Social and Economic Controls The above arrangement often means that the parents are more likely to control the remittances. In my interviews, only one woman received money directly from her husband, yet hers was an exceptional case, since she had been married for over a decade and had children of various ages, and was thus in a more advanced "life cycle" stage, which by default conferred on her more power than the typical young natal community wife. Research in the Caribbean and Central America finds that social pressure exists for wives to "behave well" while the husbands are away, which often results in an increased demand to limit wives' physical mobility (Georges 1992; Mahler 1995). This situation is exemplified in Maria's statements about her relationship with her in-laws while her husband is in the United States: "I am enslaved; they follow every move I make, everything I do, do what they want with the cash, and all I get is my expense money." When I spoke to Don Virgilio, Maria's father, he explained that his daughter no longer leaves her in-laws' compound to visit her natal family because she is afraid of what her mother-in-law might say. Don Virgilio spoke about his daughter's relationship with her mother-in-law: One time that woman told her son in the United States that my daughter was going around, doing who knows what and all my daughter ever does is maybe go fetch water with her sister, but now she never comes over to visit us. The inability to move about the village freely when a husband is in the United States is based on the fear of gossip and the social controls this gossip produces. The quote above illustrates how when a migrant wife attempts to do anything unaccompanied, she becomes extremely susceptible to gossip. In many cases, rumors about women who have been unfaithful to their migrant husbands in the United States spread through town. Regardless of their veracity, these stories often prompt men to return to their natal communities to divorce their wives or influence their decision whether or not to return. Such rumors frighten women like Maria into