The limitless place, the constitution of the house-workshop

The cases of Moroleon and Uriangato, Guanajuato, México

Abstract

The aim of this article is to analyze the productive configuration of the house-workshop in the garment industry of Moroleón y Uriangato, Guanajuato. Through ethnography and archival work in both locations, the characteristics and work dynamics of the rebozo workshops and their transition to the house-workshop are shown. To do this, the productive trajectories of the workshops were reconstructed, as well as the labor history of former gardeners, clothing manufacturers and seamstresses. We reflect on how elements of the formal and informal economies combine in this clothing market and generate a series of social resources that articulate manual or artisanal work with intensive work.

 The research concludes that in the framework of contemporary capitalism, the moral aspects of the economy persist in the configuration of forms of production and workforce. Subjects are challenged by intimate dimensions from which labor elements are negotiated, which, in turn, respond to the pressures of the market and the production of garments.