Migrant Scholars Researching Migration by Gemignani, Marco; Hernández-Albújar, Yolanda; Sládková, Jana;

Short description:

Through reflections on the importance of the connection between biography and research, this book considers the influence of scholars’ experiences of migration on their careers, highlighting the importance of reflexivity and subjectivity as assets, and positioning the researcher’s experience at the centre of the process of enquiry.

Long description:

How can biography and reflexivity become integral processes of an inquiry? How do we apply these processes to our research and to our accounts of ourselves?

Presenting studies by migration scholars who are migrants themselves, Migrant Scholars Researching Migration illustrates the creative and affective function of embedding one's research in subjectivity, reflexivity, and personal biography. The book shows that linking personal experiences and biographies with research practices and agendas can be instrumental to the development of knowledges and new methodologies. The authors demonstrate, for instance, how their migration backgrounds have affected what kind of research they ‘should’ conduct. They also describe how their research findings have changed their understanding of their personal positionings as migrants and scholars.

This book debunks the dogma of separating the researcher from their investigation by placing the researchers' experiences and multi-layered reflections at the center of their scholarly work. It sheds light on the importance of reflexivity and subjectivity as processes and assets in research rather than obstacles.

Migrant Scholars Researching Migration will appeal to researchers and students interested in methodology, biographical research, theories of knowledge, and scholars of migration and diaspora studies.

Chapters: Chapter 14 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons [Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND)] 4.0 license.

Table of Contents:

Dedication

List of figures

Acknowledgments

Notes on contributors

Foreword

CECILIA MENJÍVAR

Foreword

KENNETH J. GERGEN

Introduction

MARCO GEMIGNANI, YOLANDA HERNÁNDEZ-ALBÚJAR, AND JANA SLÁDKOVÁ

Theoretical Introduction: Subjectivity, Reflexivity, and Affectivity as Research Processes

MARCO GEMIGNANI, YOLANDA HERNÁNDEZ-ALBÚJAR, AND JANA SLÁDKOVÁ

PART I

Entanglements of Memories as Research 

1.      When we migrate

ANDREEA DECIU RITIVOI

2.      My poncho is a flamenco kimono

FERNANDO IWASAKI

3.      Wesearch: A Lao research scholar’s experience learning about and with her Southeast Asian American community

PHITSAMAY S. UY

4.      The process of becoming: An intimate and retrospective look at a 30-year journey of searching for a home 

VERONICA MONTES

5.      Looking for home: Reflections on an artistic process

PAVEL ROMANIKO

PART II

Negotiating belonging and identities in research

1. On not seeing oneself in the migration scholarship: Race and the struggle for belonging in the Indian diaspora

SUNIL BHATIA

1. In-between places: Negotiating (dis)advantage across national contexts

NIDA BIKMEN

1. Going from student to immigrant to citizen

ERNESTO CASTAÑEDA

1. Migration, narratives, and languages: Between life and work

ANNA DE FINA

1. Being a transnational language teacher educator and researcher: Borderlands, ideologies, and liminal identities

BEDRETTIN YAZAN

1. A transatlantic teacher educator: My life and career across two countries and languages

JOHANNA TIGERT

1. The research memoir of an intra-EU migrant who has become a guest in a settler colonial state

ANNA TRIANDAFFYLIDOU

PART III

Tensions of power in knowledge production

1. Bewilderment and illumination: Language as a tool to understand the migrant experience

LUKA LUCIĆ

1. Developing new approaches, stepping beyond categories: transnationalism and youth mobility trajectories in migration research

VALENTINA MAZZUCATO

1. From the “field” to the stage: A migration story

CAROLINA ALONSO BEJARANO

1. Can Black girls be transnational?

NAFEESAH ALLEN

1. From “second-generation immigrant” to sociologist of migration

MARCO MARTINIELLO

1. Keeping the struggle alive: A methodologically disobedient essay

ALI KONYALI

Conclusions: Towards New Ways of Knowing

MARCO GEMIGNANI, YOLANDA HERNÁNDEZ-ALBÚJAR, AND JANA SLÁDKOVÁ

Index