South Asian Women Essay

South Asian women feel the pressure to take on the “good mother” role because of the lack of support they have. It is evident that South Asian women lack support, however they need assistance in finding appropriate coping strategies with stress at home (George & Ramkissoon, 1998, p.115). South Asian families have strong emotional ties and have dependency among parents, children and siblings (Elliot, 1996, as cited in George & Ramkissoon, 1998, p.114). A lot of South Asian households have generations of a family living together this is for economic and cultural reasons (George & Ramkissoon,1998, p.114). Das Gupta (1994) argues that when immigrant families living in Canada sponsor an elderly parent, sibling or some sort of relative the burden …show more content…
The stress is too much” (p.115). Therefore, most of the pressure is put on South Asian mothers to be “good mothers” and take on the caretaker role. “In South Asian countries, for instance domestic labor is often performed by servants Spitzer., 2003, p.280). The lack of kin support and the demands of often inflexible and poorly waged employment often creates stress for women and for family members Spitzer et., 2003, p.280). “The more money people have available to them, the more they are able and inclined, to purchase services and labour instead of doing the work themselves” (Luxton, 2014, p.355). However, even in some South Asian households where finance was not an issue families did not want to hire assistance for domestic service and caretaking responsibilities (Spitzer et al., 2003 p.282). This mainly has to do with “traditional patriarchal beliefs in the South Asian community determine that women bear most of the responsibility for providing support and sustenance to the family (George & Ramkissoon, 1998, p.114). Policies, the cutbacks on government programs and services expect women will take on the familial caregiving responsibilities making childcare and domestic labour a private matter (Spitzer et al., 2003,