Au Pairs, Nannies and Babysitters: Paid Care as a Temporary Life Course Experience in Slovakia and in the UK. Issue 1 (July 2019)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Búriková, Zuzana Sekeráková
• Other Names: Andrijasevic Rutvica guest-editor.; Gregg Melissa guest-editor.
• Is Part Of: Feminist review. Volume 122:Issue 1(2019)
• Page Start: 80
• Page End: 94
• Publication Date: 2019-07
• Subjects: paid childcare -- au pairs -- nannies -- temporariness -- migration regime -- welfare regime; Feminism -- Periodicals; 305.4205
• DOI: 10.1177/0141778919848636
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0141-7789

Abstract

This article argues that intersectional analyses of care work also need to include a temporal aspect. Drawing on ethnographic research on Slovak au pairs working in the UK and on interviews with both providers and employers of paid childcare in Slovakia, I examine how the temporariness of care work is created within both migrant and non-migrant settings. In particular, I demonstrate that both employers and providers conceptualise paid childcare as a temporary period in their lives and show the consequences of this conceptualisation in their valuing of care work. In both examined cases, I focus on the role of care/welfare and migration regimes in the production of temporariness in care work and argue that both providers and employers of paid care construct their involvement in domestic work as a specific life course experience. While for au pairs, working stays in the UK represent a specific transition period from adolescence to adulthood, employers in Slovakia decide to employ particular types of domestic workers in relation to the particular developmental phases of their families and households.