Disobe High levels of unemployment in South Africa have shifted rural households away from a reliance on male migrant wages and towards a diversity of income-generating strategies. These economic changes have altered the role of women and the restrictions family members may try to place on their mobility and wage-earning capacity. In addition, the end of apartheid has lifted state sanctions on mobility and informal economic activity. This article examines the impact of these changes on rural women through a qualitative study of a rural community just outside the Durban municipality. One of the more visible changes has been the decline in marriage and the rise in numbers of children born outside marriage.