Contract workers from the Philippines make up one of the world's largest movements of temporary labor migrants. Deirdre McKay follows Filipino migrants from one rural community to work sites overseas and then home again. Focusing on the experiences of individuals, McKay interrogates current approaches to globalization, multi-sited research, subjectivity, and the village itself. She shows that rather than weakening village ties, temporary labor migration gives the village a new global dimension created in and through the relationships, imaginations, and faith of its members in its potential as a site for a better future.
What People Are Saying
"A unique and important study that adds a refreshing and necessary reminder that, on the most fundamental level, a village is part of the global world." Nicole Constable, author of Maid to Order in Hong Kong: Stories of Migrant Workers
"A luminous, elegant, and well-argued multi-sited ethnographic study." Martin F. Manalansan IV, author of Global Divas: Filipino Gay Men in the Diaspora
"The problems of overseas Filipino workers with loneliness; long absences from spouses, children, and other relatives; abuse by employers and governments; and efforts to use their time and talent to further individual opportunities are understood easily in McKay's monograph. The photos of her Filipino informants . . . add a human touch to the topic of overseas workers. . . . Recommended." Choice
"McKay's study makes for fascinating and recommendable reading, well beyond the realm of Filipino specialists or of migration scholars more broadly. Development, mobility, emotion, home, and home-making are all research areas to which Global Filipinos has much to contribute and inspire." International Journal of Comparative Sociology
"Global Filipinos is more than an ethnography of migration. Covering large theoretical and disciplinary ground, McKay presents an engaging and important study on wider questions of what it means to live and cope at the margins of development economies, national identities and transnational citizenship." Social Anthropology
"This in-depth and well-written narrative provides a rare glimpse into the lives of individuals shaped by globalization and migration. It also raises critical questions about the concept of a virtual village in which migrants' lives are enmeshed. It is especially recommended for readers interested in anthropology and cultural studies." Sojourn
"This book is a refreshing departure from more conventional tales of Filipino migration . . . [T]aking an avowedly anthropological approach . . . McKay's book builds from a village study; . . . The book is an important contribution nor only to debates on migration and development, but also as an exemplar of multi-sited ethnography and the study of emotion and affect. . . [T]his text should be required reading for scholars of migration and development, and indeed for anyone wishing to learn more about the implications of global mobilities in a globalizing Southeast Asia." Aseasuk News
"Global Filipinos is a significant contribution to the literature on global migration and diaspora. It likewise provides a crucial and timely corrective to Eurocentric studies of affect, subjectivity and cosmopolitanism. . . . By chronicling how a village 'extends into the world' . . . , Global Filipinos succeeds in reminding us anew that the world makes itself known and felt through the dynamics of the village." Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography
"A luminous, elegant, and well-argued multi-sited ethnographic study." Martin F. Manalansan IV, author of Global Divas: Filipino Gay Men in the Diaspora
"The problems of overseas Filipino workers with loneliness; long absences from spouses, children, and other relatives; abuse by employers and governments; and efforts to use their time and talent to further individual opportunities are understood easily in McKay's monograph. The photos of her Filipino informants . . . add a human touch to the topic of overseas workers. . . . Recommended." Choice
"McKay's study makes for fascinating and recommendable reading, well beyond the realm of Filipino specialists or of migration scholars more broadly. Development, mobility, emotion, home, and home-making are all research areas to which Global Filipinos has much to contribute and inspire." International Journal of Comparative Sociology
"Global Filipinos is more than an ethnography of migration. Covering large theoretical and disciplinary ground, McKay presents an engaging and important study on wider questions of what it means to live and cope at the margins of development economies, national identities and transnational citizenship." Social Anthropology
"This in-depth and well-written narrative provides a rare glimpse into the lives of individuals shaped by globalization and migration. It also raises critical questions about the concept of a virtual village in which migrants' lives are enmeshed. It is especially recommended for readers interested in anthropology and cultural studies." Sojourn
"This book is a refreshing departure from more conventional tales of Filipino migration . . . [T]aking an avowedly anthropological approach . . . McKay's book builds from a village study; . . . The book is an important contribution nor only to debates on migration and development, but also as an exemplar of multi-sited ethnography and the study of emotion and affect. . . [T]his text should be required reading for scholars of migration and development, and indeed for anyone wishing to learn more about the implications of global mobilities in a globalizing Southeast Asia." Aseasuk News
"Global Filipinos is a significant contribution to the literature on global migration and diaspora. It likewise provides a crucial and timely corrective to Eurocentric studies of affect, subjectivity and cosmopolitanism. . . . By chronicling how a village 'extends into the world' . . . , Global Filipinos succeeds in reminding us anew that the world makes itself known and felt through the dynamics of the village." Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography