The Descendant Bargain: Latina Youth Remaking Kinship and Generation through Educational Sibcare in Nashville, Tennessee : The Descendant Bargain

Abstract

<p class="first" id="P1">Older sisters in Latino, immigrant-origin families in the United States bear significant caretaking responsibilities for their siblings, especially regarding their siblings’ educations. Young women in Nashville, Tennessee, frame their same-generation caretaking commitments and educational expectations for their siblings in intergenerational terms—what I term the descendant bargain. This intergenerational framing reveals how elder sisters position their siblingship—and their educational carework—as vital to forging socioeconomic mobility and kinship obligations, labor often understood as the domain of parents. Youthful siblings’ educational carework is a critical kinship practice that demonstrates the central role of youth in making kinship and remaking genealogical generation in immigrant families. </p>