Self‐legitimation and sense‐making of Southern European parents' migration to Norway: The role of family aspirations

Herrero‐Arias, Raquel; Hollekim, Ragnhild; Haukanes, Haldis

doi:10.1002/psp.2362

Cited by 10 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 45 publications

(113 reference statements)

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“…Aiming to fill this gap, this article explores Southern European immigrants' expectations of treatment and diagnosis and their management of the divergence between their expectations and the actual medical practices they encounter in Norway, both as patients and as parents of young patients. The article draws on data from a doctoral project that explored how Southern European parents experience parenting and interact with welfare institutions in Norway [34,35]. Although the informants were not asked directly about healthcare services, their experiences with such services emerged as a key issue in their lives in Norway.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A qualitative study on the experiences of southern European immigrant parents navigating the Norwegian healthcare system

Herrero‐Arias

Díaz

2021

Int J Equity Health

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Background Patients’ experiences with health providers and their diagnostic and treatment expectations are shaped by cultural health beliefs and previous experiences with healthcare services in home country. This study explores how Southern European immigrant parents navigate the Norwegian healthcare system, through its focus on how this group manage their expectations on diagnosis and treatment practices when these are unmet. Methods The study had a qualitative research design. Fourteen in-depth interviews and two focus group discussions with 20 Southern European immigrant parents were conducted in 2017 in three Norwegian municipalities. With the help of NVivo software, data were transcribed verbatim and coded. Following a thematic analysis approach to identify patterns in immigrants’ experiences with the Norwegian healthcare services, the codes were organized into two themes. Results The first theme includes immigrants’ expectations on diagnostic tests and medical treatment. Southern European immigrants expected more diagnostic tests and pharmacological treatment than what was deemed necessary by Norwegian health providers. Experiences with unmet expectations influenced how immigrants addressed their and their children’s healthcare needs. The second theme comprises immigrants’ experiences of seeking healthcare in Norway (attending medical consultations in the private sector, seeking immigrant healthcare providers, and navigating the healthcare through their Norwegian social networks). This category includes also the alternative solutions immigrants undertook when they were dissatisfied with the diagnosis and treatment practices they were offered in Norway (self-medication and seeking healthcare in home countries). Conclusions Cultural health beliefs and previous experiences with healthcare services from home country shaped immigrants’ expectations on diagnosis and treatment practices. This had great implications for their navigation through the healthcare system and interactions with health providers in the host country. The study suggests that successful inclusion of immigrants into the Norwegian healthcare system requires an acknowledgement of the cultural factors that influence access and use of healthcare services. Exploring immigrants’ perspectives and experiences offers important information to understand the challenges of cross-cultural healthcare and to improve communication and equitable access.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A qualitative study on the experiences of southern European immigrant parents navigating the Norwegian healthcare system

Herrero‐Arias

Díaz

2021

Int J Equity Health

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“…Migrant parents discussed how the focus on outdoor activities mirrored processes of cultural reproduction, particularly, the Norwegian State's responsibility to promote acquiring skills needed to experience nature (Nilsen, 2008). As previously discussed (Herrero-Arias et al, 2020b), migrant parents negotiated their and their children's belonging to the host society through the performance of "Norwegian" practices, like outdoors activities. In this context, parenting emerges as a citizenship practice (Longman, De Graeve, & Brouckaert, 2013).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In a previous article (Herrero-Arias et al, 2020b), we analysed informants' narratives of migration to Norway. Migrant parents articulated their migration stories around their aspirations for 'involved parenthood' in a country with policies that they perceived to be ones aiming to support their family projects.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the analysis presented below we draw on data from a doctoral project that comprised Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) and interviews with parents from Spain, Italy, Portugal and Greece about a range of aspects of raising their children (Herrero-Arias et al, 2020a, 2020b. Family leisure and outdoor play emerged as key areas of informants' interactions with professionals and, for this article, we extracted and analysed the data related to parents' discussions about this aspect of parental experience.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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‘The more you go to the mountains, the better parent you are’. Migrant parents in Norway navigating risk discourses in professional advice on family leisure and outdoor play

Herrero‐Arias

Lee

Hollekim

2020

Health, Risk & Society

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Drawing on data from a study with Southern European parents living in Norway, this article discusses the experiences of migrant parents with professional advice on family leisure and outdoor play. The study is situated broadly in research about the contemporary parenting role and the social construction of parents as risk-managers. Within this construction, parents are understood as continually managing a 'double-bind', in which they are asked to both protect children from multiple risks, and expose them to risk to develop resilience. Norway provides an interesting context for further investigation, given its institutionalised emphasis on the importance of outdoor life and play. This is embedded in public provision for children and in dominant understandings of how families should use leisure time and how children should play.We explore how migrant parents respond to the associated discourses of risk in their encounters with kindergarten professionals and community health nurses. Participants navigated risk discourse in professional advice on family leisure and children's outdoor play in three ways: contesting discourses of risk; feigning cooperation; and accepting professional intervention and advice in either collaborative or compliant relationships. Migrant parents experienced professional constructions of risk-management as implying a form of individual responsibility, which typically recognized risks to children's wellbeing linked with their lifestyle choices.Although some found ways to negotiate risk and accommodate, parental experience was characterised by tension and difficulties in encountering the double-bind, which deserves further attention.

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“…Further, several studies have addressed social workers' lack of cultural competence and migrants' settlement challenges in a new country as substantial challenges in working with immigrants (Anis, 2005;Eliassi, 2015;Križ & Skivenes, 2010). These challenges, as addressed in the studies, are often portrayed as the reasons that migrants fear the CWS, even though this phenomenon is often studied from the social worker perspective and the studies that have highlighted the migrants' perspectives are small scale (Fylkesnes, et al, 2015;Fylkesnes et al, 2018;Herrero-Arias, Hollekim & Haukanes, 2020;Kabatanya & Vagli, 2019;Tembo & Studsrød, 2020).…”

Section: Fear Of Child Welfare Service Among Immigrants and Disadvant...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Beyond fear of child welfare services : An ethnographic study among Norwegian-Somali parents

Handulle¹

2022

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In many countries, migrants and ethnic minorities express fear of child welfare service (CWS). This is reflected in Norwegian research and media, where fear and mistrust surround the debate on migrants’ relationship with the agency. This thesis explores Norwegian Somalis’ fears of the Norwegian CWS in the context of their situation in Norway and their social world. While the relationship between the Norwegian CWS and several migrant groups is strained, we know little about how fears are constructed and perpetuated within migrant communities. Throughout my dissertation, I emphasise that migrants’ relations to CWS –whether fear factors into it or not – must be understood in light ofprocesses and dynamics far beyond CWS. We must pay attention to tight-knit ethnic communities, social networks, marginalised positions and transnational relations. My inquiry is guided by two core questions: How is the fear of CWS constructed among Norwegian-Somali parents, and how does the fear of CWS impact their everyday lives? These questions were explored through nine months of ethnography, seven months in Oslo and two months in Somalia among returnees from Norway. Fieldwork consisted of, inter alia, observations in cafés and shops, participation in seminars and mosques, participant observation in a transnational school in Somalia, informal conversations, formally organised focus groups and in-depth interviews with parents. The three articles comprising the empirical part of the dissertation cover the following topics. The first article explores how CWS fears among Norwegian-Somali parents are embedded in social networks and transmitted via stories of child removals. This paper provides extensive insight into the construction and perpetuation of fear. The analysis suggests a particular social process underlying Somali parents’ fears, which we coin ABCD, pertaining to (a) their socioeconomic adversities; (b)coping through bonding social capital; (c) children as a “lifeline”;and (d) (disproportionate) diffusion of child removal stories. The results demonstrate the importance of child removal stories that are transmitted through tight-knit social networks as well as why and how these stories spread. Paper 2 is about how second-generation Somali parents portray middle-class identity when interacting with school and kindergarten personnel to avoid racial scrutiny and referrals to CWS. The paper examines how CWS scepticism and fear extend far beyond direct interactions between caseworkers and clients. We show how scepticism and fear influence parents’ encounters with institutions like schools and kindergartens, as these are institutions that have the power and obligation to potentially report to CWS. The third paper addresses Norwegian-Somali returnees’ struggle for a sense of belonging in Norway and their worries regarding their children’s future. It highlights the complexity of being a marginalised migrant in Norway and the consequences thereof. I show that parents utilise temporary return as a tool to strengthen their dual belonging to both Somalia and Norway by reconstituting belonging to both countries through parenting in Somalia. The results reveal that parents cultivate and reproduce Norwegian cultural repertoires when in Somalia in order to maintain a belonging to Norway and to prepare for their future return to Norway, while concurrently encouraging their children to be proud of their Somaliness. In sum, the findings from my thesis imply that Somali parents’ fears of CWS are drawn not only from their perceptions of that single institution but also from their experiences as Somali parents in Norwegian society as a whole. I therefore argue that, if we are to understand CWS fears among migrant parents in general and Somali parents in particular, we must adopt a broader approach that understands parents’ everyday lives and whether and how their experiences relate to socioeconomic marginalisation, racism, coping and networking. I also argue that, to understand CWS fears, we need a bottom-up methodological approach. The in-depth ethnographic account of the Norwegian Somalis’ CWS fears, investigated bottom-up, remains this study’s main contribution.

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Self‐legitimation and sense‐making of Southern European parents' migration to Norway: The role of family aspirations

Cited by 10 publications

References 45 publications

A qualitative study on the experiences of southern European immigrant parents navigating the Norwegian healthcare system

A qualitative study on the experiences of southern European immigrant parents navigating the Norwegian healthcare system

‘The more you go to the mountains, the better parent you are’. Migrant parents in Norway navigating risk discourses in professional advice on family leisure and outdoor play

Beyond fear of child welfare services : An ethnographic study among Norwegian-Somali parents

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