The Domestic Worker's Place in the ‘Madam's’ Space. The Construction of the Workspace in the Home of Muslim Madams

ABSTRACT Research on domestic work in South Africa has largely focused on the employee, however, here we focus on the ‘madam’ and explore the way in which the workspace of the domestic worker and the ‘private’ space of the employer are constructed. The paper focuses on the domestic workers’ place in the Indian Muslim madam's space, revealing the contradictory nature of the home as a personal space for the employer and a workplace for the domestic worker. Within the home, emotional and physical boundaries produce spaces that may be more private than others. These spaces are further influenced by the way in which Indian Muslim women construct the religious uniqueness of their home, where some spaces are filled with sacred meaning and access is restricted at certain times. Based on the qualitative data, collected in the North Beach area of Durban, the paper investigates the sharing of the workspace between ‘the madam’ and the domestic worker and their negotiation of the boundaries within the home.