Keeping the Base, Making a Living: Entanglement of Domestic and Economic Life in Delivery Work

• In Event: 41021 - Student Forum Refereed Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (90 minute): Roundtable 7: Work and Labor

Abstract

This paper investigates the dynamic interplay between domestic life and economic practices within the context of a family-operated online delivery business in the metropolitan region of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Drawing on extensive ethnographic fieldwork with Manuela, a young female motorcycle courier, and her husband, I explore how their efforts to "keep the base" and "make a living" challenge traditional boundaries between home and work. Through a close examination of the socio-economic strategies employed by this couple, I analyze the intricate ways in which money, moralities, and gendered responsibilities are negotiated.

The research highlights how their home functions as a hybrid space—simultaneously a private household and the operational hub for their delivery business. It reveals how financial practices such as earmarking and balancing expenses reflect a relational economy shaped by necessity, uncertainty, and social obligations. The narratives of Manuela and her family underscore the precarious yet resilient efforts to maintain economic stability and sustain relationships amid post-pandemic transformations in labor markets.

By situating the household as a socio-anthropological object, this study offers insights into how working-class families navigate the intersecting demands of maintaining both livelihood and home in contexts marked by financial precarity. Ultimately, this paper contributes to a deeper understanding of the entanglements between gender, kinship, labor, and economic survival in the era of gig work.

Author

• Ana Raquel Couto, Federal Fluminense University