Handapangoda, Wasana (Head) / Aulenbacher, Brigitte (Mentor)
Lise Meitner-Grant
Project M 2724-G
11/2019-04/2023
Ideal’ Migrant Subjects: Domestic Service in Globalization
Applicant: Wasana Sampath Handapangoda
Co-applicant: Brigitte Aulenbacher
Funded by the Austrian Science Fund FWF
159.340 €

‘Ideal’ Migrant Subjects: Domestic Service in Globalization

Project content: This project will examine and understand the processes, reasons, and consequences of forming ideal migrant subjects in the global care market based on the migration of women in Sri Lanka to the Middle East as domestic workers. In doing so, it will look at the wider societal practices engaged in the discourse of ideal migrant subjects, including employers, recruiters, brokers, state and non-state agencies, and migrant domestic workers themselves, who attach varying and often overlapping and competing meanings and uses to transnational domestic work.

Research questions: Three research questions are attempted: Who are ideal migrant subjects? How are they created and on what basis? What are the economic, social, cultural, and political implications of ideal migrant subjects?

Methods: This project will use post-structuralist, ethnographic fieldwork method, which acknowledges that people structure, describe, and give meaning to their lives through narratives over which they hold power. Thus, taking an interpretive and participatory approach to exploring the phenomenon of ideal migrant subjects, this project will examine migration of Sri Lankan domestic workers to Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, a popular transnational route for Sri Lankan domestic workers in the global care market. Through the integration of different actors engaged in the discourse, a participant text of both the subject and subjectivities will be created.

Originality and innovation: First, this rests with the context of research chosen. Given the social, cultural, and political contexts, the Middle East represents a distinct regime of domestic care, which contrasts with those existing in the Global North and newly industrialized Asia. Exploring the Middle Eastern care regime, which is theoretically and politically demanding, will allow for an understanding of the localized dynamics of globalization in forming ideal migrant subjects. Second, by integrating intermediate collectives—social groups that defy straightforward racial categorization: nonwhite/nonblack, but brown—and thus brownness as a racial construct, this project will contribute to mainstream scholarship on race and its intersections with other forms of social inequality in producing ideal migrant subjects. Third, this project will bring together and examine the wider societal practices engaged in the discourse of migrant subjects and thus the complex power relations and power dynamics played out in the global market in creating ideal migrant subjects. Finally, this project will collaborate with an ongoing FWF-project, “Decent Care Work? Transnational Home Care Arrangements”, headed by this project’s mentor, which is part of a D-A-CH-collaboration with partner projects in Frankfurt and Zurich addressing similar questions. This will result in an exchange between the two care regimes in the discourse of migrant subjects.

Applicant and head: Dr. Wasana Handapangoda
Co-applicant and mentor: Prof. Dr. Brigitte Aulenbacher
Johannes Kepler University Linz, Institute of Sociology, Department for the Theory of Society and Social Analyses, Altenberger Str. 69, 4040 Linz, Austria
Funding: Austrian Science Fund FWF, Project M 2724-G, 11/2019-04/2023

2011 Ph.D. in Global Society Studies, Doshisha University, Japan
2006 M.Sc. in Management, University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka
2003 Certificate in Teaching in Higher Education, University of Colombo, Sri Lanka/Staff and Educational Development Association (SEDA), United Kingdom
2000 B.Sc. Management (Public Special), University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka

Academic Positions
Since 03.2013-   Senior Lecturer (Grade I), Department of Business Economics, Faculty of Management Studies and Commerce, University Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka
03.2007 - 02.2013  Senior Lecturer (Grade II), Department of Business Economics, Faculty of Management Studies and Commerce, University Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka
03.2002 - 02.2007 Lecturer (Probationary), Department of Business Economics, Faculty of Management Studies and Commerce, University Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka
06.2001 - 02.2002  Lecturer (Temporary), Department of Public Administration, Faculty of Management Studies and Commerce, University Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka
11.2000 - 05.2001  Tutor, Department of Public Administration, Faculty of Management Studies and Commerce, University Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka

Visiting Academic/Research Positions
10.2014 - 03.2015 Resident Scholar, Stout Research Centre for New Zealand Studies, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand
07.2014 - 09.2014 Visiting Researcher, School of Social and Cultural Studies, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand
04.2013 - 10.2013 Visiting Lecturer, Postgraduate Institute of Medicine, University of Colombo, Sri Lanka
05.2006 - 09.2006 Visiting Lecturer, Department of Social Sciences, Kotalawala Defence University, Sri Lanka
05.2003 - 07.2003 Visiting Lecturer, Faculty of Engineering, University of Moratuwa, Sri Lanka

Important Appreciations
Academic Awards/Prizes
10.2007- 03.2011 Japanese Government (MEXT) Scholarship for doctoral studies in Japan
09.2005 Award for the best conference paper (Recognizing Violence agaist Women as an Obstacle to Organizational Peace and Development: A New Vision for an Old Issue), International Research Conference on Management and Finance (IRCMF), University of Colombo, Sri Lanka

Academic Lektures
08.12.2008/10.12.2008/11.12.2008 Identifying Gender in the Concept of Human Security/Gender Inequality, Women’s Empowerment and Human Capabilities/ Feminization of International Labour Migration: An Analysis of Gains and Drains with Reference to Asian Female Labour Migrants to Middle-Eastern States, International Teaching Programme on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), Graduate School of International Development (GSID), Nagoya University, Japan and Department of Political Science, University of Colombo, Sri Lanka
17.06.2019  Sri Lankan Women Migrant Workers to the Gulf States: Searching for Empowerment and Autonomy, Graduate School of Global Studies (GSGS), Doshisha University, Japan

Review and Editiorial Activities
Reviewer, Community, work & family, Routledge, 2022
Reviewer, Gender, Technology and Development (GTD), SAGE, 2021, 2022
Co-editor, The Sri Lanka Forum of Junior Business Economists (SLFJBE), Department of Business Economics, University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka, 2021
Reviewer, Current Sociology, SAGE, 2020
Since 2016/2012-2014 Executive Editor, Sri Lankan Journal of Business Economics (SLJBE), Department of Business Economics, University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka
2019  Reviewer, Journal of Heritage Tourism, Routledge
2019  Reviewer, Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change, Routledge
2018/2019 Reviewer, Vidyodaya Journal of Management, Faculty of Management Studies and Commerce, University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka
2016 Reviewer, Journal of Cultural Geography, Routledge
2016 Reviewer, Gender, Technology and Development, Sage
2015  Co-Editor, Inclusive Growth towards Economic Transformation. Sri Lanka Economics Research Conference (SLERC), Volume IV, Sri Lanka Forum of University Economists, Sri Lanka
2012 Reviewer, Annual Conference of Network of Asia-Pacific Schools and Institutes of Public Administration and Governance (NAPSIPAG)

Memperships
Since 2012 Lifetime Member, Sri Lanka Forum of University Economists
Since 2007 Lifetime Member, National Science Foundation (NSF), Sri Lanka

Funded Projects
2011-2012 Preserving Culture or Adopting Change? Exploring the Value of Culture as a Means to Sustainable Development: The Case of Traditional Wooden Mask Industry in Southern Sri Lanka (Principal Applicant), University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka. Reference no:  ASP/06/RE/MGT/2012/11 (Total LKR 250,000.00)

Editorships of Journals:
Sri Lankan Journal of Business Economics (SLJBE) (2016-/2012/2014), Department of Business Economics, University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka, Executive Editor.

Articles in Journals:

Handapangoda, W. S. (2022). “Brokered domestic work: The Sri Lanka-Saudi market”. Global Dialogue 12(3), Magazine of the International Sociological Association (ISA).

Handapangoda, W. S. (2022). “Shaping life chances of migrant workers: The role of migration brokers in Sri Lankan migrant domestics’ sojourns in Arab States” (Accepted and in progress). Migration and Social Policy, Sozialpolitik.ch

Handapangoda, W. S. (2021). “Reproducing ‘self’ and ‘other’ in the micropolitics of paid domestic labour: Sri Lankan migrant domestic workers in Saudi Arabia” (Accepted), Anthology of Migration and Work, edited by Lisa Carstensen, Peter Birke, Lisa Riedner and Nikolai Huke, Beltz Juventa

Handapangoda, W. S./ Madduma Bandara, Y. M. H. / Anura Kumara, U. (2019).  Exploring Tradition in Heritage Tourism: The Experience of Sri Lanka’s Traditional Mask Art. International Journal of Heritage Studies: Routledge (Print). https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13527258.2018.1481132, öffnet eine externe URL in einem neuen Fenster

Handapangoda, W. S./ Madduma Bandara, Y. M. H. / Anura Kumara, U. (2018).  Exploring Tradition in Heritage Tourism: The Experience of Sri Lanka’s Traditional Mask Art. International Journal of Heritage Studies: Routledge (Online). https://doi.org/10.1080/13527258.2018.1481132, öffnet eine externe URL in einem neuen Fenster

Handapangoda, W. S./Kumara, A. S. (2017). The World at Her Fingertips? Examining the Empowerment Potential of Mobile Phones to Women in Sri Lanka, The Case of Dependent Housewives. Gender, Technology and Development, 17(3), 361-385: Routledge (Online). https://doi.org/10.1177/0971852413498742, öffnet eine externe URL in einem neuen Fenster

Handapangoda, W. S./Withanawasam, M. P. K./Madukala, J. I./Saparamadu, A. A. D.T. (2016). Caught between Extremes: The Culture and Economics of Traditional Mask Art in Contemporary Sri Lanka, Journal of Cultural Geography, 33(2), 181-207: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.1080/08873631.2015.1133174, öffnet eine externe URL in einem neuen Fenster

Handapangoda, W. S. (2015). Identity Production on Social Media: The Narrative of Second-generation Youth of Sinhalese Sri Lankan Origin in New Zealand, Journal of New Zealand Studies, 21, 37-52. https://doi.org/10.26686/jnzs.v0i21.3905, öffnet eine externe URL in einem neuen Fenster

Handapangoda, W. S. (2014). Is Transnational Labour Migration Empowering for Women? Re-evaluating the Case of Married Sri Lankan Domestic Maids. Indian Journal of Gender Studies, 21(3), 353-377: Sage. https://doi.org/10.1177/0971521514540704, öffnet eine externe URL in einem neuen Fenster

Handapangoda, W. S./Kumara, A. S.  (2013). The World at Her Fingertips? Examining the Empowerment Potential of Mobile Phones to Women in Sri Lanka, The Case of Dependent Housewives. Gender, Technology and Development, 17(3), 361-385: Sage (Print).  https://doi.org/10.1177/0971852413498742, öffnet eine externe URL in einem neuen Fenster

Contributions to Edited Volumes:
Perera, M. S. S./ Handapangoda, W. S./Lalanie, P. P./Sriyalatha, M. A. K./Fernando, P. J. S. (ed.) (2015). Inclusive Growth towards Economic Transformation. Sri Lanka Economics Research Conference (SLERC), Volume IV, Sri Lanka Forum of University Economists, Sri Lanka.

Other:
Handapangoda, W. S. (2019). A Retrospective-Perspective: Re-evaluating the Meaning of Gender in Disaster Risk Governance in Post-Tsunami Sri Lanka. Paper presneted at the 20th Spring Conference, Japan Association for International Development (JASID), Rikuzentakata, Japan, 15th June 2019.

Department of Geography, University of Zurich, Switzerland, 13^th December, 2022. Title: “The realities of work, life and identity formation: The case of Sri Lankan migrant domestic workers in the Gulf”

Department of Sociology, University of Ca' Foscari, Venice, Italy, 6^th December, 2023. Title: “The work-life realities in the domestic workplace: The case of Sri Lankan live-in migrant domestic workers in the
Arabian Gulf” 

The Sociology and Geography Colloquium, The Department of Sociology and Human Geography and the Forum Asia Pacific, Paris Lodron University of Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria, 19^th November, 2023. Title: “Constructing ‘self’ and ‘other’ in the micropolitics of housework: Sri Lankan migrant domestics in the
Saudi private household” 

Early Millennial Transformations: Integration, Inequality, and Insecurity in Europe and the World Conference organized by the Central European University (CEU) and the Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies (wiiw), Austria, 22^nd-23^rd September, 2022. Co-presented with Brigitte Aulenbacher, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria. Title: “The Global Brokerage of Domestic Services and Social Inequalities: The Austrian and Sri Lankan Case Compared”

Department for the Theory of Society and Social Analyses, Institute of Sociology, Johannes Kepler University, Austria, 7^th December, 2021. Title: “Brokered domestic work and home care: The case of Sri Lanka”

XX International Sociology Association (ISA) Congress, Melbourne, Australia, 25 June – 1 July, 2023. Title: “Precarious Resistance in the Transnational Labour Market: The Lived Experiences of Sri Lankan Migrant Domestic Maids in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait” (Accepted)

IV International Sociology Association (ISA) Forum, Porto Alegre, Brazil. 14-18 July 2020. Title: “(Re)Producing the Meaning of Domestic Work in the ‘Middle Space’: The Case of Transnational Migration Brokerage in Sri Lanka” (Accepted)

ESA RN01 Ageing in Europe Midterm Conference 2020 at University of Jyväskylä, Finland, 26-28 August 2020. Title: Finding agency in a context of victimization: Sri Lankan migrant domestic workers in Gulf States (Accepted)