Table Of ContentMigration at Work
CeMIS Migration and Intercultural Studies 5
The Centre for Migration and Intercultural Studies (CeMIS) was founded in
2005 at the University of Antwerp, on the initiative of a group of researchers
who were working together within the framework of the Antwerp Centre for
Migrant Studies. The Centre conducts research and provides education and
other academic services relating to migration, integration and intercultural
themes in various social fields, including the labour market, welfare, family,
education, health and law. Collaborating with civil society, policymakers and
other academic partners, the research centre addresses the challenges arising from
migration and intercultural life in today’s society. CeMIS seeks to provide an
open and pluralistic research platform that fosters collaboration between society
and academia.
Series editors
Christiane Timmerman (†) (University of Antwerp), Noel Clycq (University of
Antwerp), An Daems (University of Antwerp)
Series board
Lore Van Praag (University of Antwerp), Dirk Vanheule (University of Antwerp),
Noel Clycq (University of Antwerp), Sunčica Vujić (University of Antwerp), Paul
Van Royen (University of Antwerp), Godfried Engbersen (Erasmus University
Rotterdam), Kevin Smets (University of Antwerp/Vrije Universiteit Brussel),
Hilde Greefs (University of Antwerp), François Levrau (Centre Pieter Gillis/
University of Antwerp)
Migration at Work
Aspirations, Imaginaries and
Structures of Mobility
Edited by
Fiona-Katharina Seiger
Christiane Timmerman
Noel B. Salazar
Johan Wets
Leuven University Press
The publication of this work was supported by the Research Foundation-Flanders (FWO) Project
G.0759.14N, the Erasmus Open Access Fund and the KU Leuven Fund for Fair Open Access.
Published in 2020 by Leuven University Press/Presses Universitaires de Louvain/Universitaire
Pers Leuven. Minderbroedersstraat 4, B-3000 Leuven (Belgium).
© Selection and editorial matter: F.-K. Seiger, C. Timmerman, N. B. Salazar, J. Wets, 2020
© Individual chapters: the respective authors, 2020
This book is published under a Creative Commons CC BY 4.0 Licence.
Attribution should include the following information:
Fiona-Katharina Seiger, Christiane Timmerman, Noel B. Salazar, and Johan Wets, eds, Migration
at Work: Aspirations, Imaginaries & Structures of Mobility. Leuven, Leuven University Press. (CC
BY 4.0)
Further details about Creative Commons licences are available at http://creativecommons.org/
licenses/
ISBN 978 94 6270 240 0 (Paperback)
ISBN 978 94 6166 344 3 (ePDF)
ISBN 978 94 6166 345 0 (ePUB)
https://doi.org/10.11116/9789461663443
D/2020/1869/41
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Layout: Coco Bookmedia
Cover design: Johan Van Looveren
In Memoriam Christiane Timmerman
This book is dedicated to the late Professor Christiane Timmerman, who passed
away on 10 February 2019. She was one of the promotors of the project behind
this book and one of the book’s editors.
Christiane Timmerman (born in 1959) was a Belgian psychologist,
anthropologist and migration expert. She was a member of the Faculty of Social
Sciences of the University of Antwerp where she lectured in migration and
integration. Since 2006 Christiane had been the director of CeMIS, the Centre
for Migration and Intercultural Studies, an interdisciplinary research centre of
the University of Antwerp.
Christiane studied at the University of Leuven (KU Leuven) where she
obtained Master’s degrees in Psychology (Clinical Psychology and Experimental
Social Psychology) in 1983 and in Social and Cultural Anthropology in 1987.
Later she embarked on a PhD in Social and Cultural Anthropology, which she
completed in 1996.
She had gained professional experience with civil society organisations working
with migrants before starting her academic career. Her research trajectory took
her to the University of Leuven and then to the University of Antwerp. There,
she took over the directorship of UCSIA, the University Centre Saint Ignatius
Antwerp in 2004 (until 2011), before co-founding CeMIS.
Under her leadership, CeMIS became an internationally recognised leader of
and partner in various large-scale international research projects. CeMIS also
joined the IMISCOE network, the largest European network for migration,
integration and social cohesion. Christiane put migration and integration
research in Flanders and in Belgium firmly on the map.
Table of contents
Introduction 11
Fiona-Katharina Seiger, Noel B. Salazar and Johan Wets
Part I: Projects, structures and regimes of labour mobility 23
Temporary Labour Migrants from Latvia Negotiate Return
Trips for Care: Distributing Resources Across Borders 25
Aija Lulle
Regulatory Regimes and (Infra-)Structuring Emancipation Dynamics:
The Case of Health Workers’ Migration 43
Joana de Sousa Ribeiro
Gendered Labour Migration in South Africa:
A Capability Approach Lens 65
Alice Ncube & Faith Mkwananzi
“I am not moving life, but life moves me.” Experiences of
Intra-EU Im/Mobility among West African Migrants 91
Mirjam Wajsberg
Part II: Labour migration, imaginaries and aspirations 111
Balancing Personal Aspirations, Family Expectations and
Job Matching: “Migratory Career” Reconstruction Among
Highly Educated Women in the Basque Country 113
Maria Luisa Di Martino, Concha Maiztegui and Iratxe Aristegui
“Working there is amazing, but life here is better”: Imaginaries of
Onward Migration Destinations Among Albanian Migrant
Construction Workers in Italy and Greece 135
Iraklis Dimitriadis
“Welcome to my waiting room! Please, take a seat!”:
On Future-Imaginaries being Shattered and Postponed 153
Christine Moderbacher
Found a Nanny and Lived Happily Ever After: The Representations
of Filipina Nannies on Human Resources Agency Websites in Turkey 171
Deniz Ayaydin
Afterword: Changing Work, Changing Migrations 191
Russell King
Acknowledgments
The editors would like to thank The Research Foundation – Flanders (FWO)
for funding the “Migration at Work” workshop during which many of the papers
included in this volume were presented. Moreover, the editors would like to
thank the FWO, the Erasmus University Open Publication Fund, and the KU
Leuven Fund for Fair Open Access Publishing for making open access publishing
possible for this volume.
