The paradox of “skill”: a study of gendered experiences of North Indian women migrant workers in United Arab Emirates (UAE)

This research paper examines how does “skill” shape gendered experiences of the North Indian female migrants working in Information and Technology (IT) sector in UAE at the intersections of gender, class, race, nationality. To understand this, the paper explores valuation and devaluation of skill in the home and host country. Drawing the social construction of skill framework (Steinberg, 1990; Liu-Farrer et al., 2021) and intersectionality (Crenshaw, 1989), this study analyses how skill recognition is mediated through gendered expectations operating at multiple scales. The study uses the primary data collected from qualitative interviewing and secondary data sources. Through examining the case of North Indian female migrants working in IT sector in UAE, this study demonstrates how gendered skill recognition operates across professional contexts in both home and host countries. It contributes to migration scholarship by revealing how public discourse on skilled migration reproduces gender hierarchies through ostensibly neutral categories of skill and merit.