Imagining, Planning, Rethinking the Future. Motherhood experiences of Ethiopian domestic workers

This essay examines motherhood through the experiences of Ethiopian domestic workers, drawing on ethnographic research conducted between 2018 and 2019 in the city of Debre Markos, located in the Amhara region. Studies on domestic work in this context rarely explore the experiences of domestic workers as mothers, as live-in domestic work in private homes is often deemed incompatible with motherhood. The essay presents two cases of biological motherhood among domestic workers. Their accounts are interwoven with those of domestic workers who, at the time of the interviews, did not yet have children but shared desires, plans, and dilemmas related to their potential future reproductive trajectories. Situated within the broader debate on the intersection of motherhood, migration, and labor, this essay explores practices, ideas, expectations, and strategies surrounding motherhood – both experienced and imagined – while also highlighting how reproductive trajectories intersect with gender-based violence in the lives of Ethiopian domestic workers.