Expoloring Diversity Seminar Seriens Workshop
“Transnational(ism)” in IMER-research – Networks, boundaries and mobilisation.
In recent years there has been a general increase in empirical research and theoretical engagement with transnationalism and transnational networks. In regard to the field of international migration and ethnic relations, transnationalism has been hotly debated and a central concern for research. Some approaches have focussed on the more manifest, organizational aspects of relations between sending and receiving countries, such as studies of remittances, migration patterns etc. Others have focussed on phenomenological dimensions; transnational social imaginaries, the stretching of lifeworlds in time and in space. Another division is between research following a more traditional Diaspora-approach, exploring the networks and transactions between “mother”- and recipient countries, and research focussing on migrants’ “double consciousness” as a more persistent dimension in the migrant situation. Both approaches include the meaning and the politics of borders and boundaries, but in different ways. Whereas the first approach tends to centre nation and ethnicity as imperative identity-dimensions in transnational mobilisation, the second approach opens other venues for research on transnational imagination and action. This second approach is perhaps more clearly envisioned in Paul Gilroys work on the Black Atlantic. Gilroy’s transnationalism is one that looks beyond ethnicity and nation as identity-construction dimensions, and focuses on the potential transnational solidarity stemming from being reduced to the other within the nation-state framework. If the first, and traditional, transnationalism approach focuses on the positive aspects of national and ethnic identities, the second approach departs from the negative aspects of the very same identities. These different approaches can again be seen to lead to different research focuses and also to different forms of political mobilisation.
This workshop brings together scholars who work in the intersection between transnationalism research and IMER-research. The purpose is to critically discuss what is meant by the terms “transnational” and “transnationalism”, and to provide some theoretical, methodological and empirical guidelines to research. How do we distinguish between “transnational” and “postnational”, how is the conceptualisation of transnational(-ism) linked to debates in globalisation theory, and how do we incorporate material, political and cultural aspects in research on transnationalism and migration?
IMER-Bergen has at present three research projects in the field of transnationalism research. Two of these focus on transnational mobilisation among young adults of ethnic minority background, the third focuses on different forms of transnational relations and mobilities, their spatial logics and the politics of space/place.
WORKSHOP program
“Transnational(ism)” in IMER-research – Networks, boundaries and mobilisation –
| Tid : | Mandag 17 Desember 2007, 10.00-17.00 |
| Sted : | UiB, Lauritz Meltzers hus, 9 etasje, Seminarrom. |
| 10.00 | Mette Andersson, UiB |
| ” Begrep og forskningsfokus” | |
| 10.30 | Thomas Olesen, University of Aarhus |
| “The Porous Public” | |
| 11.00 | Spørsmål og diskusjon |
| 11.30 | Pause |
| 11.45 | Garbi Schmidt, Danish National Institute of Social Research |
| “Transnational or Universal? Muslim Identity Forming Across National Boundaries” | |
| 12.15 | Spørsmål og diskusjon |
| 12.45 | Lunsj |
| 13.45 | Øivind Fuglerud, UiO |
| “Transnational practises and diasporic identification: Lessons from the Tamil case” | |
| 14.15 | Spørsmål og diskusjon |
| 14.45 | Pause |
| 15.00 | Elisabeth Eide, UiO |
| “Caricatures turning transnational – and landing in national contexts” | |
| 15.30 | Spørsmål og diskusjon |
| 16.00 | Generell diskusjon (slutt 17.00) |
Exploring Diversity SEMINAR SERIES
WORKSHOP
“Transnational(ism)” in IMER-research – Networks, boundaries and mobilisation –
In recent years there has been a general increase in empirical research and theoretical engagement with transnationalism and transnational networks. In regard to the field of international migration and ethnic relations, transnationalism has been hotly debated and a central concern for research. Some approaches have focussed on the more manifest, organizational aspects of relations between sending and receiving countries, such as studies of remittances, migration patterns etc. Others have focussed on phenomenological dimensions; transnational social imaginaries, the stretching of lifeworlds in time and in space. Another division is between research following a more traditional Diaspora-approach, exploring the networks and transactions between “mother”- and recipient countries, and research focussing on migrants’ “double consciousness” as a more persistent dimension in the migrant situation. Both approaches include the meaning and the politics of borders and boundaries, but in different ways. Whereas the first approach tends to centre nation and ethnicity as imperative identity-dimensions in transnational mobilisation, the second approach opens other venues for research on transnational imagination and action. This second approach is perhaps more clearly envisioned in Paul Gilroys work on the Black Atlantic. Gilroy’s transnationalism is one that looks beyond ethnicity and nation as identity-construction dimensions, and focuses on the potential transnational solidarity stemming from being reduced to the other within the nation-state framework. If the first, and traditional, transnationalism approach focuses on the positive aspects of national and ethnic identities, the second approach departs from the negative aspects of the very same identities. These different approaches can again be seen to lead to different research focuses and also to different forms of political mobilisation.
This workshop brings together scholars who work in the intersection between transnationalism research and IMER-research. The purpose is to critically discuss what is meant by the terms “transnational” and “transnationalism”, and to provide some theoretical, methodological and empirical guidelines to research. How do we distinguish between “transnational” and “postnational”, how is the conceptualisation of transnational(-ism) linked to debates in globalisation theory, and how do we incorporate material, political and cultural aspects in research on transnationalism and migration?
IMER-Bergen has at present three research projects in the field of transnationalism research. Two of these focus on transnational mobilisation among young adults of ethnic minority background, the third focuses on different forms of transnational relations and mobilities, their spatial logics and the politics of space/place.
Exploring Diversity SEMINAR SERIES
WORKSHOP program
“Transnational(ism)” in IMER-research – Networks, boundaries and mobilisation –
| Tid : | Mandag 17 Desember 2007, 10.00-17.00 |
| Sted : | UiB, Lauritz Meltzers hus, 9 etasje, Seminarrom. |
| 10.00 | Mette Andersson, UiB |
| ” Begrep og forskningsfokus” | |
| 10.30 | Thomas Olesen, University of Aarhus |
| “The Porous Public” | |
| 11.00 | Spørsmål og diskusjon |
| 11.30 | Pause |
| 11.45 | Garbi Schmidt, Danish National Institute of Social Research |
| “Transnational or Universal? Muslim Identity Forming Across National Boundaries” | |
| 12.15 | Spørsmål og diskusjon |
| 12.45 | Lunsj |
| 13.45 | Øivind Fuglerud, UiO |
| “Transnational practises and diasporic identification: Lessons from the Tamil case” | |
| 14.15 | Spørsmål og diskusjon |
| 14.45 | Pause |
| 15.00 | Elisabeth Eide, UiO |
| “Caricatures turning transnational – and landing in national contexts” | |
| 15.30 | Spørsmål og diskusjon |
| 16.00 | Generell diskusjon (slutt 17.00) |
The workshop is organized by Mette Andersson, Associate Professor, Dept. of Sociology , UiB and Knut Hidle, Research Director, Agderforskning
Exploring Diversity SEMINAR SERIES
WORKSHOP
“The Crystallisation of National Identities in Contemporary Europe”
Open IMER/UiB Workshop
This workshop will deal with a trend in many European states which may be referred to with labels such as the ‘crystallisation’ of national identities or neo-nationalism.
The workshop will examine questions like: is there a particular encompassment of globalisation by the European nation-states, generating neo-nationalism or the crystallisation of national identities? Are neo-nationalism and crystallisation inherent results emanating out of emerging European state-forms influenced by globalisation? Is the historical European national diversity generating something specific European which manifests itself in these contemporary phenomena? Or are there, at the level of generation, a restructuration of political universes and modes of citizenship where neo-nationalism and/or crystallisation of national identities are concomitants? If so, which are the key structurating forces? What (new) (world) order would such neo-nationalism and/or crystallisation imply? To whom would it give more power and legitimacy?
Workshop programme :
Wednesday September 17. :
13.15 – 16.30
1. Yngve Lithman: Welcome and Introduction
2. Bruce Kapferer: Globalization and the Nation State.
3. Mette Andersson: The social imaginary of first generation Europeans.
Thursday September 18. :
09.15 – 12.15
1. Andre Gingrich: “National Identity Inc.”: Uncertainties, politics of emotions, and the fading of European visions.
2. Sigalit Ben-Zion: The problem of the crystallization of national identity in Europe in the post-multiculturalism era.
3. Yngve Lithman: Nationalism, Chrystallization: observations from Scandinavia.
13.15 -17.00
1. Christian Joppke: Changes in the conceptual of citizenship in contemporary Europe: Liberalism and the nation.
2. Elisabeth Ivarsflaten: The anti-racism norm in Western European immigration politics: Why we need to consider it and how to measure it.
3.Hakan Sicakkan: Tracing the de-crystallization of European national identities: humanitarian sovereignty sharing, alternative public spaces and invented belongings.
WORKSHOP
Migration in Nordic societies: Recent perspectives
The workshop is organised as a collaboration between IMER Bergen and the Department of Sociology, UiB. It is open for all interested researchers and students.
Program:
09.00: Welcome by Lise Widding Isaksen (Dept. of Sociology, UiB).
09.15: Helle Stenum (Danish Institute for International Studies, Copenhagen): “Bane and Boon, Gains and pains; Dos and Don’ts. Moral economy and flexible citizens in au pair migration”.
09.45: Coffee break.
10.00: Lise Widding Isaksen (Dept. of Sociology, UiB): “Domestic Workers and Political Agency”.
10.30: Mariya Bikova (Dept. of Sociology, UiB): “Au pair Migration Norway – Philippines”.
11.00: Discussion. Discussant: Christine M. Jacobsen (IMER Bergen and Dept. of Social Anthropology, UiB).
12.00 – 13.00: Lunch break.
13.00: Anna Gavanas (Institute for Future Studies, Stockholm): “Migration, in/formalization and the expanding domestic service sector in Sweden”.
13.30: Vera Galindabaeva (European University, St. Petersburg): “The Effects of Rural-Urban Migration on Transformation of Child Care Arrangemenst in Buryat Rural Families in Post-Soviet Russia”.
14.00: Coffee break.
14.15: Synnøve Bendixsen (IMER Bergen and Uni Rokkan Centre): Ethiopian Irregular Migrants’ demonstration in Oslo Cathedral.
14.45 -15.30: Discussion. Discussant: Lise Widding Isaksen (Dept. of Sociology, UiB).
Friday 7 October, 09.00-15.30.
Faculty of Law, Seminar room 1, Magnus Lagabøtesplass 1.
WORKSHOP POSTER
Closing conference PROVIR
“Exceptional welfare: Dilemmas in/of irregular migration”
How do states respond to the physical presence and needs of people it officially has excluded? To what extent do international human rights provide protection? How does migration control and welfare policy affect irregular migrants’ experiences and subjectivities?
Physically present, but legally excluded, irregular migrants’ present societies with particular dilemmas relating to both sovereignty and human suffering. European countries increasingly involve welfare services in migration control, either by restricting access, or by using welfare services to detect/expose irregular migrants. This raises important questions concerning not only how migrants’ legal status influences their capacity to access services, but also the practical and ethical implications for service providers. Furthermore, it challenges the extent to which human rights actually limit the exclusionary powers of states and as such whether human rights are viable outside the confines of citizenship.
Provision of Welfare to Irregular Migrants (PROVIR) will be organizing its closing conference at the University of Bergen, 19th – 21th of November 2014. As an interdisciplinary project, the PROVIR research group and its international partners have combined a legal and social science approach to the provision of welfare to ‘irregular migrants’ in Norway, and comparatively in Europe, looking particularly at health care and education. The aim of the project has been to investigate the complex relationship between law, institutional practice, and migrants’ lived experience.
The closing conference aims to bring together researchers from various disciplines who are interested in the interplay between migration control and welfare policy. At the conference, findings from the PROVIR-project will be presented by the research team. In addition to presentations by key note speakers, the PROVIR research team also welcomes papers to be presented at workshops. We especially invite contributions addressing:
1) Irregular migrants’ legal situation regarding access to welfare provisions, either in national or international law.
2) Institutional practices and responses by service providers.
3) Migrants’ experiences, agency and embodiment.
We welcome both theoretical and empirical ventures into these questions, and papers may combine the aforementioned issues with interdisciplinary approaches. We particularly encourage papers exploring issues related to health, education and children. Paper proposals (maximum 300 words) can be submitted until the 25th of April 2014. Please include a short bio with the abstract. Conference registration deadline is 1st of October.
More information about the PROVIR-project is available at http://rokkan.uni.no/sites/provir/
IMER Abroad: PROVIR Seminar – Precarious migrants and access to welfare: Between policy, law and practice
This workshop will discuss the legal and experienced dilemmas found in the encounter between migrants living in a legally precarious situation and the welfare state in which they reside. Participants will present ongoing empirically based research on migrants’ access to welfare in policy, law and practice in various European countries. They will also discuss the particular position of youth and children in vulnerable situations. The program is available here.
PROVIR closing conference: Registration deadline 01.10.2014:
Conference registration deadline is 1st of October. Send abstract and registration details to Marry-Anne.Karlsen@uni.noMore information about the PROVIR-project is available at http://rokkan.uni.no/sites/provir/ To register and pay registration fee, please use the following link: https://provir.hoopla.no/sales/#1609368930/
Closing conference PROVIR: “Exceptional welfare: Dilemmas in/of irregular migration”
How do states respond to the physical presence and needs of people it officially has excluded? To what extent do international human rights provide protection? How does migration control and welfare policy affect irregular migrants’ experiences and subjectivities?Physically present, but legally excluded, irregular migrants’ present societies with particular dilemmas relating to both sovereignty and human suffering. European countries increasingly involve welfare services in migration control, either by restricting access, or by using welfare services to detect/expose irregular migrants. This raises important questions concerning not only how migrants’ legal status influences their capacity to access services, but also the practical and ethical implications for service providers. Furthermore, it challenges the extent to which human rights actually limit the exclusionary powers of states and as such whether human rights are viable outside the confines of citizenship.
Provision of Welfare to Irregular Migrants (PROVIR) will be organizing its closing conference at the University of Bergen, 19th – 21th of November 2014. As an interdisciplinary project, the PROVIR research group and its international partners have combined a legal and social science approach to the provision of welfare to ‘irregular migrants’ in Norway, and comparatively in Europe, looking particularly at health care and education. The aim of the project has been to investigate the complex relationship between law, institutional practice, and migrants’ lived experience.
The closing conference aims to bring together researchers from various disciplines who are interested in the interplay between migration control and welfare policy. At the conference, findings from the PROVIR-project will be presented by the research team. In addition to presentations by key note speakers, the PROVIR research team also welcomes papers to be presented at workshops. The topics adressed will be:
- Irregular migrants’ legal situation regarding access to welfare provisions, either in national or international law.
- Institutional practices and responses by service providers.
- Migrants’ experiences, agency and embodiment.
PROGRAM:
Wednesday 19th of November Venue: Det Akademiske Kvarter
18.00-19.30: Letter to the king Film by Hisham Zaman
Letter to the King portrays five people on a day trip from a refugee camp to Oslo, a welcome change in an otherwise monotonous life. But we soon realize that each and every one of them has an agenda for their trip. All five will make decisive choices on this day, as they discover happiness, humiliation, love or fulfill a long-awaited revenge. The five stories are tied together by a letter, written by eighty-three year old Mirza. Mirza wants to hand over the letter to the King personally.
19.30-21.00: Mediating irregular migration
The phenomenon of irregular migration is inextricably linked to its forms of mediation. Researchers, artists, authors, journalists and others contribute to the proliferation of images of the lives, and deaths, of those who migrate without proper authorization from the state. While stereotypical accounts of victims/criminals proliferate in mainstream media – (counter) representations that challenge such stereotyping also exist. The speakers in this panel discussion have all participated in producing and/or analysing images of irregular migration. Taking as their point of departure the film “Letter to the King”, they will discuss the poetics and politics of mediating irregular migration. What (im)possibilities does such mediation offer for current border struggles?
Plenary panel discussion with:
Hisham Zaman, Director (To be confirmed)
Shahram Khosravi, Associate Professor of Social Anthropology, University of Stockholm
Synnøve N. Bendixsen, Post-doctoral fellow PROVIR and Department of Social Anthropology, University of Bergen
Film and panel discussion organized in cooperation with Studentersamfunnet i Bergen (http://samfunnet.sib.no/)
Thursday 20th of November Venue: Faculty of Law, Magnus Lagabøtes plass 1, University of Bergen
09.30-10.00: Tea, coffee and registrations
10.00-10.15: Welcome address
10.15-11.45: Precarious inclusion: Provision of welfare to irregular migrants in Norway
Presentation of PROVIR research findings by
Christine M. Jacobsen, Karl Harald Søvig, Synnøve Bendixsen, Andrea Sussman and Marry-Anne Karlsen
11.45-12.00: Coffee break
12.00-13.00: Care Beyond Welfare?
Key note lecture by Miriam Ticktin, Associate Professor of Anthropology, The New School for Social Research and Eugene Lang College (US)
13.00-14.00: Lunch
14.00-16.00: Workshops
16.00-16.15: Coffee break
16.15-17.15: Wrongs, Rights and Regularization
Key note lecture by Linda Bosniak, Distinguished Professor of Law, Rutgers School of Law–Camden (US)
19.00: Conference dinner
Nøsteboden
Friday 21st of November
Venue: Faculty of Law, Magnus Lagabøtes plass 1, University of Bergen
09.15-10.15: Limiting Health Care as a Tool of Immigration Policy: Ethnographic Insights into Deservingness and Responses by Civil Society
Key note lecture by Heide Castañeda, Associate Professor and Graduate Director, Department of Anthropology, University of South Florida (US)
10.15-10.30: Coffee break
10.30-13.00: Workshops
13.00-14.00: Lunch
14.00-16.00: Excepted, excluded or precariously included? Dilemmas in/of irregular migration Roundtable discussion by PROVIR research team and international partners:
Bridget Anderson, Professor of Migration and Citizenship and Deputy Director of Centre on Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS), University of Oxford (UK)
Milena Chimienti, Professor, University of Applied Science Western Switzerland – Social Work, Haute Ecole Fribourgeoise de Travail Social (HETS) (Switzerland)
Henriette Abbing, (Emiratus) Professor of Health Law, University of Utrecht (the Netherlands)
Christine M. Jacobsen, Professor, PROVIR project leader and Director of Center for Women’s and Gender Research (SKOK), University of Bergen (Norway)
Karl Harald Søvig, Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Bergen (Norway)
Workshop Porgram:
Download workshop program here