posted on 2018-10-30, 14:18authored byAija Lulle, Laura Buzinska
This paper visualises tertiary-level students who study abroad as simultaneously both international students and members of an emerging diaspora. Coming from a country (Latvia) which is peripheral and relatively poor by European standards, students go abroad for multiple reasons not necessarily directly connected with study (e.g. family reasons, labour migration); yet their evolving diasporic status is instrumentalised by the Latvian government which wants them to return and contribute to the country’s development. Based on 27 in-depth interviews with Latvian students and graduates who have studied abroad, our analysis focuses on three interlinked dimensions of inequality: access to education at home and abroad; the varying prestige of higher education qualifications from different countries and universities; and the inequalities involved in getting recognition of the symbolic and cultural capital that derives from a non-Latvian university. Within a setting of neoliberal globalisation and conflicting messages from the homeland, students and graduates are faced with a challenging dilemma: how to balance their materialistic desire for a decent job and career with their patriotic duty to return to Latvia.
Funding
Centre for Diaspora and Migration Research and the State Research Programme EKOSOC.LV 5.2.4.
History
School
Social Sciences
Department
Geography and Environment
Published in
Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies
Volume
43
Issue
8
Pages
1362 - 1378
Citation
LULLE, A. and BUZINSKA, L., 2017. Between a ‘student abroad’ and ‘being from Latvia’: inequalities of access, prestige, and foreign-earned cultural capital. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 43 (8), pp.1362-1378
This work is made available according to the conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) licence. Full details of this licence are available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Publication date
2017-05-05
Notes
This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies on 05/05/2017, available online: https://doi.org/10.1080/1369183X.2017.1300336