Abstract

Transnational households, in which family members live across national borders as a result of migration, have become an increasingly significant feature of contemporary global life. Despite growing scholarly attention to transnational family dynamics, the specific experiences of Eritrean male migrants and Eritrean left-behind wives remain underdeveloped from the existing literature, particularly regarding how care practices, moral obligations and digital mediation are negotiated across distance. This study addresses this gap through a dual-perspective design based on  semi-structured interviews with nine male migrants residing in Sweden and six left-behind wives residing in Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt, analyzed through reflexive thematic analysis. The findings show that care becomes highly asymmetrical following migration, with left-behind wives absorbing the vast majority of domestic, childcare and emotional responsibilities within a mutually co-constructed moral arrangement sustained by both partners. The male breadwinner model functions as a shared normative framework actively reinforced by both men and women, while guilt operates differently across gender lines- rooted in physical absence for men and perceived inadequacy for women. Digital mediation emerges as an ambivalent infrastructure that simultaneously enables care and reproduces gendered hierarchies, while a consistent pattern of mutual information concealment produces a “bubble effect" that masks the divergence between partners’ lived realities over time. 

Keywords: transnational households, care circulation, gendered care, male breadwinner model, digital mediation, Eritrean diaspora

Yikealo, Sara (2026). “I Try to be Present Despite My Absence”: Gendered Care, Moral Obligations and Digital Mediation in Eritrean Transnational Households.  

Human Geography, advanced level, master thesis for master exam in Human Geography, 30 ECTS credits 

Supervisor: Linn Axelsson

Language: English