Session Information
SES C 06, Paper Session
Paper Session
Contribution
My research focuses on academic immigrants, who have earned their academic credentials from overseas institutions prior to their move to Finland. The research inquires about the recognition of cultural capital of academic immigrants in Finland, in order to explain power dimensions affecting the professional acculturation of academic immigrants to Finland. It is critical to research the underlying obstacles that hinder the processes of academic immigrants as they face unexpected challenges in their attempt to enter the labour market or further education institutions. Still today there is an under-representation of ethnic minorities in highly skilled professions of the labour market in Finland. This shows the unappreciative nature of the dominant class towards the working conditions of immigrants. There have not been studies about the unappreciative nature towards the foreign earned educational credits and degrees, transcultural capital, as such.
Since research on diversity in education does not always expose the preservation of racial inequalities in the educational system, this research attempts to also inquire and enlighten the power dimension in the recognition and redistribution of transcultural capital of academic immigrants. Transcultural capital (Meinhof and Triandafyllidou, 2006), a term adapted from Bourdieu´s concept of capital, highlights the strategic use of knowledge, skills and networks acquired by migrants through connections with their country and cultures of origin which are made active in their new country of residence.
The main research question: “What kind of cultural capital of academic immigrants stay unappreciated and why? “, attempts to reveal the attitudes of education providers and other service providers in their decisions in providing access to further education, recognising of foreign-earned credentials and providing of career possibilities for academic immigrants. The research is interested in finding out; how does the unappreciation of cultural capital affect the acculturation motivation and professional identity of academic immigrant.
This paper looks at socio-political dimension of multiculturalism, as academic immigrants seek for the recognition of their cultural capital. The theoretical framework is interested in the link between recognition and transcultural capital. The humans can be said to yearn for two kinds of recognition: intimate and public. Everyone has a need for recognition to be appreciated and valued as a unique individual. The public sphere of recognition has to do more with the politics of equality and justice. For the academic immigrants, the politics of recognition are both intimate and public. The recognition of their transcultural capital provides an access to practise their careers and to be involved in the society. This active citizenship adds the value of being worthy when their knowledge (cultural capital) and identity are recognised.
Cultural capital, both embodied and institutionalised, coincide with Nancy Fraser’s (2003) theories on redistribution-recognition dilemma. Redistribution politics de-emphasise the differentiation between groups where as recognition politics highlight group difference. The devalued group’s identity makes it a target for social disregard and forms of injustice. The research makes a case for a humanist paradigm that privileges the investigation of social and political relations of power and places critical consciousness at the center of educational structures.
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Arneil, Barbara. (2006). Diverse Communities: The problem with social capital. Cambridge University Press. Banks, J. A., & Banks, C. A. (Eds.). (2007). Multicultural issues and perspectives. Hoboken, NJ:Wiley. Blackler, F. (2002). Knowledge knowledge work and organizations. In C. W. Choo and N. Bontis (eds), The Strategic Management of Intellectual Capital and Organizational Knowledge, New York: Oxford University Press. Bourdieu, Pierre. (1986) The forms of capital. in J.G. Richardson's Handbook for Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education, pp. 241–258. Bourdieu, Pierre & Jean-Claude Passeron. (1990). Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture. Sage Publications. Bourdieu, Pierre & Wacquant, Loïc J.D. (1992) An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology. Blackwell Publishers. Creswell, John W. (2008). Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Approaches. Sage Publications. Fraser, Nancy. (2003). Rethinking Recognition. New Left Review, 3, 107-121. Fraser, N., and Honneth, A. (2003). Redistribution or recognition: A political-philosophical Exchange. London: Verso. Foucault. M. (2001). Power /Knowledge. In Seidman. S. and Alexander. J.C (eds) The New Sociological Theory Reader. London: Routledge. Foucault. M. (2002). Truth and Power. In Calhoun. C., et al. (eds) Contemporary Sociological Theory. Oxford: Blackwell. Fuller, Bruce and Hannum, Emily (Eds.) (2002). Schooling and social capital in diverse cultures. Research in Sociology of education, volume 13. Elsevier Science Ltd. Giroux, H. A. (2003). Critical theory and educational practice. In A. Darder, M. Baltodano, & R. D. Torres (Eds.), The critical reader. New York: Routledge Falmer. Grenfell, M. & Kelly, M. (2004) (eds.) Pierre Bourdieu: Language, Culture and Education: Theory into Practice. Peter Lang. Meinhof, U. and Triandafyllidou, A. (2006). Beyond the diaspora: transnational practices as transcultural capital. In U. Meinhof and A. Triandafyllidou (eds), Transcultural Europe: Cultural Policy in a Changing Europe, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 200_23 Nieto, Sonya. (2004). Affirming Diversity. The Socio-political context of multicultural education. Amherst: University of Massachusetts.
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