Abstract
The authors in this edited volume explore the theme of migration in a unique way. They study feelings of belonging, identity, and citizenship within migrant families, looking at the intergenerational relations and contrasting mixed sentiments in the after-settlement period of first-generation migrants and their children. This book offers an insight on how immigration in the globalized world shapes the institution of family across cultures, drawing on cultural conflict vs. solidarity and ambivalence perspectives that play out within the families of migrants. While cultural conflict theory underscores the intergenerational divergence in migrant families, there is plenty of evidence that migrants tend to give back to their families, and that they do cherish the tradition of care for family members. Mentioned several times is Mauss’ (1960) concept of the triple obligation of “giving, receiving and reciprocating” as a model of social exchange specific for migrant families. Finally, the book is a comparative study of migrants from sub-Saharan Africa, sharing similar cultural roots who have since migrated to three different countries: Britain, France and South Africa, having diverse lived experiences as migrants.
Citizenship, Belonging and Intergenerational Relations in African Migration is well organized: from theoretical underpinnings, historical perspectives on migration flows of African migrants to countries of interest, to three case studies where we learn about individual destinies of migrant families. The book is divided in two parts. Part I presents the macro framework of south-north and south-south migrations, while Part II goes into a more detailed portrayal of diverse lived experiences of first-generation migrants and their children, using qualitative methods. The same structures are applied to all case studies, which makes the reading and comparison between countries straightforward. Each case looks at the diverse motivations for migration: labor, education, politically motivated, and at the same time they show how various motives for migration impact differently the life trajectories of migrants.
The authors explicitly focus on post-colonial, specifically post 9/11 era migration policies in Britain and France, and post-Apartheid migration policies in South Africa and their impact on the lives of older migrants and their children. For example, xenophobic violence in 2008 in South Africa had an indirect link to hostile policies toward migrant workers in that country during the post-Apartheid period. The data collection was carried out from June 2008 through December 2010 and offers politicians, citizens, academics, and wider audiences a snapshot of migrants’ lives and their position between the desire to belong to the country where they migrated, and their longing for their homelands, especially prominent among first-generation migrants. They wish to instill or pass the traditions of their culture and traditions to their children, but this is a particularly hard task to do in the era of globalization.