Investigating Social Change: Migratory Stratifications

In collaboration with University of Glasgow Social Anthropology & Migration

Chaired by: Dr Karolina Benghellab (University of Glasgow)

Abstract

This panel event draws on a Special Issue published by Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power: Investigating Social Change: 'Migratory Stratifications' as a Fresh Analytical Tool, Vol 32 No 6.

Migrations serve as both a driving force and a reflection of profound social, cultural, economic, demographic and territorial transformations. They interact with global phenomena – of which they are an integral part – while simultaneously being shaped by them, exerting a significant impact on national and local contexts. At the same time, migrations constitute a social fact, in which the entirety of human practice and experience is involved in a relationship of interdependence. This interplay unfolds within and across the social, economic, political, cultural and religious spheres, worldviews and symbolic representations. Building on these premises and adopting a diachronic perspective, the panel will discuss how migratory phenomena actively reshape societies of origin, destination and transit, and analyse the stratification of different migratory epochs – shaped by shifting global and local dynamics – through their incorporation into material artefacts and socio-cultural practices.

This event will take place online. Please register to attend, and a joining link will be sent to you on the day of the event.

Francesco Della Puppa hold his PhD in Social Sciences from the University of Padua, and is Associate Professor in General Sociology in the Department of Philosophy and Cultural Heritage at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice. His research interests include international migration; migrant family and family reunification; onward migration and secondary movements; migrant labour and digital work; social conflict and social movements; Bangladeshi Diaspora; ethnography and qualitative social research. He has published extensively in prestigious academic journals, including Sociology, International Migration Review, Identities, Ethnic and Racial Studies, International Migration, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, Globalizations, Global Networks, Social Anthropology, Ethnography.

Giuliana Sanò is an Associate Professor of Social and Cultural Anthropology at the University of Messina. Her primary research interests include international migration, migrant labour, the reception system for refugees and asylum seekers, internal migration, and social transformations in urban and rural areas. She is the author of the book, Fabbriche di Plastica. Il lavoro nell’agricoltura industriale (Plastic Factories: Labor in Industrial Agriculture). She is also the Principal Investigator for the Migrant Digital Work project, and the University of Messina representative for the InMigrHealth: Investigating Migrants’ Occupational Health project.

Giulia Storato, PhD in Social Sciences, is currently a research facilitator at Ca' Foscari University of Venice, Italy. Her past research activities focused mainly on migration studies, childhood and youth studies and qualitative, visual and participatory methods.

Chiara Martini is an activist and researcher working on borders and solidarity. She is currently completing a PhD in Sociology and Methodology of Social Research at the University of Milan. Since 2018, she has been engaged in research, activism, and volunteer work in support of people on the move across Italy and the Western Balkans. Her doctoral research focuses on grassroots solidarities along the Balkan Routes, with particular attention to the contexts of Greece, Bulgaria, and Bosnia-Herzegovina. More broadly, her research interests include bordering and de-bordering processes, forms of solidarity from below, and the transformations of urban spaces shaped by mobility and regimes of containment.

Giulia Dugar is an Adjunct Professor in the Departments of Political and Social Sciences, and Languages, Literature and Modern Cultures at the University of Bologna where, among other courses, she teaches Sociology of Asian Countries. Her research interests lie at the crossroads of sociology, migration, education studies and Japanese area studies. During her doctoral experience, she investigated the integration of immigrant-origin youths living in Japan, with a special focus on school integration. In addition to her academic post, she periodically collaborates with the Fondazione Leone Moressa think tank in Venice, Italy, where she assists in drafting national reports on the economic aspects of Italian migration.

Roberta Altin is Professor of Cultural Anthropology at the Department of Humanities, University of Trieste, Italy. Her research focuses on transnational migration, refugee studies, and museum and media anthropology. She has previously been founder and coordinator of the Center for Migration & International Cooperation on Sustainable Development) at the University of Trieste (2017-2023), vice-president of the Italian Society of Applied Anthropology (2020-2023), and director of the Blacksmith Art and Cutlery Museum – Maniago (2004-2021). She has published in various journals including Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power, Journal of International Migration and Integration, Journal of Balkan and Near Eastern Studies and Journal of Modern Italian Studies, and is also the author of several books.

Karolina Benghellab is a Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Glasgow. Her research focuses on the relationship between international border management and what people on the move call 'games' (border crossing without authorization) and 'push-backs' (forced returns over a border with the use of violence). In this context, Karolina also seeks how international border controls overlap with local histories and domestic armed conflicts, and how these impact people on the move and residents equally. Karolina’s research is also critical of how race and gender intervene into border controls, and how diverse people challenge racialized and gendered inequalities and create mechanisms to resist violence when crossing borders and smuggling people. Her most recent work also considers climatic conditions and their intervention to violence in migration transit.