Of Migrant Decisions and Men: Anna Maksymiuk Kieturakis, Translator, Wife, Mother

Many theories of migration (e.g., circular migration theory, the target income theory, the neoclassical economic theory) examine external factors (e.g., wages, opportunities, assets) to explain migrant decisions to leave, to stay, and to return. What we overlook in these economic rational actor models is an understanding of how migration decisions are embedded in social relationships. One contemporary migrant, Anna Maksymiuk Kieturakis, who was part of a corps of translators during the Gdańsk strikes in 1980, describes her decision to leave Poland as influenced by her fiancé, her decision to stay in the United States as intertwined with her husband's career and son's childrearing needs, and her decision to return as motivated by the educational needs of her son. Understanding these migration decisions within a matrix of relations does not diminish the migrant's agency, nor does it suggest that one set of needs is subservient to another, only that people make choices, and their decisions are embedded within and bounded by personal relationships.