Do intra-EU mobility contribute to the creation of a #europolitan (pan-EU) identity? Notes at the margin of IMISCOE 2018 conference in Barcelona.
Freedom of movement is a pillar of the EU project, and yet little is known about the free movers and their experience of settlement in different EU member states
Nando Sigona
Apparently, I’ve learned from one of the presenters at IMISCOE 2018 in Barcelona, Italians are or were until recently the largest group of ‘migrants’ in Barcelona. Wandering in the city centre, Italian voices make frequent appearances in the city soundscape. While many Italians are tourists, there is also a sizeable population of them that have made Barcelona their home. For the European Commission they are not ‘migrants’, they are ‘mobile citizens’ or ‘free movers’. This distinction is not new in any way and it is policed quite strictly by the European Commission, at least in its own communications and publications. When it comes to the popular parlance and national media, the boundaries between EU and non-EU foreign residents become…
View original post 805 more words
Postcards from ... 
Greatly appreciated for bringing this into question! Before we construct a new key term/concept for integration (of whomever in wherever) i think we should carry out more fieldwork, write more empirical descriptions and less theory. Less over sociologised concepts would bring more understanding into the already vast matrix of nuances and dimensions of concepts in general, and integration specifically. But, I guess as many houses, so many traditions. I seem to remember the talk on superdiversity in Amsterdam (2013?) no could quite agree on that final panel (which I thoroughly enjoyed, btw).