Il lavoro delle donne rom in agricoltura fra identità in mutamento e riconoscimento negato

The general purpose of this paper is to understand the working conditions of Roma migrant women residing in Calabria, in the Piana of Lamezia - Sant'Eufemia, analysing the links, the contradictions, the conflicts that their forms of employment make evident within the agricultural sector and in the entire local society. The research adopts the gender and intersectional perspectives that have emerged both in Romani studies and in the literature concerning the processes of feminization of agriculture and racialization of the migrant workforce. Starting from these theoretical references, and on the basis of research materials collected through many years of participative observation, we will consider agriculture as a field of subjectification and contestation in which Roma women shape different social roles and values, but also as a space in which new social asymmetries and gender-based violence are reified. More specifically, we will see how the growing commitment of Roma women in agriculture implies a decisive questioning of values and lifestyles rooted in tradition. On the one hand, in fact, new social relations and collective identities emerge from clear dynamics of emancipation and cultural hybridization facilitated by mass access to wage labour, by the desire to find independent opportunities for professional recognition as well as to promote the right of children to study and live in a new country. On the other hand, however, the dynamics of racialization present in the local context keep submitting Roma migrant women to patriarchal bonds and powers useful to face the absence of regular residence permits, child care services and equal opportunities into the labour market.