University of Wisconsin Milwaukee UWM Digital Commons Theses and Dissertations December 2014 Caring and Cleaning "On Par": the Work of Au Pairs & Housecleaners in the Chicagoland Area Anna Kuroczycka Schultes University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Follow this and additional works at: https://dc.uwm.edu/etd Part of the United States History Commons, and the Women's Studies Commons Recommended Citation Kuroczycka Schultes, Anna, "Caring and Cleaning "On Par": the Work of Au Pairs & Housecleaners in the Chicagoland Area" (2014). Theses and Dissertations. 630. https://dc.uwm.edu/etd/630 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by UWM Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of UWM Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. CARING AND CLEANING “ON PAR”: THE WORK OF AU PAIRS & HOUSECLEANERS IN THE CHICAGOLAND AREA by Anna Kuroczycka Schultes A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English at The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee December 2014 ABSTRACT CARING AND CLEANING “ON PAR”: THE WORK OF AU PAIRS & HOUSECLEANERS IN THE CHICAGOLAND AREA by Anna Kuroczycka Schultes The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2014 Under the Supervision of Professor Rachel I. Buff Immigrant domestic workers are perceived as highly exploitable and expendable employees, yet they are entangled in a very complex global exchange of services. The main purpose of this study will be to revise existing knowledge and assumptions about the female migrant service sector, especially within the field of domestic and care labor, by comparing the work of au pairs with housecleaners. Although these two forms of work appear to have many similarities on the surface, they are actually at opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of visibility and regulation. Unlike the highly regulated nature of au pair work and its history as work for the middle class, housecleaners operate in an entirely unregulated market for undocumented immigrant workers. I argue that the au pair program, the most prestigious form of care labor, was initiated after the Immigration and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA) in order to provide a legal and regulated space for care workers that also secured access to distinction and exempted a very few temporary workers from the worst depredations of neoliberal service work. My findings in this study are a result of mixed methods research - based on my own interviews with au pairs and housecleaners in the Chicagoland area - but also on literary representations, theory, and the qualitative work of others. ii © Copyright by Anna Kuroczycka Schultes, 2014 All Rights Reserved iii To my daughter Adriana, husband Scott, and my parents - for their unwavering love and support iv TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE Introduction………………………………………………………………………………1 Chapter 1: Caring & Cleaning “On Par”: The Reproduction of Social Class…………..32 Chapter 2: Migration Policies & “Female-friendly” Labor………………………….......87 Chapter 3: Stratification of Domestic Labor: Mothering Woes and Employer/Caregiver Roles……………………………………………………………………………………119 Conclusion: Implications for Further Research on Feminist Labor, Migration & Cultural Exchange………………………………………………………………………………..151 Works Cited…………………………………………………………………………….157 Appendix A: Au Pair Interview Questions ………...…………………………………..173 Appendix B: Housecleaner Survey – English…………………………………………..176 Appendix C: Housecleaners Survey – Polish…………………………………………..183 Appendix D: Housecleaner Interview Questions – English……………………………190 Appendix E: Housecleaner Interview Questions – Polish……………………………...191 Appendix F: Number of J-1 Visa Recipients by State & Category, 2012……………...192 Appendix G: Au Pair Sending Countries……………………………………………….211 Curriculum Vitae……………………………………………………………………….212 v LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: Source: http://culturalcareaupair.com/costs/program-costs/ ………….. 61 Figure 2: Source: http://culturalcareaupair.com/costs/discounts/ ……………….... 61 vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS To start, I would like to thank my chair, Rachel Buff, who took my project on somewhat unexpectedly and sought it through till the end. Rachel, I greatly appreciate the thoughtful comments you brought to each edit of the paper and am indebted to you not only for your expertise within the history of immigration but also for guiding me to draw certain conclusions about findings that I had previously not considered. I could not have even started this study without the help of Rachel Spilka, my advisee in the early stages of the project, who helped shape a solid foundation for what ended up turning into a dissertation. Thank you for teaching me everything I know about research methodology. I would also like to thank Aneesh Aneesh for always being unbelievably encouraging and willing to lend a hand on any paper that I happened to be working on. You guided me to dive into my research from a more sociological perspective, opening up multiple avenues of inquiry. Lastly, I would like to thank Professors KumKum Sangari and Gwynne Kennedy who throughout the course of the preliminary exam process made me realize how passionate I am about becoming a female migration scholar. Many thanks are also in order for Ewa Łuczak, my master’s thesis advisor at the University of Warsaw in Poland, for being one of the first professors who truly made me excited about the potential of spending my life in academia and who encouraged me to traverse uncharted territories in my early studies of popular African American literature. I would like to believe that this dissertation was first born in early childhood when I was a Polish immigrant in the United States. My mother, Irena Kuroczycka-Saniutycz, vii M.D., Ph.D. and father, Stefan Kuroczycki-Saniutycz, M.D., Ph.D., always fostered a tremendous culture of learning in our household regardless of the circumstances. Mama, I have always been in awe of your intelligence, strength, beauty and wisdom. Tata, your knowledge of all things public health related never ceases to astound me. But most importantly, thank you both from the bottom of my heart for helping me take care of Adriana throughout the course of many, many months spent writing and editing at the library and local coffee shops. Without your help, I have no doubt that this project would not have been possible. Dziękuję. Most importantly, I would like to thank the two loves of my life: my husband, Scott, and my daughter, Adriana. Scott, thank you for your unwavering support over the past six years of graduate school and your commitment to seeing this doctorate through till the end. I am so lucky to be married to someone who truly understands what it means to be passionate about one’s goals and dedicated to their success. Lastly, I dedicate this project to my daughter and my inspiration – Adriana. Your unconditional love, inner beauty and fiercely precocious nature make every day worth living. Thank you. viii 1 Introduction Suburbanization, along with the increasing number of dual-income families in the second half of the twentieth century, has resulted in an increased number of women who can no longer manage to take care of the household by themselves. Many migrant women, whether documented or undocumented, have taken up domestic work, which now constitutes a major niche within the global economy, especially in the United States. A number of neoliberal policies implemented by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, i.e. policies aimed at reducing government spending in order to enhance the role of the private sector, such as devaluing of local currency, the cutting of social services, and imposing wage freezes, have been acting as “push” and “pull” factors in attracting migration out of one country and into another (Pyle 290). The adjustment of immigration policies in the United States has been one of the “pull” factors attracting immigrants to domestic work.1 In this dissertation, I examine the much-debated experiences of immigrant women from diverse backgrounds who are domestic and care workers in order to revise existing knowledge and assumptions about the female migrant service sector, especially within the field of domestic and care labor.2 Female immigrant domestic workers are entangled in a very complex global exchange of services. Domestic work, a term which encompasses babysitters, nannies, housekeepers, housecleaners, and caretakers, amongst others, can be performed in both a live-in and live-out capacity. Live-in domestics are 1 The impact of immigration policies on migrating women will be discussed in a subsequent chapter. 2 For the purpose of this dissertation, I will use these terms “domestic worker” and “care worker” interchangeably. 2 reported as receiving the worst treatment from their employers because of their constant availability, and are perceived negatively by other domestic workers who live-out and pursue the same type of employment. In order to scrutinize the reasons behind gendered migration for domestic work purposes, I focus specifically on two types of laborers: au pairs and housecleaners. Due to the great variety of jobs conducted in and around the house, I limit my discussion in this dissertation to those introduced by Pierette Hondagneu-Sotelo and Ernestine Avila’s tripartite taxonomy of domestic work arrangements: live-in and live-out nanny3 and housekeeper jobs and weekly housecleaning jobs (554), and add au pairs to the picture. Au pairs need to be foreign nationals, between