave consistently thoughtful and meaningful advice, and regularly reiterated their willingness to assist me throughout this long process. Michele Rivkin- viii Fish truly advised me in her capacity as the chair of my dissertation committee, always finding time to work through ideas, provide suggestions, read drafts, improve my writing, and to steadily encourage my progress. From seminar papers to grant proposals to preparing my dissertation, Michele reliably offered her support. Additionally, over the last eight years, Peter Redfield kept his door open, his smile warm, his humor well-timed, and his questions insightful, keeping perspective constantly in the picture. My spouse, Arielle, not only supported my studies and research at every turn, but she believed in it whole-heartedly, which is a gift beyond compare. There are no words adequate to express my gratitude for all the ways she met the challenges that my graduate school years introduced into our lives, from moving from Manhattan to Chapel Hill, accompanying me to Israel for the first year of my fieldwork, and maintaining her daily willingness to do whatever requires doing. Arielle read endless drafts of seminar papers, grant proposals, and dissertation chapters over the years, providing her critiques and perspectives. She knows my research inside and out, and her willingness to talk through every idea and challenge never flags. She calmly managed my periods of frustrated silences, the days when I talked endlessly in circles about little details, and gracefully took on many long weekends of childcare duties as I worked behind the closed door of my office. However, I want to thank Arielle the most for putting her trust in me as my research lead us into complex territory, and her willingness to open herself and her thinking to what we both discovered along that road. For that, she has my utmost respect and gratitude. On a daily basis since 2012, my son has reminded me of the larger world beyond my computer and the books that surround my desk.