Circuitous Pathways

Marriage as a Route toward (Il)Legality for Indonesian Migrant Workers in Malaysia

Datos Bibliográficos

ID11147239
AutoresH L Chee (0000-0001-6731-8724, National University of Singapore, autor de correspondencia), Chee Heng Leng (National University of Singapore), B S A Yeoh (0000-0002-0240-3175, National University of Singapore), Rashidah Shuib (Universiti Sains Malaysia)
Año2012
Volumen21
Número3
Páginas317-344
Fecha de publicación2012-09-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaAsian and Pacific migration journal (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0117-1968 • E-ISSN: 2057-049X
EditorialSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/011719681202100303
OpenAlexW2035958791
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas8
Referencias citadas15

This paper addresses the disjuncture between an immigration regime that seeks to prevent unskilled migrant workers from marrying citizens, and the reality that many are actually able to carve a marital pathway toward legality of residence. Beginning from the premise that the state constructs (il)legality through laws and policies, we draw from 38 interviews conducted among Indonesian migrant workers and their citizen spouses in Malaysia to highlight the agency of migrants and local citizens in reconfiguring and reshaping this construction. Locating our discussion within the migration literature that challenges the construction of legality and illegality as rigidly separate and non-overlapping zones, we trace the circuitous marital pathways that our interviewees forge toward (il)legality as they navigate through blurred categories of legal and illegal, wife and worker. State institutionalization of marriage has produced its own ambiguities, and a marriage can be religiously valid even if not officially registered. Societal ambiguities arise from the tensions between what is valid according to religion and custom and what is prohibited according to state policy. These ambiguities allow for the institutionalization of a marital pathway, though complicated and circuitous, from temporary legality and illegality toward (il)legality of residence, though not necessarily toward full membership in the nation

Agency (philosophy · Indonesian · Political science · Premise · Principle of legality · Residence · Social science · Sociology · State (computer science · Asian Studies and History · Gender Studies · Law · Migration and Labor Dynamics · Migration, Refugees, and Integration