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IMER NEWSLETTER NR. 2 2015

Dear all, here is the IMER Bergen newsletter for March and April 2015.  If you want to include something in the next IMER newsletter, please send an e-mail to imer@uni.no (text should be between 50 and 150 words + title and web links). Sincere apologies for cross posting.

CONTENT:

 

IMER NEWS

 

EMERGING URBANITIES Lunch seminar:Sara Kohne: The experience of change in culturally diverse urban areas. Examples from two districts in Berlin and Oslo.

Sara Kohne is a PhD candidate in the discipline of Cultural Studies at the Department of Archaeology, History, Cultural Studies and Religion at the University of Bergen. Her research interests lie within the areas of cultural understandings of place, processes of change, and inequality in urban contexts. 

 

IMER Lunch seminars spring 2015 - Emerging Urbanities and other seminars

This spring IMER Bergen invites to a series of lunch seminars on the topic of Emerging Urbanities. The seminars are open to all researchers, students and other people interested. Urbanity has been a central foci to the IMER network and a part of our research agenda for several years. In the upcoming seminars we will ask where our contemporary cities are heading. Some of the topics will be planned pluralism, gentrification, urban minority/migrant life, housing segregation, the global in the local, governance in ethnically plural cities, and multicultural youth life in the city.

More upcoming emerging urbanities seminars:

Tuesday 26th May: Cindy Horst – Active citizenship in culturally and religiously diverse societies. Read more:  http://imer.w.uib.no/event/imer-lunch-seminar-cindy-horst/?instance_id=485 @ UNI Rokkansenteret, Nygårdsgaten 5 Bergen (6. etg.)12.00 -13.30

 

SEMINARS

A humanitarian crisis at the doorstep of Europe: Drivers, dynamics and challenges of increased migration across the Mediterranean

 Prio, Wedensday, 20 May 2015. 09.00-16.00. The number of migrants arriving in Europe, across the Eastern land borders or the Southern maritime borders, has been on a sharp rise over the past two years. More than 150 000 embarked on the perilous journey across the Mediterranean in 2014, a number close to three times as high as in the record year of 2011 in the aftermath of the Arab spring. 2015 appears to become a new tragic record year: 1750 migrants have lost their lives at sea since the beginning of the year, more than thirty times more than during the same period last year. Please find more information and registration here

Kunnskapsutvikling om arbeidsinnvandring

Fafo og Frischsenteret inviterer til avslutningskonferanse torsdag 21. mai 2015
kl. 12.00–16.00 i Fafos lokaler i Borggata 2B på Grønland i Oslo. Fafo og Frischsenteret har siden 2010 samarbeidet om prosjektet Kunnskapsutvikling 
om arbeidsinnvandring, finansiert av Arbeids- og sosialdepartementet. I samarbeid med Fafo Østforum, inviteres det nå til en halvdags konferanse. I tillegg til presentasjoner fra  prosjektet, vil professor Douglas Massey (Princeton University) innlede om internasjonale erfaringer med arbeidsmigrasjon. Les mer om prosjektet på Fafos prosjektside og på Frischsenterets prosjektside. Registrering innen 13. mai Konferansen strømmes. Direktesendingen kan ses på Fafo-tv. Hva er drivkreftene bak migrasjonsstrømmene fra øst til Norge? Hvordan har det gått med arbeidsinnvandrerne som har kommet til Norge? Hvilke konsekvenser har migrasjonen hatt for norsk økonomi og arbeidsliv?  Disse spørsmålene vil bli belyst på konferansen. Registreringsskjema

 

CONFERENCES AND WORKSHOPS

"Migration and the Inclusive City"



In the 2015 Call on Migration and the Inclusive City, the Cities Alliance seeks to promote innovative policy responses and practical approaches that adopt an inclusive response to migrants, including access to land, services, employment opportunities as well as recognition and voice. Proposals are invited on one or more of the following four focus areas. Proposals can address international and/or national migration; all should demonstrate clear attention to the issue of gender equality. Additionally, proposals could also address the special needs, capacities and potentials of the most vulnerable migrant groups (such as children).Deadline: 8 May 2015 Read more: http://www.citiesalliance.org/CATF2015-spotlight

12th Somali Studies International Association Congress - Helsinki, Finland

 We are happy to announce the 12th Somali Studies International Association (SSIA) Congress, which will take place in Helsinki, Finland, 19-23 August 2015. The congress will be held in cooperation with Somali Studies International Association, University of Helsinki, University of Jyväskylä, University of Eastern Finland, Finnish Youth Research Society and Finnish Somalia Network. The title of the 12th SSIA Congress is Revisiting Somali Identities – Addressing Gender, Generation and Belonging. Further details on the registration can be found from the congress website: http://www.somalistudies.org/ssia-congress-2015/registration/

EASA ANTHROMOB 2015 Workshop

 The European Association of Social Anthropologists Anthropology and Mobility Network (ANTHROMOB) announces the call for papers for its bi-annual workshop. Grounding (im)mobility: Embodiment, ephemera, ecologies @ Institute of Social Sciences, University of Lisbon, Portugal. Thursday 10 – Friday 11 September, 2015. Metaphors of mobility have provided a wide range of new connections between fields once imagined as unrelated. Frameworks of mobility enable thinking through topics such as tourism, migration and nomadism as well as urbanization, embodiment and transport as happening in parallel and in concert, rather than as ideologically divisible categories. Likewise, recent work on materiality has prompted us to reconsider how peculiar combinations of both what might be considered material and what might be conceptualized as immaterial are involved in producing, managing, or hindering contemporary movements. Attention to materialities has allowed for a more nuanced conceptualization of a world shaped by ‘stuff’ and ‘things’ (Henare et al. 2007; Miller 2009), as well as recognition of the multiple and alternative ‘ontologies’ that constitute the world(s) people live in. This has been paralleled by a renewed focus on themes such as hope and imagination (Moore 2011; Salazar and Graburn 2014), affect and morality (Berlant 2011; Zigon 2008), personhood and subjectivity (Strathern 1988; Humphrey 2008; Moore 2007), and hegemonic narratives of value that shape uneven power relations in the contemporary world (Glick Schiller and Salazar 2014), which also fit productively into anthropological reflections on (im)mobility. The aim of this workshop is to bring together scholars working on, and problematising, the (im)material dimensions of contemporary mobility with a particular emphasis on exploring embodiments, ephemera and ecologies that are often researched in isolation of one another. Whether it is the phenomenology of transport, migration, media, material culture, or the multiple moralities, imaginaries, and ontological horizons that interact through movement today, this workshop will challenge commonly clustered fields of analysis. We envision sketching a more comprehensive, plural, and composite vision of mobility, and asking what kinds of collaborations and connections can emerge from of approaching (im)materialities in mobilities as a possible unifying pattern of analysis. We encourage papers which empirically explore at least two topics commonly found under the mobilities paradigm (e.g. tourism and migration, tourism and embodiment, media and urban transport) or connect one classic topic of mobility to other areas (e.g. science and technology studies or eco-anthropology). Media based, visual and ecological studies that connect to classic fields of anthropological inquiry are particularly welcome, as are methodologically innovative approaches to the workshop’s theme. Please submit abstracts (under 300 words, please) by 3 April, 2015 via our online Google form at this URL: http://goo.gl/wk39cb. In the interest of encouraging new approaches and collaboration, we anticipate running a variety of panel formats and sessions. 

Invitation and call for papers: Women negotiating secularism and multiculturalism through civil society organizations

 Centre for Trust, Peace & Social Relations, Coventry University, UK, June 30 – July 1st 2015. This workshop is the second of a series of international workshops on the theme “Is secularism bad for women? Women, Religion and Multiculturalism in contemporary Europe” focusing on the relation between the role of religion in women’s lives and gender equality. Read more: https://womenreligionandsecularism.wordpress.com/.

 CALL FOR PAPERS: Diaspora: A one-day conference on a travelling concept

 Deadline May 12 2015, Stockholm University September 9 2015.Since the 1980s scholars of different backgrounds have contributed to the reinvention of diaspora as an important concept in academic research. As an analytical tool and perspective on the triadic relations built into the processes of “expatriate minority communities”, the concept travelled across disciplines and did at times change the disciplines or was itself altered in the process. For this one-day conference we invite scholars to submit empirically based papers about diaspora and its ‘travelling’ features in different dimensions. The subjects, forms of life and artifacts under study are often transnationally distributed and expressed in fluid forms. How are researchers dealing with this? We are interested in papers discussing both conceptual and methodological challenges in conducting diaspora research. Read more: http://www.hsozkult.de/event/id/termine-27688

 

SUMMER SCHOOLS

International Summer School “Cultures, Migrations, Borders”

The Department of Social Anthropology and History of the University of the Aegean and the Institute of Migration and Ethnic Studies of the University of Amsterdam welcome applications for the Summer School“Cultures, Migrations, Borders” that will take place on the island of Lesvos from 6 to 18 July, 2015. The Summer School aims at bringing together students and researchers in humanities and social sciences with an interest in borders and migration. The program is designed to combine theoretical instruction by renowned instructors from five universities with various on-site activities.Deadline for applications: May 15th 2015. Please note that there will be several scholarships available for summer school participants. Scholarship application deadline: May 1st 2015.Additional information on the program, the instructors, cost, accommodation and the application form can be found at: https://migbord2015.pns.aegean.gr/ For enquiries please send e-mail to: migbord2015@aegean.gr

Summer School “Walking the line – Art of border zones in times of crisis” 

 The Cluster of Excellence “Asia and Europe in a Global Context” welcomes applications for the Summer School “Walking the line – Art of border zones in times of crisis.” It will take place from July 26 to 31, 2015 at Heidelberg University in Germany. For further details of the program and how to apply, visit the Summer School website at http://www.asia-europe.uni-heidelberg.de/en/summerschool.

International Summer School : Migration Research Center at Koç University

 Diasporas and Transnational Communities - 29 June- 10 July 2015. The Call for Applications is now opened. Submissions are due by midnight GMT on Sunday, 25 April 2015. Download the complete Call for Applications information in PDF format for easy reference. Read more: http://miss.ku.edu.tr/home

SUMMER SCHOOL ON REFUGEE PROTECTION AND FORCED MIGRATION

20 July – 14 August 2015 Humboldt Summer University (HUWISU), Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. Applications are invited for this year's Summer School in Refugee Protection and Forced Migration to be held at the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. This course examines the protection regime pertaining to refugees, internally displaced persons (IDPs), and stateless persons. It gives special attention to the evolving set of legal norms, institutions, and procedures that have emerged from the international community’s resolve to protect refugees and other forced migrants. Read more: http://huwisu.de/courses/details/117/

International Summer School in Forced Migration

 Application deadline 1 May 2015 (reminder). Refugee Studies Centre, University of Oxford International Summer School in Forced Migration 06-24 July 2015. Applications are invited to the 2015 International Summer School in Forced Migration, to be held at Wadham College, Oxford. The Summer School, now in its 26th year, offers an intensive, interdisciplinary and participative approach to the study of forced migration. It aims to enable people working with refugees and other forced migrants to examine critically the forces and institutions that dominate the world of the displaced. Beginning with reflection on the diverse ways of conceptualizing forced migration, the course considers political, legal and wellbeing issues associated with contemporary displacement. Individual course modules also tackle a range of other topics, including globalization and forced migration, and negotiating strategies in humanitarian situations. Applications: Online: www.rsc.ox.ac.uk/summer-school. For any enquiries please contact: summer.school@qeh.ox.ac.uk For more information: www.rsc.ox.ac.uk/summer-school

 

PUBLICATION OPORTUNITIES

Call for Special Issues 2016 – Nordic Journal of Migration Research

 The Editors for the journal Nordic Journal of Migration Research invite proposals for Special Issues with deadline May 15th 2015. Decisions will be taken early June 2015. NJMR special issue proposals should be sent to the Managing Editor Tiina Vaittinen (tiina.vaittinen (at )uta.fi). Read more: http://www.degruyter.com/view/j/njmr

Call for papers: Forced Migration Review Issue 51 

To be published in November 2015 – will include a major feature called ‘Thinking ahead: displacement, transition and solutions’. Deadline for submission of articles: Monday 7th September 2015. www.fmreview.org/solutions Source: Forced Migration List - List Archives: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/forced-migration.html

Call for papers – Forthcoming special issue of Comparative Social Research  

Research with the title “Labor Mobility in the Enlarged Single European Market: Engine for social convergence or divergence?”Deadline for abstracts 1 May 2015, final drafts 1 October 2015.  Please feel free to take contact you have any enquiries. Jon Erik Dølvik and Line Eldring. Volume editors jed@fafo.no / lel@fafo.no

Call for Abstracts: International Journal of Sociology: Migration in the Global South

While the preponderance of migration research focuses on immigrants to developed countries, most international migration occurs between developing countries in what is often referred to as the “global south” (Abel and Sander 2014). Migration to developing countries, many of which are among the new immigrant destinations, is not well integrated with migration theory broadly (Winders 2014). More fully incorporating migration to the global south into our theoretical paradigms is necessary to produce better knowledge about the forces shaping migration, the integration and/or exclusion of migrants, how migrants are shaping the economies and sociopolitical contexts of their receiving societies, and transnational connections and exchanges emerging from international migration. This special issue of the International Journal of Sociology will address this important and growing area in the field of international sociology and migration studies. We invite authors to submit extended abstracts (300-500 words) that address the topic of migration into and through the Global South; we especially encourage submissions that will contribute to migration and/or globalization theory broadly. We welcome both empirical and theoretical submissions, as well as work that is interdisciplinary. The deadline for abstract submissions is May 29, 2015. If authors are invited to submit full papers, they will need to submit their manuscripts of 9,000 words or less by September 15, 2015. We expect to publish the special issue in early 2016

 

NETWORKS

ESGIM Network

The ESGIM ( European Sexuality, Gender Identity and Migration Research Network) is now established, following the queer migration workshop at Lund University, Sweden, September 2014. We hope to bring together scholars, researchers, students, and activists (as well as other interested persons) for the purpose of discussion, collaboration, and information sharing on topics related to the complex and multifold intersections of sexuality, gender and gender identity, queerness, and migration in the context of “Europe.”  Please visit our website and let us know if you would like to be included within our online Researcher Database. Read more: http://esgim.net/    

 

PUBLICATIONS

Randi Gressgård  (2015)- "The Power of (Re)attachment in Urban Strategy: Interrogating the Framing of Social Sustainability in Malmö" Environment and Planning A, Vol. 47, Issue 1, 2015

Based on a critical examination of Malmö’s new development strategy, this paper discusses the power of attachment in urban strategy, with a special focus on the ideological framing of social sustainability. It argues that the social sustainability agenda has less to do with its practical purpose of equalizing living conditions in a segregated city and more to do with its ability to mobilize people under a future vision through attachment to a fantasmatic narrative. The fantasmatic construction of the ‘future city’ helps promote ideological closure, but the fantasmatic vision is not tantamount to a utopian ideal that transcends participants’ self-interests. The paper analyzes urban strategists’ communication of visionary planning ideas, such as the idea of social sustainability, as a ritual practice that generates an abstract uniformity through people’s consensual appropriation of schemes. At the same time, the appropriation of schemes affords the participants a space of resistance which could turn the power of attachment into a politics of reattachment that critically engages with—and politicizes—ideological constructs that relate everything to a single vision. Read more: http://www.envplan.com/abstract.cgi?id=a130167p

Rashmi Singla (2015). Intermarriage and Mixed Parenting, Promoting Mental Health and Wellbeing: Crossover Love Palgrave Macmillan

The world is currently witnessing a significant growth in marriages across ethnic borders, but relatively little is known of how discourses of 'normal' families, ethnicity, race, migration, globalization affect couples and children involved in these mixed marriages. This book illuminates the reality of mixed marriage through intimate stories drawn from the lives of visibly different couples. Read more:http://www.palgrave.com/page/detail/intermarriage-and-mixed-parenting-promoting-mental-health-and-wellbeing-rashmi-singla/?K=9781137390776

Sophia Rose Arjana (2015). Muslims in the Western Imagination Oxford University Press.

Throughout history, Muslim men have been depicted as monsters. The portrayal of humans as monsters helps a society delineate who belongs and who, or what, is excluded. Even when symbolic, as in post-9/11 zombie films. This study is the first to present a genealogy of these creatures, from the demons and giants of the Middle Ages to the hunchbacks with filed teeth that are featured in the 2007 film 300, arguing that constructions of Muslim monsters constitute a recurring theme, first formulated in medieval Christian thought. Sophia Rose Arjana shows how Muslim monsters are often related to Jewish monsters, and more broadly to Christian anti-Semitism and anxieties surrounding African and other foreign bodies, which involves both religious bigotry and fears surrounding bodily difference. Arjana argues persuasively that these dehumanizing constructions are deeply embedded in Western consciousness, existing today as internalized beliefs and practices that contribute to the culture of violence--both rhetorical and physical--against Muslims. Read more: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/muslims-in-the-western-imagination-9780199324927?cc=us&lang=en#

Marjam Nadim (2015). Kulturell reproduksjon eller endring? - Småbarnsmødre med innvandringsbakgrunn og arbeid. Nytt norsk tidsskrift nr. 01/2015

Etterkommere av innvandrerne, de som også kalles andre- og tredjegenerasjons innvandrere ser en målestokk for integrering. Derfor følges disse barna nøye når de står ved terskelen til voksenlivet. Det er mulig å måle i hvilken grad de velger å videreføre kultur og skikker når det gjelder familieliv og yrkesvalg. "I den offentlige debatten har det vært en bekymring for at de vil videreføre såkalte tradisjonelle familieidealer og en kjønnskomplementær organisering av familielivet hvor yrkesarbeid er forbeholdt menn, mens kvinner primært er hjemme med ansvar for hus og barn. Etterkommernes valg følges med stor interesse fordi deres tilpasninger gir oss en pekepinn på de langsiktige konsekvensene av innvandringen til Norge." Kunne du tenke deg å lese denne artikkelen kan du sjekke om du har tilgang her - eller ta kontakt med ditt nærmeste bibliotek.

Rapport: Reidun Ingebretsen, Kirsten Thorsen og Vigdis Hegna Myrvang (2015).  Livsmot og mismot blant kvinner med innvandrerbakgrunn. Forlaget Aldring og helse)

Gjennom samtaler med 20 aldrende innvandrerkvinner har forskerne undersøkt hvordan kvinnene ser sin alderdom i møte i Norge. Hvilke belastninger og bekymringer har de i hverdagen, og hva mener de kan lette situasjonen og gi god trivsel og livskvalitet? Studien er forankret ved Nasjonal kompetansetjeneste for aldring og helse, og har fått finansiell støtte fra Extra Stiftelsen via Norske Kvinners Sanitetsforening. Rapporten er utgitt ved Forlaget Aldring og helse og kan bestilles der: http://www.aldringoghelse.no/bokhandel/minoriteter/livsmot-og-mismot.  

 

 

 
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