Making home from home : the transitional experience of South-African and Brazilian au pairs in the Netherlands

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MAKING HOME FROM HOME

The transitional experience of South-African and Brazilian au pairs in the Netherlands

Carine van der Leest

10432205

carine_vdleest@hotmail.com

MSc Cultural and Social Anthropology Anthropology Department, GSSS University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam 22/06/2018

Word count: 25136

Supervisor: Dr. Rob van Ginkel 2nd reader: Dr. Vincent de Rooij 3rd reader: Dr. Annemarie Mol

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Plagiarism declaration

I hereby confirm that I have read and understood the University of Amsterdam plagiarism policy. I declare that this thesis meets the rules and regulations regarding fraud and

plagiarism, that this assignment is entirely my own work and all sources have been properly acknowledged.

Carine van der Leest 22-06-2018

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Abstract

In this thesis I will discuss the everyday life experiences of Brazilian and South-African au pairs in the Netherlands. Au pairing is a complicated, yet interesting concept because of the ambiguous character of the au pair role. In this thesis I argue for a renewed view on the concepts of liminality and liminoidity by Victor Turner which sees the two as a continuum instead of a succession. I argue that au pairs find themselves in a state of liminality, that is; an ambiguous position where they are betwixt and between the stages of adolescence and

adulthood which is termed the phase of emerging adulthood. I consider the au pair program a liminoid phenomenon; a temporary break from society; which in turn contributes to the transition associated with their liminality. Because accepting responsibility for one’s self, making one’s own decisions and becoming (financially) independent are now considered the new markers of adulthood, I will show how this liminoid experience contributes to obtaining these markers, focussing on the ambiguities of being both/neither employee and family member, of being both/neither a motherly figure and a maternalised figure in the family, and their use of space. Moreover, by showing how former au pairs perceive themselves as changed people, I discuss how the process of return has allowed their obtained knowledge to be valorised. So, how do the au pairs experience and cope with the ambivalences of the in-between and how does the au pair program help them transit from a state of emerging adulthood to a state of young adulthood?

Keywords: au pair, rite de passage, liminality, liminoidity, domestic care work, kinship,

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Acknowledgements

I want to express my gratitude to all the au pairs who have participated in this research. Thank you for taking the time to talk to me, for telling me about your experiences and giving me an insight into your lives here in the Netherlands and back home. It was a real pleasure getting to know you better and hearing your fun stories. Thank you for sharing.

I also want to thank my colleagues at the agency. First of all for allowing me to use the

agency as a starting point in this research. Second, for showing interest while respecting the privacy of my data and for never expecting me to share this. Thank you for allowing me to maintain a strict division between my research and my work, I appreciate it a lot.

Furthermore I would like to thank all who have guided me throughout the process. I

want to thank my family and friends for their encouragement and for always being there to talk to. Most of all I want to thank my supervisor Rob van Ginkel for his help, meaningful insights and support. I am very grateful for your guidance throughout this process and your help in improving myself.

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INTRODUCTION

“A secret life”

You know what it is? I’m a little scared of moving back home. I’ve built my life up here, and of course you know from the start that it is only temporary, but this year has changed me so much that I don’t know how it’s going to feel when I’m back home. It’s like you have been living a secret life that no one in your surroundings really knows about. Like, of course they know that I was in the Netherlands, but they don’t know what it’s like, they haven’t met the same people, they haven’t seen where I lived. It has truly, truly been the best year in my life and now I have to go back to normal. But I’m not the same person, so how do I do that? [Paula, Brazil]

Having worked as an au pair myself I could relate so well to what Paula was saying. She had worked as an au pair in the Netherlands for almost a year and was about to leave the country when we had this conversation, and it triggered me to start writing about the au pair experience in the Netherlands. The au pair program has so much to offer girls, which is also why I started working at an au pair agency. I hope(d) to contribute to providing these young women a life changing experience. I don’t mean to say that the au pair year is an easy process. On the contrary, it’s a great challenge. But if you manage, it changes you forever. In this thesis I will be discussing the au pair

experiences of Brazilian and South-African au pairs in the Netherlands to shed light on these challenges and the outcomes hereof.

Starting point

While reading literature on the topics of domestic care work in general and au pairs in specific, I noticed two main points of inquiry. The first describes au pairs within the field of domestic care work and focuses thereby on the potential exploitation of au pairs when considering the discursive strategy to describe the au pair as another family member. The second point of inquiry describes the au pair experience in terms of a rite the passage, focusing on the reflexive and world-orientated minds of young au pairs who make the decision to move abroad in order to learn and grow. The first inquiry, however, seems to prevail, but in this thesis I hope to specifically contribute to the second.

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engagement of the other’s perspective into one’s own. Academics describing au pairs in terms of domestic laborers are lacking the view of au pairs as adventurous young voyagers in search of personal growth, whereas academics describing au pairs in terms of rite de passage pass by the everyday reality of domestic work that the au pair job actually involves. Within this thesis I hope to resolve this gap. Most importantly, I want to step away from the image of au pairs as “good workers” - who simply come here to do the jobs that natives do not want to do or do not have the skills to do – or “poor slaves” – exploited and victimised migrants who are duped into situations that can resemble modern slavery, the two approaches noticed by Bridget Anderson (2015: 637). In this thesis I want to emphasize the au pairs’ agency by showing how they live

through the ambivalences of their role in the family. Moreover, instead of showing how the au pair program only benefits families, I hope to show what it brings the girls themselves.

Outsourcing care in the family

Although the au pair program is officially described as a cultural exchange program, au pairs do in fact perform domestic care work. Because of the multitude of tasks – ranging from cleaning, groceries, cooking, to the care of children; picking up from school, arranging play-dates, taking a bath, bringing to bed - it seems hard to define what exactly is domestic care work. All in all it can be said to be those tasks performed in the household involving

processes of care, that is: ‘the activities provide what is necessary for the health, well-being, maintenance and protection of someone or something’ (Leboutte & Socias 2015: 1).

Domestic care work became an important topic for social scientists in the field of

feminism in the 1970s. They argued against the fact that domestic care work continued to be seen as unskilled and unpaid women’s work. This form of labour was considered “naturally” feminine, and seen as the independent responsibility of the nuclear family. Stemming from the breadwinner model of the first half of the 20th century where the husband is responsible for the family income and the wife is first and foremost housewife, care work was considered the natural task of a woman out of her position as mother of the family (de Ruijter 2004: 219). Domestic care work has also been termed ‘shadow work’ (Illich 1981). It is invisible work (shadowed), because it can’t easily be conceptualised in market exchange terms (MacDonald 1998: 31). In contrast, it was seen as stemming from emotional dispositions; labour for love instead of labour for money. This concern with housework’s productivity has been tackled by

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social scientists who argued for the reproductive power of this labour. ‘In order to centralise domestic labour some feminists have argued that it produces a commodity which is absolutely central to capitalism: labour power itself’ (Anderson 2000: 12). Furthermore, the specific form of care provided to children reproduces our society because it reflects assumptions on how children should behave, be disciplined, fed, and educated (Uttal 2010: 731).

The assumption that care work is the primary task of the mother has been challenged

by the increased outsourcing of care work in industrialized countries in the past few decades. Main reason for this is the growing participation of women in the labour market, causing a compositional change of the household as a result of the growing numbers of dual earners. ‘A strategy for combining work and care is domestic outsourcing, which means to say that certain domestic services are bought in the market’ (de Ruijter 2004: 220). Routine, everyday care tasks that had traditionally been done by family members are being outsourced to hired caretakers, often female migrants. Division can be made on live-out and live-in domestic care workers. The au pair program is one way by which the outsourcing of domestic care to (temporary) live-in migrants is done.

This intermingling of emotionally charged care work and the rational exchange market

has been problematized within the social sciences. Main focus has been on the harm done to people performing this commodified care work. Hochschild coined the term emotional labour to discuss this issue: in order to fulfil the emotional requirements of the job, caregivers have to display feelings and emotions they do not actually feel. This requisite ‘deep acting’ would cause psychological distress; a sense of alienation as a result of ‘selling one’s heart’ (England 2005: 392). As opposed to this commodification of emotion framework there is the prisoner of

love framework, which argues that the emotions involved in care work are real. So much in

fact that the intrinsic fulfilment of the job makes up for low wages, which allows the employer to get away with paying care workers less (ibid.: 390).

However, in this thesis I want to apply the love and money framework, because I find

it more suiting to the au pair context that I will describe. This framework goes against the idea that there is an oppositional dichotomy between the domain of love and the domain of self-interested economic action. It ‘rejects the dualism that assumes markets are inherently pervaded by narrow selfishness and corrupt altruistic motives, while assuming that families, non-profit institutions, and informal groups are wellsprings of genuine care’ (ibid.: 382). So it goes against the idea that people working in the capitalist market sector are primarily

motivated by money, whereas people working in the private sector only do it out of love. This framework is useful within my research because it emphasizes the ambivalences of the au pair

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role. It is too one-sided to believe that au pairs, as workers in the private sector, solely choose the job for the sake of caring. Rather, their primary motivation to become an au pair is hardly ever the will to take care of children. Although this does not mean that au pairs don’t create a bond with their host family, they are not “imprisoned” by the love involved in their job. On the contrary, their job is often seen as a vehicle to be free.

In this thesis I consider domestic care work as tasks that are integral to the

construction and maintenance of the family situation. Providing care is a fundamental part of family life, and by taking part in these practices which constitute family, au pairs position themselves as pseudo family members (Barnhart, Huff & Cotte 2014 :1682). The above described ambiguity of performing affectionate care work within the self-interested exchange market shows how au pairs find themselves betwixt and between the ambivalent categories of employee and family member. How au pairs experience and cope with this ambivalence will be discussed in chapter 2.

Kinship and the concept of home in Anthropology

Kinship is about the intense, emotional experiences that embody family relations (Carsten 2004: 6). From the 1970s onward anthropologists became significantly more interested in what goes on inside houses as they moved away from kinship studies that concentrated on the role of men in maintaining political order and which saw societies as fixed structures. Instead they asserted that ‘kinship is made in houses through the intimate sharing of space, good, and nurturance that goes on within domestic space’ (ibid.: 34), thereby focusing on a more

processual understanding of kinship. Kinship as something that can be made or done has been verbalized as kinning. ‘By this is also meant a process by which a foetus, new-born child, or any previously unconnected person, is brought into a significant and permanent relationship that is expressed in a kin idiom’ (Howell 2003: 465). Thus, this constructivist perspective sees kinship not as a given, but as enacted through human behaviour and social interaction, as well as through subjective interpretation of social relations (Drotbohm & Alber 2015: 6). Because au pairs are examples of such previously unconnected persons who enter the family household to perform emotionally charged care work, the process of kinning is important to look at.

In this thesis I will show how kinship is constituted by au pairs through their

performances of care. As Drotbohm and Alber say: ‘Care provides an alternative way of creating kinship in the absence of biological ties’ (ibid.: 7). This has also been coined fictive

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accept the affection, obligations and duties of “real” kin’ (Mac Ray 1992 in Karner 1998: 72). As Karner argues, fictive kinship is used within settings of outsourced domestic care to

maintain a sense of the cultural ideal of family caregiving (Karner 1998: 72). As I will discuss further in the setting section, care within a familial setting is still preferred by Dutch families. In this thesis I want to merge the two above mentioned terms by arguing how fictive kinning is done by au pairs in order to create and maintain the family situation. So, by performing care tasks au pairs participate in activities that position them as (fictive) family members, thereby tackling the threat imposed on the normative idea of the nuclear family as the primary care taker as a result of the outsourcing of care work. As said, this will be discussed in chapter 2.

As the construction of kinship takes place inside the house, kinning is conflated with

the notion of home. Mary Douglas describes the home as a collective good (Douglas 1991). It has its own rhythms and exists because of the contributions and sacrifices by all its members, their physical presence being considered as the biggest contribution. ‘Home is place but it is also a space inhabited by family, people, things and belongings – a familiar, if not

comfortable space where particular activities and relationships are lived’ (Mallet 2004: 63). As such there is a division between the physical object that is the house and the social unit that is the home. ‘Houses offer us a way of grasping the significance of kinship “from the inside”, that is, through an exploration of the everyday intimacies that occur there’ (Carsten 2004: 56). The au pair program exemplifies the fluid nature of family as hosts repeatedly allow a new au pair to enter their private lives. The concept of home is important because it shows how au pairs, who have left their previous home situation by choice, enter the home of an at that point unknown family and how they position themselves as another family member, as the au pair program requires. In short, I will focus on the use of space within the house and how the social process of (fictive) kinning is done within the physical unit of the house to reflect upon the liminoid and liminal state of au pairs.

Rite de passage, liminality and liminoidity

The concept of rite de passage was first introduced by Arnold van Gennep (1960). Van Gennep offered a theoretical perspective on various transitions from one social state to another – like the transition from a boy to a man - and looked at the lasting effects of these transitional experiences. He defined rites de passage as “rites which accompany every change of state, place, social position or age” (Van Gennep 1960 in Turner 1969: 94). Van Gennep divided these transitional rites into three phases: separation, margin and aggregation. The

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separation phase is the phase where the individual is removed from his former social position or state of being. This is also described as the pre-liminal state. The aggregation phase is the phase where the individual is incorporated into his new state of being, also described as the post-liminal phase, and the marginal phase is the phase in between (Van Gennep 1960: 11, 21). This is the state of liminality, further theorized by Victor Turner. To Turner, state is defined as “any type of stable or recurrent condition that is culturally recognized” (Turner 1969: 94). Liminal states can therefore be the transition from childhood to adulthood, but also baptism or a period of illness or pregnancy. After having been separated from one’s previous state, the liminal individual is in a state of ambiguity and is structurally undefinable because he is at once no longer classified and not yet classified. Liminal people are ‘betwixt and between all the recognized fixed points in space-time of structural classification’ (ibid.: 97). Furthermore, they have nothing; that is, no status, property or rank, nothing to distinguish them from others going through the same experience. Liminality is seen as a period of time where the individual is socially excluded and gets the chance to think about his own society so that they return with greater knowledge on how things work; as a changed person with a different status.

In 1974 Turner revised his theory on liminality, making the distinction between

liminal and liminoid. Liminoid experiences have characteristics of liminal experiences but are applicable to modern industrialized societies with its greater emphasis on individuality. Liminoid experiences have been made possible by industrialized societies because these societies have produced a clear division between work and leisure, leisure being non-work, even an anti-work phase in the life of a person who also works (Turner 1974: 65, 67). Because ‘society ceases to govern its activities by means of common ritual obligations: some activities, including work and leisure, become, at least in theory, subject to individual choice. The work by which a person earns his or her living is set apart from his other activities’ (ibid.: 67).

Whereas liminal phenomena – in tribal and early agrarian societies – ‘tend to be

collective, concerned with calendrical, biological, social-structural rhythms or with crises in social processes, liminoid phenomena are more characteristically individual products. They are not cyclical, but continuously generated, though in the times and places apart from work settings assigned to "leisure" activities’ (ibid.: 85). Moreover, whereas liminal phenomena are supposed to underset the survival of the social system as a whole, liminoid phenomena ‘are often parts of social critiques, exposing the injustices, inefficiencies and immoralities of the mainstream economic and political structure and organization’ (ibid.: 86). Liminoid

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(and often paid for) by choice. So, like in the liminal ritual the liminoid individual is in a stage of betwixt and between. ‘They share with ritual the feature of playfulness from which emerge new, expressive possibilities and modes of self-representation’ (Rowe 2008: 130). But rather than this stemming from a crisis that needs resolution, as an aspect of society, the liminoid stage can be perceived as a temporary escape, a break from society. They therefore have a more personal-psychological outcome. Within their liminoid stage the individual is removed from all context, falling into anti-structure by which Turner means ‘the liberation from the normative constraints incumbent upon occupying a sequence of social statuses’ (Turner 1982: 44, cited in Maxwell 2008: 62).

In this thesis I will show how the au pair year can be seen as a liminoid experience,

thereby focusing on the various ambiguities within the au pair role. Instead of considering liminoidity as the successor of liminality, I prefer to see it as a continuum. So instead of seeing it as either this or that, I argue that both concepts can be applicable simultaneously. Considering their life stage the au pairs find themselves in a state of liminality. They are in between the categories of adolescence and adulthood, which I will further discuss in the first chapter. They choose the au pair program in order to gain life experience and personal growth which they hope will help their transition into young adults. Simultaneously, the au pair program can be perceived as a liminoid experience. They temporarily break away from society, making them geographically liminoid. This perspective shows the fluid character of the liminal concepts. There can be several ways to be limbo at one moment in time. Overall, in this thesis I will show how these different forms of being limbo influence each other.

Setting

The family ideal in the Netherlands

The family ideal in the Netherlands has long been dominated by the above mentioned breadwinner model where women were viewed as mothers and not as employees (Yerkes 2009: 538). But with the rise of strong secularisation and progressive cultural values in the 1980s, the Netherlands has turned into ‘an outlier in Europe with regard to part-time employment’ (ibid.: 539). However, the family still plays an important role within Dutch society and there is still a gendered division of work and care. Nearly 75% of women and

22% of men work part time, as stated by the CBS. 1_{As the following chart from their research}

1_{See https://www.cbs.nl/en-gb/news/2009/30/the-netherlands-has-highest-rate-of-part-timers-in-europe}

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shows, childcare is still profoundly carried out by women.

Table 1. Percentage of men and women taking care of children during the week

The state has tried to attract more women to the labour market; amongst others, by means of the new Child Care Act of 2005. Every parent using childcare, is eligible to subsidies from the government, depending on household income (Akgunduz & Plantenga 2014: 381). However, this law has not been very beneficial for higher income families,

especially since the legislative changes in 2012 have reduced the subsidies for higher incomes even more. Childcare is expensive in this country and the waiting lists are long. Therefore, au pairs offer a good alternative. Moreover, as the CBS research shows, many Dutch mothers still value care within a familial setting above formal forms of childcare such as day-care centres. A better quality of life within the nuclear family-household is for most host families the underlying reason for choosing an au pair. They find it important that their children can come back home after school and that they have the opportunity to have friends over for a play-date. Research by the WODC has shown that 86% of the host families choose an au pair because they like to have their children in their own safe environment (Schans et al. 2014: 38). It also offers a lot of flexibility not having to confirm to the more restricting hours of a day-care centre. Moreover, having an au pair take care of the household offers the parents more quality time with their children and each other, knowing that everything else is taken care of. 68% of the host families find it important that their children are being taken care of by one and the same person for an entire year, making it a more comfortable and familiar

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The au pair program in the Netherlands

According to the Dutch au pair association Bonapa, every year about 1600 young sojourners travel to the Netherlands to work as an au pair.2 In order to work as an au pair in the

Netherlands, you have to subscribe at an official au pair agency. However, because there are also young people from within Europe entering the country as au pairs and young people entering the country as au pairs illegally, this number is not fixed. The biggest group comes from the Philippines (31,17 %), followed by South-African au pairs (20,7 %). Brazilians make up another 5%, and have only recently started to grow in numbers. Since 1 June 2013, only agencies that are officially recognized by the IND (Immigration and Naturalisation Service ) are eligible to apply for residence permits, which allow au pairs to stay in the country for a maximum of one year. Au pairs working in the Netherlands have to be between 18 and 31 years old. They cannot have the Dutch nationality or be related to their host family. They will have a live-in position, are allowed to work a maximum of 30 hours per week (8 hours per day) and are not allowed to do working activities outside of this family’s household. They are entitled to have two days off per week and one full weekend off per month. Their tasks include taking care of the children and light household chores. This can range from bringing the kids to school, preparing lunch and dinner, playing with the children, helping with housework, vacuum cleaning, doing laundry and so on and so forth. In exchange for their help, the au pairs receive free room and board and additional pocket money of €340,- per month.3 On top of that the host family is required to contribute €300,- for a language course. The au pair program is officially described as a cultural exchange program. The main purpose is to make the au pair familiar with “Dutch culture” in exchange of her help in the family’s household. The idea is that to live up close with a Dutch family and being part of their everyday routines makes the acquaintance with Dutch culture possible; eating Dutch dishes, hearing the language, learning to ride a bike etc., but also experiencing Dutch festivities like

Sinterklaas and King’s day.4

After having worked as an au pair in America and Spain myself, I started working at an au pair agency in the Netherlands. The agency was established in 2011 and is a recognized sponsor of the IND. The agency places about 100 au pairs in the Netherlands per year, of which around and about 30 come from South-Africa and 40 come from Brazil. The rest is

2_{See http://bonapa.nl/feiten/ (accessed on 10-11-2017).}

3_{See https://ind.nl/Uitwisseling/Paginas/Au-pair.aspx (accessed on 10-11-2017).}

4_{Check https://www.smilingfacesaupairs.nl/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Dutch-Culture-.pdf for an example of}

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mainly from other countries in America and Europe. The majority comes from South-Africa and Brazil because the agency cooperates with agents in these countries due to the large supply. Most au pairs are living with families in and around Amsterdam, in the municipalities of Amsterdam, Haarlem, Amstelveen, Bloemendaal and Gooise Meren. The agency has been a very important setting within my research because it has provided me access to girls wanting to live, living in, and having lived as au pairs in the Netherlands. I will go into this further in the methodology section.

Research population

In my research I have focused on South-African and Brazilian au pairs living in the Netherlands. I have chosen these groups because they are amongst the biggest au pair populations in the Netherlands in general and in the agency in particular. More important however, is that these groups comply to what Christine Geserick calls, the privileged

travellers, who travel in order to collect new experiences and qualifications (Geserick 2012:

50), instead of as a way to make money for family back home or a pathway to a better future in Europe as often mentioned by Philippine au pairs (Schans et al. 2014: 34). Because the vast majority (99%) of au pairs in the Netherlands are female, I have only taken female au pairs into account in my research.

Obviously, both groups comply to the general demographic requirements of the au pair program as described above. Most Brazilian girls come from the area of Sao Paulo, and most South-African girls from the area of Cape Town. Both groups can be considered middle class individuals. Au pairs coming to the Netherlands are not allowed to pay more than €34,- to agencies as registration and mediation fees. Apart from this they pay a fixed amount of €450,- (from South-Africa) and €800,- (from Brazil) to contribute to their flight ticket. This difference in price is simply explained by the fact that flight tickets from Brazil are more expensive. All the other costs, like visa costs and insurances, are covered by the host families. In total, to hire an au pair costs a family around €8000,- per year.

However, there are also noticeable differences between them. All Brazilian applicants

have already completed higher education and obtained either a bachelor or a master’s degree. The average age of Brazilian applicants is 26. The demographics of the South-African girls, however, show greater varieties. First of all, the South-African girls are relatively younger when they apply for the program. The average age of South-African girls is 21. Some just got out of high school, whereas others had already obtained a higher degree. Most of the South-African girls had just finished either form of school and were working temporary jobs when

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applying for the au pair program. Apart from having finished secondary education, it is a requirement of the program to have some sort of experience in childcare. Most girls have obtained this experience by babysitting relatives’ or friends’ children, volunteering at day-cares or church related creches.

Many of the Brazilian girls I’ve spoken to emphasized the constraints imposed upon

them by the Brazilian economy. Not being able to find a job because of the crisis or to move away from their parents house, etcetera, made the girls decide to opt for the au pair program. The South-African girls rather spoke of a gap year. In most cases it was seen as a break from school, either after high school or in between different degrees. All in all it seems as though Brazilian girls put greater emphasis on so-called push factors related to their country of origin: they want to leave Brazil because the economic situation makes it difficult to find a job and become self-supporting. The South-African girls seem to put greater emphasis on so-called pull factors: they want to leave South-Africa because they want to travel and explore both other countries and themselves by being away. For either group the au pair program is seen as a vehicle to become more independent, responsible and self-reliant. I will be discussing this further in chapter 1.

Apart from one, the au pairs in this research were placed in families living in the area

of Amsterdam. According to the program regulations, the income standard of host families has to be 150% of the gross minimum wage. In reality, though, it can be stated that 70% makes at least €5000,- a month. 90% of the hosts has at least tertiary education (ibid.: 34). Host families have an average of three children, which are generally not older than twelve when having an au pair at home. Two of my informants have been in re-match during their stay in the Netherlands, which means that they changed families after a couple of months because of a so-called mismatch.

Methodology

In this research I focus on the perspective of au pairs. Through my position at the agency I got into contact with many au pairs. Through my work I spoke to about 20-30 girls who were in the process of becoming an au pair during the time of my research. With them I spoke about the reasons to become an au pair in the Netherlands and their expectations of the program. I further sent out surveys to girls who are already in the country as au pairs. I received fifteen answered surveys, which have helped me gain insight into the reasons to join the au pair program, their expectations, their tasks in the family, what it’s like to live in someone else’s

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home and their role in the family. I also conducted fifteen semi-structured interviews. Most of these interviews were voice-recorded and lasted between 45 and 120 minutes. Eight of the interviewees were from South-Africa, seven were from Brazil. At the time of the interview, two South-Africans and three Brazilians had recently moved back to their country of origin, so these interviews took place through Skype. Next to these interviews I’ve held one video-interview with three au pairs at the office.

I have also made use of three welcome trainings held at the office. These meetings are

held approximately every four weeks and are attended by girls who have recently arrived in the country. In these meetings we go over their legal obligations, culture differences, and challenges. Furthermore, I’ve attended an au pair event held by the agency: about 50-60 au pairs attended the event which was held at an ice skating rink (meant to make them

acquainted with Dutch culture). Both the meetings and the event have created the possibility to have informal group conversations with girls currently working as au pairs.

Next to this, I’ve been in daily contact with au pairs through my work. This is both in

the form of au pairs visiting the office to talk about their situation, evaluation conversations and phone calls with both au pairs and host families.

As this shows, my position at the agency has helped tremendously in getting into

contact with au pairs in the Netherlands. Not only has it offered the possibility to be in contact with them on a daily basis and to reach out to them for interviews, but it also gave me access to the au pair’s background information and profiles (the application profile the girls have to create in order to find a matching family). However, it is important to note that my position in the field has also been influenced by my attachment to the agency. Although I have always pointed out that questions and answers regarding my research would never be shared with the agency and that all data would be dealt with anonymously, I can understand that this might have had an influence on girls not answering my requests. Moreover, in this research I have not been able to perform participant observation at the family’s address. Allowing access into the spaces that were not actually theirs, especially with the involvement of little children turned out to be a too sensitive question. It is understandable that au pairs and families would not want to give insight into their very private lives, especially to someone who is also attached to the organization that regulates their au pair contract. I have been very aware of this. For the sake of my research I have therefore decided to stick to au pair interviews and conversations. Moreover, it does say something about their position in the household, which I will discuss throughout this thesis. Because my focus is on their perception, I feel that the interviews have provided me with sufficient information. Although my attachment to the

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agency might have influenced the answers given during interviews, I truly believe that my background as a former au pair has made up for that partially. It helped form a bond with my informants, being able to relate to their emotions and experiences. Moreover, I find it

important to point out that my experience at the agency has made me comfortable enough to say that au pairs always find their way to us for any kind of help. I therefore believe in the sincerity of this thesis, despite my attachment to the organization.

1.7 Outline

In the following chapter I will discuss the separation phase, focussing on the reasons to choose for the au pair program. I will show that au pairs, as emerging adults, can be seen as a special kind of migrant in a time of growing mobility. By using excerpts from interviews, I will discuss what the au pairs hope to get out of the au pair year, thereby emphasizing the social implications of this aspirational migration.

Chapter 2 discusses the liminoid state and the ambiguities it entails to show that the au pairs are betwixt and between different categories. I will go into the ambivalence of entering a family’s home as both a new family member and employee, thereby also discussing the different family roles the au pair takes on. I will talk about the au pair’s being in the house, that is; her social role and her physical presence and use of space in the household to give an overall view on how au pairs experience and cope with the ambivalences of the in between. Because the aim of this thesis is to provide an insight into the lived experiences of au pairs in the Netherlands, my main focus has been on this phase of the rite de passage. This also explains why this chapter is significantly longer than chapter 1 and 3.

Chapter 3 discusses the aggregation phase. Using excerpts from interviews with

former au pairs, I will discuss what it is like for them to be back home and how the au pair program has helped them transit from a state of emerging adulthood to a state of adulthood. Moreover, by showing how the au pairs perceive themselves as changed people, how they describe themselves vis-à-vis their home country and peers, I shed light on the relationship between geographical liminoidity and social liminality.

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CHAPTER 1: SEPARATION PHASE: leaving home

Why leave home?

So this is the situation in Brazil. Since I was born, or since I can remember, I was always hearing something from my parents like, ‘oh we’re living in a crisis’, crisis all the time. You know, I was already 28 and I had finished my master, but it seemed impossible to find a job. And I am not a person with a bad background. I had ten years of working experience in my area and I’m not a bad employee, so why is it so hard? So yeah, it’s about work and life here. Like, here, you work really hard, you study really hard and nothing is changing for you. If you are rich here, that’s great. If you are poor or in the middle, no chances for you. So I needed to change that for me. And it’s also dangerous for us here, especially women, to walk around the city. We have so many bad guys walking around. So I started to look for a county for my au pair

program and then someone told me about Europe, and the Netherlands felt really safe. And this is the thing, safe. You know, for me, a Brazilian, it was the perfect one.

Because for me it was also the first time as an au pair, I felt really safe that in the Netherlands you have to go through an agency. When you have the opportunity to live in another country it’s amazing, cause you learn, you can see how things can work better. And yeah, it was a way out of the job search. I could put the experience on my CV and LinkedIn and hopefully improve my prospects for a better job and future. And you see I already had some childcare experience. I don’t know why, maybe it’s because of my energy, but it’s really easy for me to take care of children. I come from a big family and I really value family life, so this program seemed perfect. It’s a safe and affordable way to get some life experience and help out a family.

[Fabienne, Brazil]

I had just finished my degree in Cape Town, and I just felt that I needed a break. I didn’t really know what I was gonna do next, and life just sort of caught up with me. I needed to get my life going in a positive way and I felt like this was the right time to step away from everything. You know, I hoped that this year abroad would help me learn more about myself and to see if I could do this, as a test to myself. I thought, well it’s only a year. I needed that year to breathe and get my feet back on track. Through this year I could step out of my comfort zone and experience new things; different places, new people, test my boundaries. I just wanted to grow within myself, really.

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Besides, even if I would earn a lot of money in South-Africa, there is no way I would be able to see so many places as I would during this program. And I did want to have studied something so that when I come back I can fall back on my studies and find a job. But I just wanted to become more independent and responsible before I do that, and because I love working with children it seemed like the perfect way to travel.

[Megan, South-Africa]

The above used excerpts show the stories of two girls; Fabienne from Brazil and Megan from South-Africa, which give us an insight into the reasons for choosing the au pair program. As Turner says: ‘our basic model of society is that of a structure of positions’, which makes liminality an interstructural situation (Turner 1969: 93). So what position do the girls find themselves in and separate from when applying for the au pair program? I have chosen the above excerpts from my interviews, because they reveal both the similarities and the differences between the two demographics of this research that I have observed in my data and already partially discussed in the setting section.

Although it’s important to take these cultural backgrounds into account, I argue that

the key lies in their comparison. That is, even though the specifics of their situation are different, the similarity lies in the fact that they all try to get away in order to alter their position. So whether they need a break from job searching or studies itself, they are temporarily stepping away from their society in the hope that this will make them grow. I, therefore, argue that the au pair year is a liminoid experience within a state of liminality.

In order to show that the au pairs find themselves in a liminal state, I will make use of

the term emerging adulthood, a phrase coined by Jeffrey Jensen Arnett (2007). Emerging adulthood, Arnett says, is the phase in between adolescence and young adulthood (Arnett 2007: 130). The phase coincides with the age group of au pairs, lasting from the late teens till the late twenties. I argue that the girls in this research find themselves in a state of emerging adulthood: having left the stage of adolescence they are in a phase in life in which they are

becoming (young) adults.

Arnett mentions five main features that distinguish emerging adulthood from the

adolescence that precedes it and the young adulthood that follows it (ibid.: 131-133). The first feature of emerging adulthood to discuss here is that it is the age of instability, which is mostly reflected in occupational and residential changes. This can either be moving in with a partner or into a college dorm, but also a travel adventure, like the au pair year. The instability can make it a difficult and stressful time. ‘The experience of losing a job, or of striving to find

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employment yet being unable to do so, is frustrating and demoralizing for emerging adults’ (ibid.: 132), as exemplified above by Fabienne.

But, as Arnett says, this period is also characterized by optimism. It is, and this is

another feature, the age of possibilities. ‘It is a time of life when hope runs high, because few doors have been firmly closed and all dreams still seem alive’ (ibid.: 133). The travel

adventure, that is the au pair year, can therefore be seen as a means to make life “kind to them again”. As the example of the Brazilian au pair whom I quoted above shows, the au pair program offered a chance to step out of the job search and hopefully better her prospects. At the same time it offered the South-African au pair some time and space to breathe and get back on track. So whether they feel stuck because they can’t seem to find a job, because they need a break from studying or because they simply don’t know what they want to do next, the emerging adult still believes in a good outcome and still has many ways out to improve her situation.

Making a change by going on a travel adventure is still possible because they find

themselves in the self-focused age, which is another feature. ‘Emerging adulthood is the time in the entire life course when people are most free from institutional demands and obligations (ibid.: 133). They can devote their time to travel and self-exploration before settling into adult commitments. They have passed the age of compulsory schooling and have not yet reached the age of parenting commitments. So even those who were already employed, still had the chance to quit and “leave life behind”.

This is why I describe the au pair year as a liminoid experience within a state of

liminality. By doing this I step away from Turner’s vision on the terms which sees liminoidity as the successor of liminality in modern industrialized societies (Turner 1974). Instead, I want to consider the terms a continuum to show how both concepts can be applicable at the same time. Considering their life phase, the au pairs can be considered liminal. They are in between the phase of adolescence and adulthood; an unavoidable biological transition. The au pair program, however, must be considered liminoid. In order to buttress their aging transition, the au pairs make the individual choice to temporarily escape from their society. However, instead of this being a collective experience which is supposed to underset the survival of the social system as a whole, it is rather part of a social critique. Because their current situation does not fully allow for their (desired) maturational transition, they choose the au pair program as a form of liberation. The liminoid experience offers a break from all previous social roles. Unlike liminal phenomena which are obligatory transitions, the liminoidity - that is the au pair year-experience - is optional. Like a commodity, the au pair program is

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deliberately “bought” by au pairs. Because the au pair story I want to tell contains both liminal and liminoid aspects, I opt for a theoretical framework that builds on Turner’s concepts, but which emphasizes their interrelationship.

As Arnett shows, the phase of emerging adulthood is made possible by the occurring

demographic shifts in modern, industrialized countries. That is; marriage and parenthood are delayed, therefore the period of role exploration gets extended. This is also the case in Brazil and South-Africa. According to the Brazilian and South-African Demographics Profile of 2018, South-African and Brazilian women are having fewer children, ‘as women increase their educational attainment, workforce participation, and use of family planning methods;

delay marriage; and opt for smaller families’.5 Because marriage and parenthood had been the

previous markers of adulthood, Arnett shows that emerging adults now point out three individualistic markers to adulthood, being: accepting responsibility for one’s self, making one’s own decisions and becoming financially independent (ibid.: 133). Being in between the phases of adolescence and adulthood shows how liminality is existent in modern,

industrialized countries. However, the demographic shifts signify the individualising character of these societies.

All the girls in my research have expressed the wish to become more independent and

responsible, and the hope to achieve these adulthood markers through this program. As said, many of the Brazilian girls I’ve spoken to emphasized the economic restraints imposed upon them by the economic crisis in their country. The economy has an important influence on this demographic shift as it takes longer to find a self-supporting job. As a consequence the girls find themselves carrying out various temporary jobs and are not able to move out of or have to move back into their parents’ homes, leaving them under the often strict social supervision of their close relatives. This also explains why and how the Brazilian girls – being relatively older – can still be considered emerging adults. The economic situation withholds a more rapid transition to adulthood. The au pair program is therefore considered a means to this end.

The way towards young adulthood is closely linked to the last feature of emerging

adulthood in that it is the age of identity exploration. ‘It is a time of finding out who you are and what kind of adult life you want to pursue’ (ibid.: 131). It is about exploring the

possibilities to find out what kind of job or partner you would like to get, another feature

5_{See http://www.indexmundi.com/south_africa/demographics_profile.html and}

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which is confirmed by many of the girls. For some this was specifically related to childcare work:6

(1) ‘I have always had a passion and desire to work with children and I decided to do a year of au pairing to evaluate for myself whether it would be something I'd want to pursue for the rest of my life’. [South-Africa]

(2) ‘I was working as a psychologist in a kids hospital, but I felt like I wanted another kind of experience abroad. I chose the au pair program because it was going to give me the opportunity to experience something different’. [Brazil]

(3) ‘At the same time as moving away from home and experiencing new things, I can express out my love and passion for kids. I see it also as a perfect ‘test’ to determine if working with kids is really something that I would like to do some day’. [South-Africa]

For most, however, it was a more personal quest:

(4) ‘I truly hoped I would get to know myself a little better. I would just go by myself and I would just see what the rest of the year would bring’. [South-Africa]

(5) ‘It is the ideal way to spend years where you are not sure where your next step in life might take you’. [South-Africa]

(6) ‘I chose the au pair program because it was going to give me the opportunity to experience something different and travel and live in a different culture as well. To be open minded, have more confidence in myself and to experience great things during my year as an au pair’. [Brazil]

(7) ‘Being an au pair gives me the opportunity to hide from real career and live life more as tourist, not as a professional. Being with children is fun and the au pair program gives you the chance to work in a fun job and travel and learn about culture and think about your own life’. [Brazil]

The above quotes show, again, the dual interplay between liminality and liminoidity. Being in a liminal life stage, the liminoid “break-away from life as it is”, offers a route to obtain the renewed adulthood markers. This shows how liminoid experiences can, in fact,

6_{The following quotes come from the surveys. Because I won’t be referring to these girls in the text, I have not}

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contribute to their transition. Finding themselves in a stage of emerging adulthood where the original adulthood markers no longer apply might in the first place lead to insecurity and social criticism. However, having no strict obligations, this phase also offers chances, changes and hope. It is a time of identity exploration where they hope to grow as a person. Being liminal offers the opportunity to take this break; to “hide”, which in turn might contribute to obtaining more responsibility and independence. It is the interplay between liminal maturity and geographical liminoidity.

On the move

The au pair can be seen as a special kind of migrant in a growing phase of mobility. Within the social sciences the immense scale of travelling has led to the so-called mobilities paradigm, starting in the mid-1990s. Although the scale of movement is bigger than ever before, this paradigm doesn’t state that the mobility of the world of today is a new

phenomenon. The novelty of this paradigm is that it goes beyond seeing places as spatially fixed categories (Sheller & Urry 2006: 209). Rather than seeing travelling simply as a movement from place A to place B, this paradigm studies the social implications and

consequences of being mobile in the world. As people move they form and reform places and the movement forms and reforms them. Therefore, it would be impossible to deny the

transitional character of liminoid experiences, especially when they involve geographical movements.

As I have tried to show above, the au pair program is adopted as a passage to realize

personal aspirations. It can therefore be seen as a specific form of aspirational migration. ‘Aspirational migration, goes beyond the simple acquisition of linguistic [or other] capabilities but connects to a fundamental quest for self-fulfilment in career and life prospects’ (Ellis 2017: 855).

Why, you might wonder, do these girls specifically choose the au pair program to

achieve this self-fulfilment? In other words; what do they hope to get out of the geographical liminoidity? As Tim Cresswell shows, mobility itself can be seen as an ideology. ‘Mobility becomes synonymous with the meaning it has to people, for instance freedom and

transgression’ (Cresswell 2010: 1). The au pair program offers a unique way to travel because it allows the au pair to be in another country for a full year. To many girls the idea of being away for a whole year equals independence. They consider it a test to see if they can do it and

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look forward to step out of their bubble and see the world from another perspective. It equals a sense of freedom.

I am a firm believer that travelling broadens the mind; that it makes you get a new perspective on things. So, being able to be a part of a culture that is really

different from my own is also a very important factor, as well as making new friends and meeting new people. [Ellen, Brazil]

Au pairing makes it affordable to stay abroad for a full year. Where it would normally take months of work to pay for a trip to Europe, they now get free room and board for an entire year. The additional language course that is offered by their host family is also considered an important factor of the program. Besides, living so closely with a Dutch family is the best way to really get to know the culture and the language by going through the everyday family routine and speaking either English or Dutch all day. On the other hand, the girls know they won’t be receiving a lot of pocket money. It’s part of the challenge to handle the money well.

You really don’t have much money to spend even though you really want to do a lot. You’re away from home and out with friends so you want to explore new cities and have fun together. But every month you have to make ends meet. And, I think, especially when you’re younger you don’t really know the true value of money. Oh and NS! NS takes a big chunk out of au pairs salaries. After spending the money on NS I was broke. But you need to learn to deal with this. So one month I would just explore the Netherlands and save money and then the next month I would travel. That’s what I did. [Olivia, South-Africa]

Of course the girls need to have affinity with children. Childcare is partially seen as a

lot of fun, but also as a huge responsibility; thereby enhancing this marker. Moreover, to move into someone’s home requests a lot of flexibility and patience. Being able to do this shows that you have these capacities and that you are an open-minded person. So on the one hand you show that you are capable to adapt to different situations, on the other hand you show that you are independent enough to travel the world. But moving into someone’s home offers another important plus, as mentioned by the au pairs. The au pair program is, namely, also seen as a very safe way to travel abroad because you’re under the care of the au pair agency and the host family. They feel safe having this support group to rely on. This shows, once again, the liminal life stage of the au pairs. Wanting to grow into adults, they choose the program because it will test their ability to be “away on their own” for a whole year. The au

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pair year is considered an adventurous and challenging undertaking in an unfamiliar environment. Moreover, it is ‘an adjunct to rationalised, comfortable everyday existence’ (Varley 2011: 86). However, not having reached this stage yet, they seek a way to ‘manage-out the risk’, to make sure the responsibility of their safety is not shouldered by themselves alone (ibid.: 86).

Separation

Having discussed where the au pairs come from, I will now discuss how the au pairs separate from it as they start the au pair process. As the au pair program in the Netherlands requires the mediation of an official au pair agency, the girls start the procedure by obtaining all the

required documents. Au pair agencies in the Netherlands cooperate with agents in the au pair’s country of origin. These agents guide the au pairs through the initial process. By means of a police background check and health check form filled out by their doctor, the agency

checks if the applicant is safe to proceed.Through Skype interviews with both the Dutch

agency and her agents in the country of origin, the agency tries to sketch a fitting profile of the applicant in order to make the right match. Also, the applicant sends in pictures and writes a personal dear family letter in which she introduces herself to her potential future host family. All documents eventually form a full applicant profile to be screened by the host families. The host families get to choose the girls they want to have a Skype conversation with.

The process of separation where the individual detaches herself from her previous

point in the social structure is full of symbolic acts and behaviour. The writing of the above mentioned dear family letter can be considered the first step in this process. There are no strict guidelines for these letters. The girls are writing a letter to a family they haven’t even met yet, and only know they have to introduce themselves in a way that makes them the most

attractive candidate for the job, that is: a loving, responsible girl who loves nothing more than to spend time with their children. By doing this, they already detach themselves (in words) from their emerging adulthood status; that is, being girls who are longing to become more independent and responsible and for whom childcare is hardly ever a primary reason to

choose for the au pair program. Let us look at an example excerpt of a dear family letter:7

Dear Family,

7_{This excerpt only shows parts of the dear family letter. With the au pair’s consent, I have attached the full letter}

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Through this letter I would like to introduce myself so that you can get to know me. My name is XXX and I am 19 years old. I’m from a small town near Cape Town.

I’ve always had a big love for children and enjoy working with them. My mother is the owner of a nursery school in our town for the last 8 years. I’ve always helped her out during school holidays taking care of the little ones. Ever since then I knew that my passion in life lies with the education of children by helping them grow and develop. I’ve

been permanently working with her since the 9th of January 2017 and enjoy every

moment! I’ve also always been babysitting my younger nieces. Taking care is what I’ve learned since I were young.

I’m the eldest and have 2 younger siblings. We have a very close and strong relationship. We can always count on each other. We are a very loving family and value family time more than anything! We occasionally go on family trips like camping, fishing, visiting the Kruger National Park, go on off-road trips with our 4x4, visiting the seaside etc. We absolutely love the outdoors and being in the nature!

I’m a very hard working and loyal person that can always be counted on. I’ve been raised in a good home where good norms and values are of importance. I really want to spread my wings and see the rest of the world. To express my love and passion for children and to see the world will make the choice to Au Pair the best decision I’ve ever made! I would like to become a part of a family in a foreign country. I can’t wait to learn more about your country and culture. The reason I chose The Netherlands is because it is small and gives me the warm family feeling. Experiencing the beautiful scenery first hand and learning your language as well as your culture and way of living will give me a chance to explore the world from another point of view.

The writing of the letter can be perceived as a perlocutionary act, as first described by John. L. Austin (1962). ‘Saying something will often, or even normally, produce certain

consequential effects upon the feelings, thoughts, or actions of the audience’ (ibid.: 101). The perlocutionary act can be seen as a performance with the goal of persuading or convincing the reader. It is about what we achieve by saying something. By describing themselves as

passionate caretakers, hard-working, loyal and family-minded persons, the girls (try to) convince their reader (the host family) that she’s the perfect candidate to become their au pair. Although I don’t mean to say that the girls are not loving, loyal persons already, I intend to show how they emphasize different assets of their choice to become an au pair when writing the letter. In their letter they emphasize the points families want to hear – which unfortunately also make all the letters sound rather the same – instead of pointing out their primary reasons; the need to have a break from life, to improve their future prospects, in short; the primary reasons behind this aspirational migration.

The official match is made after both the applicant and the family feel they are the

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Sometimes the applicants find a match after only a few weeks, for some it takes more than a year.

It’s a really weird process. It’s like, you decide to move abroad, and then you start reading these family profiles and you get so excited. You read their letter and you can already see yourself living with these people. I was so nervous before every Skype call. First I talked to the mom and later I got to speak to the children and it all felt really good. So when the agency contacted me that they wanted to match with me I was just over the moon. Really, the next days I was walking around with a big smile on my face, telling everyone around me that I was going to live in Amsterdam. You really get a sense of pride out of it, that they chose you. And even though you’re still at home waiting for the visa, your head is already in the other country. I really couldn’t wait. [Francine, Brazil]

For the au pairs the separation further consists of many goodbye-meetings and parties and packing their bags, with the actual crossing of the national frontier as their final step. The literal crossing of the national border symbolizes the final step of crossing the threshold whereby they enter the geographical liminoidity of their au pair year. Getting on the plane is the point of no return:

Yes I remember!, says Emma as I ask her about her very first day in the

Netherlands. I was so excited when I got onto the plane in South-Africa, and when

I landed I was like; oh god, I am so far away from home. I can’t decide if I don’t like these people that I’ll just get out. I need to make this work. I can remember my host dad picked me up. I was wearing sandals! It was February, but I wore sandals, and a shirt like this, she says as she shows me her tank top straps. I remember my host dad asked me ‘what are you wearing, you know it’s winter here right?’. And I said ‘oh I know the cold, don’t worry’. But then I realized… and I was like ‘where is the car, where is the car?’. So I just couldn’t wait to get my bag and go. And when we got to the car he told me to get a nap and I was like ‘no, I’m not tired’.. but the next minute I was like.. gone.. fast asleep. When I opened my eyes we were at the house. And I was like ‘I just need a break, I need a shower’. I got there on a Saturday and they woke me up the Sunday afternoon, when they had to go and check on me. I don’t know what was going on, but I was so tired, I slept for hours and I was still tired”. [Emma, South-Africa]

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The passage from the separation phase into the liminoid stage is bridged by a

transitional period ‘consisting of such events as an exchange of gifts, an offer of food by the inhabitants, or the provision of lodging’ (Van Gennep 1960: 28). In almost all cases, host families make sure their au pair arrives on a weekend day, which gives them the opportunity to get settled together. Often they take their au pair on a tour in the neighbourhood, showing her where to find the nearest supermarket, cafés, the train station and the kid’s school(s), etcetera. These first few days are often the most overwhelming days of the entire year. All the impressions, the time difference, the adaptation, different eating habits; it all causes a feeling of extreme exhaustion. Yawning faces and blank stares are often seen in the welcome

trainings, which are held by the agency in the first weeks after their arrival.

The beginning is especially difficult, because you’re still getting to know the family and you’re trying to find your place. You’re still exploring and figuring it out. [Malia, South-Africa]

The transitional period is a first attempt to position themselves within the family. However, as the following chapter will show, the au pair role is full of ambiguities. Having entered the liminoid stage that is the au pair year, au pairs have to learn to cope with all these ambiguities. In chapter 2 I will discuss this liminoidity to answer the question of how au pairs experience and cope with the ambiguities of the in between.

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CHAPTER 2: LIMINOID STATE: making home from home

As said, the liminoid stage is a temporary escape - a break from society - in which the individual is removed from all context, falling into anti-structure. The liminoid individual is liberated from the normative constraints associated with her original social position. It places her in a stage of being betwixt and between. The liminoid stage is, therefore, filled with ambiguities. ‘The attributes of liminality [and liminoidity] are necessarily ambiguous, since this condition and these persons elude or slip through the network of classifications that normally locate states and positions in cultural space’ (Turner 1969: 95). In this chapter I will go into the main ambiguities associated with the au pair role, starting with the ambiguity of being both/neither employee and family member.

Betwixt and between: labour for love or labour for money?

Some days I feel part of the family, some days I feel like the au pair. [Jamie,

South-Africa]

The au pair program is a cultural exchange program organised as an immigration regulation, so the au pairs do not obtain a working visa. Instead the applicants receive a Regular

Provisional Residence Permit, which is a stamp in their passport that allows their entry into the Netherlands. Once they are in the country they can obtain their residence card at the IND. From that moment on they are allowed to perform au pair activities. The overall idea is that the au pair lends a helping hand. It offers host families a flexible and cheaper form of

childcare and domestic work. In exchange, being part of the daily routine of the family offers the au pair the possibility to become acquainted with “Dutch culture”.

The general discourse describes the au pair as “one of the family”. The host family is

supposed to take her in as another family member, which is meant to say that she is supposed to be treated as an equal, as the term “au pair” already states. The idiom of the au pair as a family member is intended to offer a protective environment for everyone involved and to make the acquaintance with Dutch culture possible (Dalgas 2016: 835). Certain regulations of the au pair visa already encourage quasi-familial relations (Cox & Narula 2003: 336): the au pair is required to live at the family’s address where she receives full room and board, the money received is termed pocket money instead of salary and the work can only be done at the family’s address. Moreover, the tasks the au pairs are allowed to do are similar to

Making home from home : the transitional experience of South-African and Brazilian au pairs in the Netherlands