Work

Conceptualizing grassroots empowerment for migrant women through distributed agency

Year: 2026

Type: article

Abstract: In this paper, I explore the relationship between discourse, empowerment and material provisions through the ethnographic case of a shelter for migrant domestic workers in Hong Kong. I use the theoretical notions of distributed agency and rechronotopization and argue that these theories illuminate how the discursive imaginations of this shelter, as well as the practices that sustain it, challenge neoliberal visions of empowerment. While neoliberal empowerment assumes agency resides primarily within the individual, the account presented here illustrates the distributed nature of the agency behind grassroots empowerment, and the importance of discursively and materially (re)configured space-time to this empowerment.

Source: Discourse Studies

DOI: 10.1177/14614456261501310

Author: Lydia Catedral

Institution: Hong Kong Polytechnic University

Language: English

Topic: Cultural and political discourse analysis

Subfield: Linguistics and Language

Field: Social Sciences

Domain: Social Sciences

SDGs: Reduced inequalities, Gender equality, Peace, justice, and strong institutions

Open Access status: hybrid

Estimated APC paid: $3,650