Digital Crossings in Europe: Gender, Diaspora and Belonging

Project Information

CONNECTINGEUROPE

Grant agreement ID: 647737

DOI

10.3030/647737

Project closed

EC signature date 31 July 2015

Start date 1 January 2016

End date 30 June 2021

Funded under

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)

Total cost

€ 1 992 809,00

EU contribution

€ 1 992 809,00

Coordinated by

UNIVERSITEIT UTRECHT
Netherlands

Periodic Reporting for period 4 - CONNECTINGEUROPE (Digital Crossings in Europe: Gender, Diaspora and Belonging)

Reporting period: 2020-07-01 to 2021-06-30

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

CONNECTINGEUROPE explored the relationship between migration and digital technologies from a comparative and interdisciplinary perspective. It analysed women migrants as ‘connected users’ and, therefore, as active participants on social media platforms. It focused in particular on the digital practices of migrant women from Somalia, Romania and Turkey, living in three of Europe’s main cosmopolitan cities — London, Amsterdam and Rome — in order to study alternative forms of civic participation and emotional belonging.
The scope was to investigate the ways in which digital technology enhances, changes or alters the experience of migration, impacting the strategies that women choose to maintain their diasporic affiliations, negotiate integration in their own terms, curate transnational intimacy and practice self-care. Many variables emerged that were related not only to the different ethnic origins of the migrant women studied and the different multicultural policies of the countries of arrival but also to the different waves of migration to Europe (postcolonial, post-socialist or as refugees). Other relevant factors were class, generation, religion, education and language.
The questions we posed were:

-How do migrant women stay in touch with communities, both close by and more distant?
-What forms do diasporic connections take place online and via social media platforms?
-How are new forms of co-presence and digital intimacy sustained transnationally?

This project took the activities, choices and interventions of migrant women as the starting point, providing alternative points of view that would otherwise be lost in the public domain.
Rather than focusing on the abstract capabilities and medium specificity of the internet, we used ethnography to help us understand digital media as part of the women’s everyday practices, situating the digital media in particular contexts and revealing the socially diverse practices and engagements of different groups and generations. We discovered that for migrant women, the use of digital media is strongly embedded in their gendered roles as mothers, daughters and reunited wives, students and professionals, who keep the ties with the homeland and diaspora communities through specific digital strategies and tactics.
More than the disruptions and revolution that the use of digital media technologies brought into the life of these communities, what emerged were strong similarities among the women across Europe. This is despite the fact that their engagement with social media, or media savviness, can vary greatly, as well as the intensity of its use, the purpose or choice of specific social media apps, and the level of leadership and visibility reached through digital engagements within their community at the local or transnational level.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

CONNECTINGEUROPE focused on the study of digital practices by migrant women (aged 18-40) who have settled in three of Europe’s main cities (PhD 1: London, PhD 2: Amsterdam, PhD 3: Rome), in dialogue with family and loved ones they have left behind (postdoc: Somalia, Romania, Turkey). This included training in digital methods and ethnographic media practices along with setting up a new mixed-methods approach. The fieldwork in the different countries included a total of over 160 interviews carried out with the help of community gatekeepers and language mediators.

During the course of its lifespan CONNECTINGEUROPE has acquired international visibility, demonstrated by the many invitations received by the PI, but also by team members, to present papers at international conferences, offer keynote addresses and lectures and collaborate on new applications and activities. It has produced many peer-reviewed publications, both individual and collective.

Major Highlights:

Publications:
2022 Koen Leurs and Sandra Ponzanesi (eds.), Doing Digital Migration Studies. Amsterdam University Press. Forthcoming 2022.
2022 Sandra Ponzanesi and Koen Leurs (guest editors), special issue ‘Digital Migration Practices and the Everyday,’ Communication, Culture & Critique. 15(2) 2022, forthcoming.
2021 Sandra Ponzanesi (guest editor), special issue ‘Somali Diaspora and Digital Practices: Gender, Media and Belonging,’ Journal of Global Diaspora and Media, 2(1), 2021, 1-97.
2020 Donya Alinejad and Sandra Ponzanesi (guest editors), special issue ‘Migrancy, Digital Media and Emotion,’ International Journal of Cultural Studies, 23(5), 2020, 621-820.
2019 Sandra Ponzanesi (guest editor), special issue ‘Migration in a Digital Age: (Re)Mapping Connectivity and Belonging,’ Television and New Media, 20(6), 547-648.
2018 Koen Leurs and Sandra Ponzanesi (guest editors), special issue ‘Connected Migrants: Encapsulation & Cosmopolitanization.’ Popular Communication. The International Journal of Media and Culture, 16(1), 1-85.

Conferences:
2021 Migrant Belongings. Digital Practices and the Everyday. Closing International Virtual Conference, 21-22-23 April 2021.
2018 ‘Migration and Mobility in a Digital Age. Paradoxes of Connectivity and Belonging.’ Columbia University, Heyman Center for the Humanities, New York, 10-11 April 2018.
2016 KNAW (The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences) Colloquium & Masterclass ‘Connected Migrants: Encapsulation or Cosmopolitanism?’ Amsterdam, 14-16 December 2016.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The project has been completed, though further outcomes and dissemination are likely to continue in the coming months/year.


The project has generated innovative scholarship at several levels:

- Theoretical (new theorization of digital diasporas and the politics of emotions): it has provided new insights and understanding of the concepts of ‘digital diaspora’ and ‘affective belongings’ at the translocal level;
- Methodological (integration of digital methods and ethnographic fieldwork): a mixed-methods approach was developed that can trace the online and offline digital practices of migrant women;
- Empirical (large-scale comparative data collection, both online and offline): extensive fieldwork was conducted (with over 160 interviews) among migrant women from different backgrounds who had not been studied in comparison before, in an approach that avoided ‘methodological nationalism’.

The intersection of the different levels has led to a new understanding of Postcolonial Europe as a multidirectional site, where cosmopolitan belonging is also realized through virtual connectivity. What emerged are hybridized and heterogeneous forms of participation that change the way we understand and account for social inclusion, gender emancipation, intercultural identities and the idea of Europe itself, through the study of digital everyday practices.


Videos and Outreach:
2021 Video interview ‘In Conversation with CONNECTINGEUROPE Research Team’. The European Humanities R&D Exhibition is available at:
https://educast.fccn.pt/vod/channels/fqhyn49j2?locale=pt&page=2

2017 Video of Sandra Ponzanesi presenting the Connecting Europe project at the ERC day: http://connectingeuropeproject.eu/2017/05/08/video-of-presentation-project-connecting-europe/

2016 Sandra Ponzanesi and Koen Leurs - Colloquium on Connected Migrants in Amsterdam: Encapsulation or Cosmopolitanism:
http://connectingeuropeproject.eu/2017/01/26/interview-nishant-shah-2/

Ongoing Updates on the websites and regular presence on social media via Instagram and Twitter.

For more info, check: http://connectingeuropeproject.eu/

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