This article foregrounds a labour market for English-speaking and educated female domestic workers and their Western expatriate employers. Many women in this anthropological study had left office jobs and institutional environs connoting dignity to take up employment in Euro-American households performing what is widely perceived as low-status work. Using the narratives of domestic workers, this article scrutinizes motivations for opting for a stigmatized occupation and finds women’s accounts to be multilayered and provocative, thereby challenging established generalizations. In the intimate space of the expatriate household, these female workers diligently perform the tasks of an ‘all-rounder’ that represents a new managerial role in globalizing India. As part of expanding niche labour markets, the article highlights how these roles demand eclectic skill sets, professionalism, certified training, transnational experience and gender-specific expertise. Nonetheless, a key leitmotif is how domestic service with expatriates’ remains embedded in power relations and class-race hierarchies. In developing the anthropology of domestic labour, this article illuminates the continuation of persistent inequality and stratification in a locally functioning transnational labour market.

中文翻译：

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当代印度讲英语和受过教育的女性家政工人

本文为讲英语和受过教育的女性家庭佣工及其西方外籍雇主提供了劳动力市场前景。在这项人类学研究中，许多女性离开了办公室工作和意味着尊严的机构环境，在欧美家庭从事被广泛认为是低地位工作的工作。本文使用家政工人的叙述仔细审查了选择受污名化职业的动机，并发现女性的描述是多层次和具有挑衅性的，从而挑战既定的概括。在外籍人士家庭的私密空间中，这些女工勤奋地执行着“全能者”的任务，代表着印度全球化进程中新的管理角色。作为扩大利基劳动力市场的一部分，文章强调了这些角色如何需要不拘一格的技能、专业精神、认证培训、跨国经验和针对特定性别的专业知识。尽管如此，一个关键的主题是外籍人士的家政服务如何仍然嵌入权力关系和阶级种族等级。在发展家务劳动人类学的过程中，本文阐明了在地方运作的跨国劳动力市场中持续存在的不平等和分层现象。