Peruvian women in Catalonia : A Study on the social position of Peruvian female migrants in the labour market

Abstract: This    qualitative research investigates the social positions of Peruvian female migrants in the Catalan labour market in Spain. It questions how social categories interactin order to determine the social positions of individuals, a nd how the positions can be related to a global  world structure.   Four unstructured life story interviews with  Peruvian women resident in  Catalonia were realized in December 2014. The interviews and two previously made studies have then been reviewed by a narrative analysis. The research formed a theoretical framework of intersectionality interpreted by Nina Yuval-Davis, and a globalization and female migration theory by Saskia Sassen.  The analysis with the  implementation of theories showed that nationality has a particularly strong influence in the intersection of social categories, though one must understand how all the identifications lay imbedded in each other in order to determine the social position of each individual. It was  also concluded that an intersection of the identifications of the individuals interacts with global structures in order to determine the  social positions of the study participants in the Catalan labour market.The city of Barcelona  could through the lives of the four Peruvian females be seen as an economic centre that demands cheap labour by migrants, and where the social positions in the labour market can show a division of core and peripheral countries.