engleski

Methodological -Isms in Research on Migration and Ethnicity: Traps to Avoid?

Aim is to identify some of the common methodological -isms in research on migration and ethnicity. Unlike methodological -isms which declare the epistemological or metatheoretical position or orientation of researchers, methodological -isms represented in some of the contemporary debates warn of various sources of bias in respective fields, both in classic and contemporary theoretical works and empirical studies. Firstly, various manifestations of methodological nationalism in the study of migration and post-migration processes, following Wimmer’s and Glick Schiller’s systematic review of variants of ‘methodological nationalism’ in social sciences are addressed. Contemporary critique of methodological nationalism produced new methodological -isms, for example in the works of Ulrich Beck and John Urry. The second part deals with Beck’s methodological cosmopolitanism and Urry’s proposal of replacing the research of ‘social as society’ with the research of ‘social as mobility’. Wimmer and Glick Schiller term his programme ‘methodological fluidism’. Thirdly, Brubaker’s argument about ‘groupism’ in the study of ethnicity, nationalism and race, and Glick Schiller’s proposal of using ‘city scale approach’ in order to avoid using ethnic group as the unit of analysis of migrants’ transnational activities and incorporation are addressed. Following part deals with gender bias in the studies of migration, including transnational migration (‘methodological androcentrism’). Most of the twentieth century research on international migrations focused almost exclusively on male migrants, the tendency which was repeated in the studies of transnational migration. In order to bring gender perspective into the study of transnational migration, Pessar and Mahler introduced the conceptual framework of ‘gendered geographies of power’ which is the topic in the final part of the presentation.

methodological nationalism; methodological fluidism; groupism; methodological ethnicity; gender bias

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