Labor precariousness, race and gender: brazilian women immigrants and the portuguese labor market

Abstract

The main objective of this dissertation is to investigate work’s centrality on Brazilian women’s entrance in the Portuguese labor market. Two principal axes support the analysis: the current labor market transformation and the feminization of the immigration flow. The recent global geopolitical transformations resulted, inter alia, in the increase of economic inequality among countries, the restructuring of the modes of production, the intensification of the labor precarization process, to the decentralization of the production and to the opening of domestic economies to an international market, directly affecting the international flow of migration. Based on this transformation and its impact on labor, this study examines the immigration of Brazilian women and its relation to the Portuguese labor market. Regarding methodology, a qualitative approach was chosen, and 21 in-depth interviews were carried out with Brazilian women, from 25 to 35 years old, who work or used to work in Portugal. The Critical Discourse Analysis was used to analyze these interviews, as discourse analysis allows access to symbolical structures that forge and frame everyday life. The understanding of the process of discourse formation took priority over interpretation.