Search

With its imperial past, nationalist tradition, past westernization attempts, inverse orientalism toward populations from the East, and current neo-Ottomanist policies, Turkey presents an interesting case in which to examine the ideologies underlying its education system. Turkish schools began receiving a large number of Syrian refugees following the outbreak of the Syrian War in 2011. How does Turkey seek to absorb these former subjects of the Ottoman empire politically, discursively, and socioculturally into its national body politic, and more specifically into the education system, in light of shifting relations with Arabs and changing representation of the Arabic language and culture? Based on literature review and interviews with Syrians, state officials, and NGO representatives in Istanbul between 2017 and 2020, this study demonstrates that while there is strong emphasis on shared religious and cultural ties, Syrians are still expected to assimilate, similar to other historically minoritized populations in Turkey, albeit with some peculiarities. These peculiarities stem from increased prominence of the Arabic language through the Islamization project of the present government, international funding for the accommodation of refugees, and the economic relations the government seeks with Arab countries.

This paper sheds light on Syrian refugee women's negotiation strategies in language learning classrooms and in their broader social contexts from an intersectional perspective. Drawing on in-depth interviews and focus groups complemented by participatory observation in language classes, we use a post-structuralist approach to examine gendered language socialization. Our research combines an intersectional framework and a Bourdieusian perspective on symbolic capital to show how women perform gender and negotiate their roles in classrooms, within families and vis-à-vis the host society. The findings demonstrate that being a woman and a migrant presents particular challenges in learning language. At the same time, learning language allows for the re-negotiation of gender relations and power dynamics. We find that gender structures women's access to linguistic resources and interactional opportunities as they perform language under social pressure to conform to prescribed roles as mothers, wives and virtuous, and shy women. Yet, these roles are not static: gender roles are also reconstituted in the process of language learning and gaining symbolic capital.

This article explores the case of the migration studies industry in Turkey, which has flourished over the past decade, through an examination of knowledge production on refugee labour. Focusing on research about Syrian refugees' labour and employment in Turkey between 2012 and 2018, the article discusses the ways in which refugee labour is articulated and studied to provide ground for a wider critique of migration-related knowledge production. This study aims to reflexively question academic outputs by (1) exploring the conceptual frames used broadly in research on refugee labour, and (2) developing an overview of the literature on Turkey with a focus on this topic. Through the case of the literature on refugee labour in Turkey, we explore the underlying political economy premises of migration research. This case serves as an example to argue that knowledge produced in a Southern context is mainly incorporated as case studies despite attempts to advance theoretical discussions, highlighting a North–South hierarchization of knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gender inequality in education has been well documented in the literature, in light of family and school socialization. We build on this literature and focus from a micro sociological perspective on the emergence of 'critical reflexivity' in the specific case of a group of university scholarship students in Lebanon. Through observations and in-depth interviews, we identify gender differentiated prior dispositions that influence university experiences of those students and their career plans and demonstrate that critical reflexivity involves a process of negotiation between two fields. Family control was associated with success in studies at the expense of the social aspects of university. Gendered norms also reflected on their choices of major. Furthermore, in examining cases of emergence of reflexivity, we find that prior socialization experiences, namely degree of social conservatism, experience of change as well as social heterogeneity, influence the development of 'critical reflexivity' as students encountered a new social environment.

While literature documents how the employability agenda has become the new neoliberal common sense in universities much less attention has been given to the mechanisms of adaptation by students. Utilizing a four-year longitudinal case study of scholarship students at an elite university, this paper focuses on the process through which this 'meritocratic' program normalises neoliberal common sense in higher education. We put into question the principle of positive discrimination, considering the limited number of beneficiaries. Our findings illustrate that, instead of minimizing inequalities, this scholarship program contributes in strengthening the neoliberal ideology within the education system. We further demonstrate that students' backgrounds influence their adaptation into the program and access to employment. In addition, we argue that urban-rural differences among others have more explanatory power than class differences in understanding the complex adaptation of students into the program in the Lebanese context.

This article analyses the migration agreements between the European Union (EU) and Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan. These international policy frameworks were negotiated in tandem with one another, and all were announced in 2016. Drawing on fieldwork conducted in the three countries, the article argues that they fuse humanitarian elements with a bloc‐based security logic in an ad‐hoc mix that lacks substantive legitimacy in the three states, rendering the frameworks unstable. The article introduces the idea of hybrid migration governance which we have developed inductively to conceptualise the empirical findings from our fieldwork, building on existing work on hybridity in the conflict and security studies literature and Nora Stel's conception of governance as the ability to shape the field of action of others. In our usage, hybrid migration governance refers to the efficacy of EU intervention in the institutional management of migration in the three case study countries ('shaping the field of action'), the 'frozen' character of the societal relations formed through this process and their underlying lack of domestic legitimacy. In conclusion, we argue that hybrid migration governance poses problem for the EU's 'Barcelona' conception of human security, because rather than expanding the bloc's 'zone of security' to the international neighbourhood, these policies have generated downstream security‐risks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses the governance of migration and the Covid-19 pandemic on precarious Syrian refugees in Istanbul. Drawing from a review of state policies and interviews with refugees before and after the pandemic, we argue that the intersecting governance of migration and the pandemic compounded inequalities. While refugees initially lost their employment without notice in lockdown periods, their partial lifting revealed unequal expectations towards their labour, as they were reincorporated within even more hyper-precarious labour relations. Unlike citizens who were somewhat protected by the state, refugees were under the limited care of international funders and subject to the whims of the market. Pandemic governance resulted in increased hyper-precarity and the need to rely on individual coping mechanisms for refugees. This research shows how shifting inclusion and exclusion shapes refugees' hyper-precarity related to Covid-19 governance, transforming Syrians into 'market buffers' to prevent or delay bankruptcies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The literature on migration, language and employment is dominated by the human capital approach and promotes multilingualism as a universal good. This paper examines the relationship between language and work for migrants illustrating how they are ascribed value as capital according to their position and the "language part of work." First, we trace a genealogy of the migration regime in relation to the labor and linguistic market of migrants in Turkey, characterized by informality and exploitation. Then, we look at the experiences of refugees qualitatively to show how language is differentially valued and has modest effects on social mobility. We argue that language learning instead of stemming from individuals' possession of capital should be examined within a broader linguistic and employment framework. This research goes beyond conventional wisdom about the centrality of language as a means to improve employment by shedding light on the structure that shapes language value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wider access to higher education at a global level has been accompanied by growing literature on experiences of social mobility often using the concept of habitus as a theoretical tool to frame responses to changes in 'conditions of existence'. Drawing on the case study of a scholarship programme within an elite university in Lebanon, through in-depth interviews with students and university faculty and staff, this article elaborates on the typologies in responses that emerged as students position themselves in a new environment. These typologies, in contrast to the literature which presents them as a result of alterations in the habitus, appear to be related to each other and occur simultaneously within one person's trajectory. As such, instead of viewing these responses as degrees of incorporation of each set of schemes of perceptions from both fields, the context of origin and the new social context appear to be multi-faceted, and the interaction between them is complex. I argue, along the lines of Lahire's dispositional perspective, that the situation of contradictory experiences is not exceptional but characterizes all individuals to a certain extent, especially in the Lebanese context which is distinguished by its diversity in terms of regional and religious affiliations and in which class intersects with other types of identifications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper sheds light on Syrian refugee women's negotiation strategies in language learning classrooms and in their broader social contexts from an intersectional perspective. Drawing on in-depth interviews and focus groups complemented by participatory observation in language classes, we use a post-structuralist approach to examine gendered language socialization. Our research combines an intersectional framework and a Bourdieusian perspective on symbolic capital to show how women perform gender and negotiate their roles in classrooms, within families and vis-à-vis the host society. The findings demonstrate that being a woman and a migrant presents particular challenges in learning language. At the same time, learning language allows for the re-negotiation of gender relations and power dynamics. We find that gender structures women's access to linguistic resources and interactional opportunities as they perform language under social pressure to conform to prescribed roles as mothers, wives and virtuous, and shy women. Yet, these roles are not static: gender roles are also reconstituted in the process of language learning and gaining symbolic capital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While literature documents how the employability agenda has become the new neoliberal common sense in universities much less attention has been given to the mechanisms of adaptation by students. Utilizing a four-year longitudinal case study of scholarship students at an elite university, this paper focuses on the process through which this 'meritocratic' program normalises neoliberal common sense in higher education. We put into question the principle of positive discrimination, considering the limited number of beneficiaries. Our findings illustrate that, instead of minimizing inequalities, this scholarship program contributes in strengthening the neoliberal ideology within the education system. We further demonstrate that students' backgrounds influence their adaptation into the program and access to employment. In addition, we argue that urban-rural differences among others have more explanatory power than class differences in understanding the complex adaptation of students into the program in the Lebanese context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the Syrian conflict continues, local and global stakeholders have already begun to consider the return of the six million refugees, especially as neither the option of local integration in the countries of first asylum nor that of resettlement to third countries is seen as a realistic possibility. Elaborating on the return debates in Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan, we relate the politicisation of this question to the growing acceptance of the option of voluntary and involuntary repatriation in the international refugee regime as well as to policies and public opinion. We argue, based on empirical fieldwork, that any debate about the return of Syrian refugees is problematic, since the conditions of safety, voluntariness and sustainability are not fulfilled. Further, returns should not be left entirely to the individual hosting states and actors in the region but should be carried out in collaboration with representative authorities in Syria and the mediation of international organisations upon full resolution of conflict. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The REACH 2010 Initiative aims at reducing racial disparities in infant mortality in Genesee County, Flint, Michigan. To alleviate these disparities, healthful eating interventions were planned for which needs assessment was conducted. The objective of the current study is to explore the perceptions of African American women of childbearing age related to healthful eating. Four focus group sessions were conducted with n = 10 African American women with the help of a discussion guide composed of open-ended questions. All sessions were audiorecorded, and tapes were transcribed verbatim. Using the methodology described by Auerbach CF (2003), the transcripts were reviewed and topics were assigned from which broader themes emerged. Social Cognitive Theory (Bandura, 1989) guided the interpretation of the results. Women articulated their primary influences on healthful eating as follows: cultural and traditional food practices, social support, food preparation practices, fast-food consumption, and location of grocery stores; as well as time and budget limitations. Women also identified the following barriers to healthful eating: lactose intolerance, drug abuse, and access to prenatal care. In conclusion, the interplay between environmental and personal factors appears to impact the perceptions among the women enrolled in the current study. These results are consistent with the findings of Hargreaves et al (2002).A culturally appropriate nutrition education program integrating these factors should be targeted to reach African American women in Flint, Michigan. This project was funded by CDC REACH 2010 Precious Black Babies Project.