Preliminary Programme

Wed 12 April
    08.30 - 10.30
    11.00 - 13.00
    14.00 - 16.00
    16.30 - 18.30

Thu 13 April
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    11.00 - 13.00
    14.00 - 16.00
    16.30 - 18.30

Fri 14 April
    08.30 - 10.30
    11.00 - 13.00
    14.00 - 16.00
    16.30 - 18.30

Sat 15 April
    08.30 - 10.30
    11.00 - 13.00
    14.00 - 16.00

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Friday 14 April 2023 08.30 - 10.30
L-9 ETH17a Identities I
C24
Network: Ethnicity and Migration Chair: Suzan Abozyid
Organizers: - Discussant: Suzan Abozyid
Cigdem Billur Ada : Faith Brings Us Together: Transforming Religious Identity of Nakhichevani Migrants in Istanbul
An ethnically and religiously homogenous neighbourhood takes place at the intersection between Zeynebiye and Fatih Avenues with the nine parallel streets in Halkali, Istanbul. It consists of two different groups of migrants: internal migrants from Igdir with Azeri ethnic background and irregular migrants from Nakhichevan. The neighbourhood is significant due ... (Show more)
An ethnically and religiously homogenous neighbourhood takes place at the intersection between Zeynebiye and Fatih Avenues with the nine parallel streets in Halkali, Istanbul. It consists of two different groups of migrants: internal migrants from Igdir with Azeri ethnic background and irregular migrants from Nakhichevan. The neighbourhood is significant due to the Jafa’ri religious movement called Zeynebiye which was formed by the first group of migrants who came to the neighbourhood in the mid-1970s. In the early 1990s, the second group, the Nakhichevani migrants came to Halkali, mostly with their families as a result of the war and the subsequent economic crisis. Due to their ethnic and religious ties, the first group of the internal migrants who were mostly the members of the Zeynebiye movement became influential in resolving the employment, accommodation, healthcare and education problems of the Nakhichevani migrants, which arose from their irregularity. This movement also paved the way for the transformation of the religious identity of the Nakhichevani community. Along with an increased awareness of their sectarian differences, the Nakhichevani migrants who previously consumed alcohol started to defend the prohibition of alcohol consumption and the women who were not wearing headscarves adopted veiling within almost three decades. This paper explores how the ethnic solidarity between the internal and international migrants of Halkali transformed the religious identity of the Nakhichevani migrants in Istanbul. The research material that is used in the paper was obtained during the field research in Halkali in October 2017 and includes twenty interviews with the Nakhichevani and Jafa’ri migrants, including those with the board members of the Zeynebiye Foundation. (Show less)

Irial Glynn : Two Irelands: Two Different Emigration Experiences? Comparing Emigration from Northern Ireland and Ireland Since 1945
Devlin Trew (2013: 6), the authority on Northern Irish emigration, has written that ‘much of the literature on twentieth century Irish migration does not even mention the North’, which has ‘served to perpetuate by default a ‘partitionist’ approach in thinking about Irish migration’. This paper attempts to counterbalance such an ... (Show more)
Devlin Trew (2013: 6), the authority on Northern Irish emigration, has written that ‘much of the literature on twentieth century Irish migration does not even mention the North’, which has ‘served to perpetuate by default a ‘partitionist’ approach in thinking about Irish migration’. This paper attempts to counterbalance such an approach by comparing 1) the scale and patterns of migration from Northern Ireland (NI) and the Republic of Ireland (ROI), 2) the profile of migrants, 3) the experience that migrants had and 4) the impact that their departure had on the societies left behind. Emigration from NI was slower and steadier than from ROI, which fluctuated more wildly (e.g. the 1950s, late 1980s). Most strikingly, emigration from NI peaked during the most violent period of the ‘Troubles’ in the early 1970s, when ROI experienced substantial immigration – mostly from returning emigrants. Families remained more prominent among NI emigrants than their southern counterparts until the late 1960s, partly because of possibility offered by assisted emigration passages to British Commonwealth countries, such as Canada, Australia and New Zealand; an option closed to ROI emigrants. Although emigration did not affect the size of the NI population in the same way as it did in the ROI, it has had a remarkable impact on the society’s religious makeup. Until the 1970s, disproportionate numbers of Catholics leaving NI helped to maintain a clear Protestant majority. However, a noticeable shift occurred thereafter, which saw Protestants emigrate in greater numbers and return less often than their Catholic counterparts. This partly explains why the 2021 census for NI showed that for the first time in its history, the number of Catholic inhabitants outnumbered Protestants – by 45.7% to 43.5%; in stark contrast to the respective figures of 34% and 65% in 1951. (Show less)

Juliette Ronsin : A Transnational Labour History: the Immigration of (Post) Yugoslav Workers in Peugeot's Factories in Sochaux-Montbéliard (France), from 1965 to Today
PhD student at the Ecole Normale Supérieure (France), I am doing a thesis entitled "The (post-) Yugoslav immigration to Sochaux-Montbéliard from 1965 to today", under the direction of Mrs. Claire Zalc. How to explain the meeting between the history of the Peugeot company and the individual and collective trajectories of ... (Show more)
PhD student at the Ecole Normale Supérieure (France), I am doing a thesis entitled "The (post-) Yugoslav immigration to Sochaux-Montbéliard from 1965 to today", under the direction of Mrs. Claire Zalc. How to explain the meeting between the history of the Peugeot company and the individual and collective trajectories of (post-) Yugoslav immigrants? In France, the Yugoslav workers were hired through the National Office of Immigration from 1965, while the Peugeot company increased its recruitment of workers in a favorable period to the economy. Conversely, Yugoslavia was going through a period of economic crisis and significant unemployment. It was in this context that Yugoslavia has signed bilateral treaties concerning Yugoslav immigration with several states, including France, on 25 January 1965. Peugeot's recruiters had then gone to Yugoslavia to hire young men. They were usually people of peasant origin, without qualifications and often out of military service. In France, in Peugeot's Sochaux-Montbéliard factories, workers were grouped in the same places permanently, at the factory and outside the factory, as in the homes for young workers. The Yugoslav workers were recruited as temporary workers and thus were to stay in France only temporarily. How did this temporary aspect of their stay in France had an impact on their settlement in Sochaux-Montbéliard? The existence of (post-) Yugoslav workers was marked by round trips, especially when the French government encouraged voluntary return assistance to the country of origin. How to analyze the transnational links between France and Yugoslavia from these existences? To answer these questions, my research is based first of all on an anchorage in the historical discipline with the consultation of archival documents, including staff registration registers. In a more ethnographic approach, I am also interested in spaces located "outside the factory", in order to better grasp the "working-class condition". The use of a database and quantitative methods, allows me to reveal singularities or recurrences among the trajectories of Yugoslav workers. In a more qualitative approach, interviews with former workers are complementary. (Show less)

Mladen Zobec : Proletarian Entrepreneurs: Albanian Private Craftsmen in Socialist Slovenia
During Yugoslav socialism, Albanians were over-represented among the internal-migrant businesses and crafts. Occupational concentration in certain businesses caused Albanians to become synonymous with bakers, ice-cream sellers, and fruit and vegetable vendors. Despite ubiquity the peculiar experience of Albanian socialist privateers in Yugoslavia remains poorly understood in the literature. Relying on ... (Show more)
During Yugoslav socialism, Albanians were over-represented among the internal-migrant businesses and crafts. Occupational concentration in certain businesses caused Albanians to become synonymous with bakers, ice-cream sellers, and fruit and vegetable vendors. Despite ubiquity the peculiar experience of Albanian socialist privateers in Yugoslavia remains poorly understood in the literature. Relying on archival research and oral history this paper shows that Albanian migrants from Kosovo and Macedonia oftentimes opted for family businesses over social sector employment despite less favorable working conditions and poorer financial prospects.

In an attempt to overcome the reduction of the phenomenon to mere ‘tradition’, the paper explains how political and economic conditions in socialist Yugoslavia interacted with Albanian cultural legacies to enable the proliferation of Albanian ethnic and family businesses in Slovenia and elsewhere in Yugoslavia. In doing so, three interconnected factors are explored. Firstly, the Yugoslav socialist unemployment was experienced in Albanian populated areas in the Yugoslav southeast. Private businesses functioned as a remedy for severe unemployment. Secondly, the Othering and orientalising practices directed towards the Albanian population contributed to the distrust towards Yugoslav state institutions and the process of socialist modernisation. This distrust in turn made the private economic sphere more attractive than the state or social sector. Thirdly, the comparatively large Albanian extended families had better prospects to survive as a unit of reproduction if engaged in a family business compared to the atomised socialist workspace. (Show less)



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