Europe, Migration and Identity

Connecting Migration Experiences and Europeanness

Jan Logemann, Donna Gabaccia, Sally Kohlstedt, Sally Gregory Kohlstedt

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2015
• eBook ISBN: 9781317683261
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: World History
• Index: History

This volume explores connections between migration studies and research in the history of Europeanization and Europeaness, areas which have generated much interest in recent years. Beyond histories of European political integration and the intellectual and elite movements that have supported this process, scholars increasingly pay attention to the constructed nature of Europeaness and European identities, and to the multiplicity of ways in which this construction happens. Migrants can be a particularly useful lens on Europeanization processes as they provide a perspective from the periphery in two ways: by providing a view literally from the outside as in the case of those who left the continent or by providing a view from the margins of the European societies within which they live.

The collection asks what 'Europe' meant to migrants abroad - particularly within the transatlantic context - and within the continent during the twentieth century. Contributions from a variety of disciplinary perspectives reflect both on the broader historical context and theoretical implications and highlight specific cases, such as those of European labor migrants to the United States, of transatlantic exiles and émigrés, of Latin-American immigrants in present-day Europe, as well as the experience of highly-skilled migrants within the context of the European Union. Can we trace the emergence of European identities among different groups of migrants and, if so, what forms did they take?

This book was originally published as a special issue of National Identities.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Citation Information
• Notes on Contributors
• 1. Europe - Migration - Identity: Connections between migration experiences and Europeanness
• 2. Lessons and cautionary tales from the past: Building bridges from migration history to Europeanness
• 3. Where and when was Europe? Europeanness and its relationship to migration
• 4. Italian Americans in the 'Bocce Belt': 'Old World' memories and 'New World' identities
• 5. Gender and identity in exile: A European émigré in social work
• 6. Belonging, beyond the nation: The significance and meaning of European identity for Latin American-origin youth in Spain
• 7. Transnational highly skilled Finnish migrants in Europe: Choosing one's identity
• Index