A CHAMBERED NAUTILUS - THE CONTRADICTORY NATURE OF PUERTO-RICAN WOMENS-ROLE IN THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF A TRANSNATIONAL COMMUNITY

Recent transnational migration literature does not sufficiently explor e women's role in the development of transnational communities. By ana lyzing 30 interviews with Puerto Rican migrant and return migrant wome n, the author shows that women, through subsistence production, play a significant role in the social construction of transnational communit ies. By using a transnational perspective and placing migrant women's subsistence work and its contradictory nature at the center of her ana lysis, the author challenges studies that assume that maintaining ties to homelands leads to freedom for all family members, moves away from home/host binary frameworks of immigrant women's experiences that loc ate greater gender oppression in home countries and more freedom in ho st societies, and explores women's complex perceptions of home.