Peer-reviewed article
From Taiwan Dream to Everyday Resilience: Temporal Trajectories of Vietnamese Marriage Migrant Women in Taiwan
Le Anh Huy Huynh, Tuan Quoc Huynh ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-sonnet-5-5This study interviewed 27 Vietnamese women who migrated to Taiwan through marriage. It uses resilience theory to look at how they dealt with disappointment over time. The women reported domestic violence, neglect and isolation. They coped through spirituality, small businesses and investing in their children's education. The focus is on the women's experiences, not on children's well-being, so it is only indirectly relevant to children.
Key points
- Marriage migration from Vietnam to Taiwan is often portrayed as either integration or failure, which overlooks change over time.
- The women described disillusionment including domestic violence, neglect and isolation.
- Coping strategies included spirituality practices, small-scale entrepreneurship and investment in children's education.
- Adaptation was an iterative process rather than a linear recovery, shaped by agency, family obligations and cross-border ties.
- The authors say policy should support migrant women beyond the early settlement stages.
Limitations
The abstract is about the women's own experiences. It gives no direct data on children's outcomes, and the children's education is mentioned only as one coping strategy. The small interview sample (27 women) cannot show how common these patterns are.
Abstract
ABSTRACT Marriage migration from Vietnam to Taiwan has often been portrayed in static terms of integration or failure, overlooking how women adapt to ruptures across time. This study applies resilience theory to examine how 27 Vietnamese marriage migrant women confronted disappointment and developed coping strategies within transnational marriages. Drawing on in‐depth interviews, the findings reveal that Vietnamese marriage migrant women endured disillusionments such as domestic violence, neglect, and isolation but actively recalibrated their lives through spirituality practices, small‐scale entrepreneurship and investments in children's education. By situating these practices within a resilience framework, the study highlights how adaptation is not a linear recovery but an iterative process shaped by agency, family obligations and cross‐border ties. Through this perspective, the study shows how aspiration, rupture and recalibration recur across the life course, leading to different rather than converging trajectories. The study extends resilience theory into the domain of marriage migration, contributes to feminist and transnational scholarship by foregrounding everyday agency, and carries policy implications for supporting migrant women beyond early settlement stages.