This paper investigates how first-generation university graduates from Spanish Roma and non-Roma backgrounds experience social mobility and contend with the ‘long shadow’ of their class origins (Friedman & Laurison, 2020), compounded by ethnic identity and community belonging.

Social mobility refers to the process of transitioning from one social position to another, often leaving behind the original social context. When these shifts span significant social distances, they can disrupt existing personal connections and hinder the formation of new ones, leading to loneliness, stress, and psychological strain (e.g., Sorokin, 1959), which recently has been conceptualised as the hidden costs of social mobility (Bereményi, 2018; Cole & Omari, 2003; Durst et al., 2023; Friedman, 2014, 2016). Traditional studies of intergenerational social mobility (e.g., Erikson & Goldthorpe, 1992) emphasize upward movement, focusing on factors such as education level, professional profile, type of work, income, and consumption. These studies typically use macro data to observe total mobility rates within societies or specific population segments. Relative mobility, a key concept, describes how some groups experience different levels of change within the social structure compared to others. Low relative mobility indicates rigid class relations and limited opportunities for social advancement.

More recent scholarship adopts an intersectional lens, offering nuanced insights into how mobility impacts individuals and groups. This critical perspective, described as a ‘marginal’ approach to mobility (Lawler & Payne, 2018 drawing on Strauss, 1971), considers a broader range of factors beyond economic and educational outcomes. It emphasizes the differential experiences of mobility, exploring how structural and institutional conditions interact with social class, ethnicity, race, gender, nationality, and age to shape subjective experiences.

Rather than focusing on aggregate upward movement, this approach examines how social mobility triggers diverse strategies to navigate adversities, negotiate paths, and cope with oppressive conditions. For example, some studies identify enabling and risk factors of social mobility, while others highlight the distinctive experiences of marginalized groups (Durst & Bereményi, 2021). The concept of a ‘minority culture of mobility’ (Clerge, 2014; Neckerman et al., 1999; Vallejo, 2012) initially described strategies and experiences related to economic mobility. In the context of higher-education-driven mobility of Roma individuals, however, additional dilemmas arise, which we conceptualise as a ‘distinctive minority mobility path for racialised minority youth’ (Durst & Bereményi, 2024).

In this study, we examine the trajectories of 12 socially mobile individuals—Roma and non-Roma, men and women—who graduated from diverse academic disciplines in Catalonia and Andalusia. This preliminary analysis focuses on how they understand, or makes sense of their social mobility, related dilemmas, struggles and gains, as well as their notions of "middle-class life." Furthermore, we aimed to gain an insight into their individual and community-based coping strategies through navigation among resources, negotiation of meanings, and resistance to perceived pressures (both from mainstream society and community agents) as diverse coping strategies.

This paper presents an exploratory analysis based on 12 interviews drawn from a two-year ongoing research project (2024–2026). Using ‘intensity sampling’ (Robinson, 2014), we selected cases from the 25 completed interviews that offered particularly insightful, information-rich narratives to enhance our theoretical focus. These cases exemplify the processes of navigation, negotiation, and resistance as diverse coping strategies. Participants were recruited through personal networks, chain referral sampling, and social media platforms. Self-identification was used to categorize participants as Roma or non-Roma. We conducted photo-elicitation-driven narrative life-course interviews, obtaining voice-recorded informed consent from all participants. Data control and management complied with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Recorded interviews were transcribed verbatim and pseudonymized to safeguard participants' privacy in accordance with ethical research guidelines. The interview texts were systematically coded using ATLAS.ti 24, guided by our theoretical questions, interview framework, and additional open-coding categories that emerged during initial rounds of analysis.

In the interviews with 12 Roma and non-Roma university graduates from two distinct geographical settings (Catalonia and Andalusia), we identified three key aspects through which ‘distinctive minority mobility path’ can be examined: A) Coping with institutional racism in education and the labour market, (also known as the “racial glass ceiling” Durst et al., 2022) through a complex navigation among resources available in family and community (in terms of ‘community cultural wealth’ Yosso, 2005), broader society and institutions; B) Negotiating culturally binding family and community expectations with middle-class values and lifestyles. C) Making sense of the ‘price of the ticket’ (Friedman, 2014), or the ‘psychological toll’ (Shahrokni, 2015) where social mobility often entails changes to one’s sense of ethnic, gender and social class belonging. Common themes emerged, including the importance of the range of mobility (the distance between the social status of origin and destination) (Friedman, 2016) and the pace of social advancement (the speed at which one reaches the higher social status). However, significant differences were also observed. For instance, coping strategies varied between collective approaches rooted in community sharing and solidarity and individual problem-solving methods. These findings underscore the complex interplay between class, ethnicity, gender, and higher-education-driven social mobility, offering valuable insights into the lived experiences of Spanish Roma and non-Roma individuals navigating upward mobility.

Bereményi, B. Á. (2018). Costes de la movilidad entre gitanas y gitanos con trayectorias académicas de éxito. In A. Rodrigo & J. Masó (Eds.), (Re)visiones gitanas: Políticas, (auto)representaciones y activismos en diálogo con el género y la sexualidad (pp. 137–172). Bellaterra. Clerge, O. (2014). Toward a Minority Culture of Mobility: Immigrant Integration into the African-American Middle Class. Sociology Compass, 8(10), 1167–1182. Cole, E. R., & Omari, S. R. (2003). Race, Class and the Dilemmas of Upward Mobility for African Americans. Journal of Social Issues, 59(4), 785–802. Durst, J., & Bereményi, Á. (2021). ‘I Felt I Arrived Home’: The Minority Trajectory of Mobility for First-in-Family Hungarian Roma Graduates. In M. M. Mendes, O. Magano, & S. Toma (Eds.), Social and Economic Vulnerability of Roma People (pp. 229–249). Springer International Publishing. Durst, J., & Bereményi, Á. (2024). False promises and distinct minority mobility paths: Trajectories and costs of the education-driven social mobility of racialised ethnic groups. Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education, 54(3), 355–367. Durst, J., Nyírő, Z., Dés, F., & Boros, J. (2022). Racial glass ceiling: The glass ceiling and the labour-market segmentation of first-in-family Roma graduates in Hungary. Intersections. East European Journal of Society and Politics, 8(2), 12–40. Erikson, R., & Goldthorpe, J. H. (1992). The constant flux: A study of class mobility in industrial societies. Clarendon Press. Friedman, S. (2014). The Price of the Ticket: Rethinking the Experience of Social Mobility. Sociology, 48(2), 352–368. Friedman, S., & Laurison, D. (2020). The class ceiling. Why it pays to be privileged. Policy Press, University of Bristol. Lawler, S., & Payne, G. (2018). Social mobility for the 21st century: Everyone a winner? Routledge. Neckerman, K. M., Carter, P., & Lee, J. (1999). Segmented assimilation and minority cultures of mobility. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 22(6), 945–965. Robinson, O. C. (2014). Sampling in interview-based qualitative research: A theoretical and practical guide. Qualitative Research in Psychology, 11(1), 25–41. Shahrokni, S. (2015). The minority culture of mobility of France’s upwardly mobile descendants of North African immigrants. Ethnic & Racial Studies, 38(7), 1050–1066. Vallejo, J. A. (2012). Socially Mobile Mexican Americans and the Minority Culture of Mobility. American Behavioral Scientist, 56(5), 666–681. Yosso, T. J. (2005). Whose culture has capital? A critical race theory discussion of community cultural wealth. Race, Ethnicity and Education, 8(1), 69–91.