Carmen Castellanos Meeks

Ethnic Markets and the Empowerment of Immigrant Women in America: a Case Study of the Redland Harvest Market Village in South Florida, USA Carmen Castellanos Meeks

This book seeks to understand why immigrant women from Latin America and the Caribbean chose the ethnic market as a venue to enter the US labor market and what, if any, socioeconomic benefits they derived from their participation in it. This case study uses an ethnography methodological approach to determine the impact of the Redland Harvest Market Village participation on the livelihoods of 36 immigrant women. Do immigrant women improve their livelihoods via incorporation into the ethnic market? And do they increase their sense of agency, empowerment and well-being via incorporation into the ethnic market? Immigrant women's livelihoods are the unit of analysis and income is the key modifier on this analysis. the dynamic of class, ethnicity and gender interrelated to patriarchal family structures, cultural constrictions, ethnic niches and economic enclaves within the USA as the host society are also explored.