BIGSSS-departs Ph.D. Fellow, Cohort 2017

Research Interests

• Sociology of the Family
• Intersectionality
• Elderly-Care Arrangements
• Gender and Social Policy
• Feminist Methodology
• Life Course Research

Dissertation topic
The Employment of Migrant Care Workers in Turkey’s Live-in Long-Term Care: A Kaleidoscopic Perspective on Everyday Negotiations

Dissertation abstract
This doctoral thesis, titled The Employment of Migrant Care Workers in Turkey’s Live-in Long-Term Care: A Kaleidoscopic Perspective on Everyday Negotiations, explores the organisation of home-based eldercare in Turkey through the lens of transnational, gendered labour. It examines how caregiving arrangements are negotiated and practised in a context shaped by familialistic norms, insufficient public support, and increasing reliance on migrant care workers (MCWs). The study draws on qualitative fieldwork conducted in Istanbul, comprising 44 in-depth, problem-centred interviews with three intersecting actor groups: migrant care workers from Georgia, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan; and family-employers (older adults and their children), as well as a small number of interviews with recruitment agency managers. This research contributes to the growing literature on migrant care work by offering a situated analysis of how labour relations and caregiving practices unfold within domestic settings. Moving beyond employer–employee binaries, the thesis examines care as a relational field shaped by emotional labour, classed and gendered expectations, and socio-cultural boundaries. It traces how personal trajectories, migration routes, and intergenerational dynamics intersect in the everyday negotiation of care. The study is situated at the intersection of welfare studies, feminist research on migrant care labour, and migration studies, engaging with and contributing to debates across these overlapping fields. Rather than framing care work as a fixed contractual exchange, the thesis conceptualises the arrangement as kaleidoscopic—dynamic, hybrid, and fragile, shaped by mutual dependencies and shifting power asymmetries. Through attention to moments of silence, resistance, adjustment, and moral framing, the study reveals how care is sustained in the absence of formal regulation. Migrant women navigate this terrain through a combination of agency and vulnerability, while family-employers rely on culturally and emotionally charged frameworks to manage and make sense of these complex relationships. Older adults, often excluded from overt decision-making, nonetheless assert influence through subtle cues and moral expectations. By foregrounding how care is practised, contested, and negotiated within the intimate yet hierarchical space of the home, the thesis contributes a nuanced understanding of live-in care in contexts of informality, insecurity, and everyday uncertainty. It extends existing literature on transnational care by offering empirical insight into a middle-income setting often overlooked in global debates. In doing so, the thesis conceptualises care as a continuously negotiated social relationship rather than as a stable or clearly bounded arrangement.

Academic Supervisors
Karin Gottschall
Yasemin Karakasoglu
Prof. Sibel Kalaycioglu