Becoming siap mental: education for transnational labour migration

Disparate groups with dissimilar agendas, ranging from the Indonesian government to grassroots education collectives, agree that training and education play an important role in preparing women for safe labour migration. However, perspectives on precisely how this training and education should be structured and what information should be included vary widely. This article, which is based on 10 months of ethnographic fieldwork in Indonesia, explores the range of perspectives on what it means to become educated about migration for domestic labour. Particular attention is given to migrant women’s emphasis on the idea of being siap mental (mentally ready) for migration. This research sheds light on the challenges to developing education programmes for migrant women workers and contributes empirical evidence on the role that nonformal or out-of-school education can play in shaping values and social norms.