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Subject: search.filters.subject.441013 Sociology of migration, ethnicity and multiculturalism

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Now showing 1 - 9 of 9
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    Ka Hura te Tai (The Tides of Transition) : former refugees finding a sense of belonging within Kaupapa Māori organisations : a research report presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of International Development at Massey University, Manawatū, Aotearoa New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2025) Gisa, Kim
    Refugees experience stressful, dangerous and overall life-changing events from the cause of their flight from home to their transit, and even through till their (re)settlement. It is through their difficult journeys where their sense of belonging needs to be renegotiated, even when they may be perceived as ‘safe’ and out of danger within their new place of settlement, and a sense of belonging may not occur automatically. With New Zealand taking in 1500 quota refugees annually through the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, the country seeks to help these refugees (re)settle and make Aotearoa New Zealand their new home and regain a sense of belonging. Within the context of New Zealand, while there are various organisations involved in refugee (re)settlement this research focuses on Kaupapa Māori organisations that have set out to support former refugees to eventually lead healthier, happier and self-sufficient lives within their communities. Therefore, the aim of this research is to explore whether, and how former refugees’ sense of belonging is supported by interacting with Kaupapa Māori led organisations. Through this research, qualitative approaches were utilised by way of one-on-one interviews with staff members that work with former refugees from a Kaupapa Māori organisation based in Auckland, New Zealand called Kahui Tū Kāha. Through application of a value-based approach and belonging conceptual lens, this research highlights the various cross-cultural connections that can be seen between the diverse cultures of former refugees and how these then intersect with Kaupapa Māori framings. These findings support the idea that Kaupapa Māori values and cultural factors help refugees better connect to a new country and respective community, while also highlighting the role of belonging as a key contributor to positive well-being outcomes
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    Between two worlds : identity, belonging, and the lived experiences of intercountry adoptees in Aotearoa New Zealand : a thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Sociology at Massey University, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2025) Burton, Tiffany
    I entered this research with a question: Was I alone in feeling this way? As an intercountry adoptee raised in Aotearoa, New Zealand, I sought to understand whether others shared the same quiet ache—the dislocation, the longing, the feeling of in-betweenness. The life stories collected in this study highlight that such experiences were not singular or exceptional, but part of broader shared trajectories. Stories were shared across countries and generations, revealing personal pain and broader legal, systemic, and historical patterns. What started as a personal search gradually turned to a need to question, understand, and bring visibility to the structures that had long pushed adoptees' experiences to the margins. Intercountry adoption profoundly shapes an adoptee’s identity, belonging, and mental well-being throughout a lifetime. I explore the lived experience of six intercountry adoptees in New Zealand from childhood through adolescence into adulthood, focusing on how they construct and negotiate their identities while facing cultural displacement, systemic barriers, and societal expectations. I draw on qualitative semi-structured life story narrative methodologies and intersecting social constructivist and interpretative epistemologies to amplify the voices of adoptees, uncovering their significant emotional, psychological, and social challenges across the life course. The findings chapters speak to attachment, cultural dislocation, language loss, racialisation, belonging or lack thereof, and identity formation. These stories reveal the enduring impact of disrupted attachments, systemic neglect, cultural erasure and the resilience and meaning-making that emerge through narrative reclamation. Rather than aligning with functionalist or critical perspectives, I offer a third stance that offers space for contradiction. It acknowledges the intimacy of adoptive family relationships and the racialised, political, and economic systems that shape adoption globally and locally. This stance resists binary thinking, inviting more honest, inclusive, and ethically grounded conversations about adoption, identity, and belonging.
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    An imagined paradise for children’s education? : new Chinese migrant families’ adaptation to New Zealand education system : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Chinese Studies at Massey University, Albany, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2025-04-03) Chen, Liping
    This thesis explores new Chinese migrant families’ education-related experiences in New Zealand. It shows the perspectives of new Chinese migrant parents, children of new Chinese migrant parents, and local educators from New Zealand schools. The research is informed by epistemological constructivism, and an exploratory case study approach is employed to direct the research. This is a qualitative research in nature, and the research data is derived from in-depth one-to-one interview with three cohorts that are highly related to the research topic. In detail, 17 new Chinese migrant parents, 9 children of new Chinese migrant parents, and 12 local educators from New Zealand schools were invited to participate in this research. Research findings show that children’s education indeed play a critical role in driving new Chinese migrant families to emigrate from People’s Republic of China (PRC) to New Zealand, particularly for families arrived at New Zealand in the most recent decade. It is challenging for both the migrant parents and their children to navigate in the education system of New Zealand. For parents, they confront challenges in settling down in the host country, meanwhile, they are always concerned about their elderly parents living across the oceans. Further, they have to tackle the inter-generational divergence with their children in terms of Chinese language maintenance and disciplinary and subject areas they aspire their children to pursue. For children of Chinese migrant parents, apart from the inter-generational divergence they confront in the domain of their family, they also face challenges to adapt to the New Zealand education system. These challenges consist of English hurdle and teaching and learning style adaption. This research highlights what kind of teaching practices they aspire to seek in the context of New Zealand and what they feel dissatisfied with the education system of New Zealand compared with the education system of China. Chinese migrant parents’ unfamiliarity with the education system of New Zealand can lead to their dissatisfaction with the New Zealand education system, which consequently imposes challenges for local educators. Findings based on local educators’ accounts confirms new Chinese migrant parents’ persistence in choosing specific disciplinary and subject areas of study in higher education for their children. The underpinning reason for such a preference is that the parents believe that those study areas would bring a stable future to their children. In addition, local educators’ sense that Chinese migrant parents’ unfamiliarity with New Zealand education system makes it difficult to convince Chinese migrant parents to choose an alternative but realistic and pragmatic pathway (i.e. seeking polytechnic for their children’s post-secondary education). The new Chinese migrant parents are straddling the Chinese and New Zealand cultures. Their connections with two cultural settings intertwined to facilitate the formation of a repertoire of parenting approaches. While they would like to pass on the valued Chinese traditional virtues to children, they also aspire to draw from beneficial parenting approaches from other local parents. However, the actual process of adapting to the New Zealand education system can be challenging due to the habitus they get used to or the impact of the way they were raised by their parents. Findings also suggest that some new Chinese migrant families utilise migration to New Zealand as a strategy to opt out the fierce competition of NCEE (National College Entrance Exam) in China, and their stay in New Zealand is temporary and seek later transnational movements back to China or elsewhere to accompany their children for higher education. The pursuit of children’s education plays a critical role in shaping and reshaping the transnational trajectories of these Chinese migrant families. Once specific need of their children’s education is completed, these family may re-arrange their transnational lives. This thesis contributes to the studies of migrants’ integration into the host country in the dimension of education. Based on the findings, this study sheds light on the challenges that migrant families confront after migration to the host country, and provides insightful findings that educators or policymakers in the host country can draw from.
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    Tauhi vā : the hope in indigenous thought for New Zealand born Tongans : a thesis presented in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Sociology, Massey University, Manawatu, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2024) Havea, Siutaisa
    This thesis explores how tauhi va, one of the four fundamental pillars of Tongan culture, is enacted and applied in Aotearoa New Zealand from the cohort of New Zealand born Tongans. When translated, ‘tauhi’ means to nurture or look after, and ‘va’ translates to space. Thus, to use tauhi va in everyday contexts is to tend to the sacred and necessary space between relationships. Tauhi va has proven to transcend generations, climates, and changing circumstances. Within Aotearoa New Zealand, tauhi va is an instrument still being implemented among Tongan communities across the country; an instrument that has been translated from the innately collectivist culture of the Kingdom of Tonga, to Aotearoa New Zealand. New Zealand born Tongans find themselves in a unique position of being exposed to two cultural spheres – one that was given to them by birth-right, and the other passed on from their parents. The purpose of this research was to explore the ways in which tauhi va is being implemented by New Zealand born Tongans, in their distinctive experience of negotiating the phenomenon of dual culture. To explore this notion, five New Zealand born Tongans aged twenty five to thirty five engaged in one-on-one interviews – all of which were underpinned by talanoa as the main form of methodology. These talanoa sessions centred on key themes such as identity, being Tongan in a non-Tongan society, personal experiences with tauhi va, and many more. The findings of this study have invaluable implications not only for New Zealand born Tongans as a cohort, but on how Indigenous thought has the ability to blossom in contemporary Aotearoa New Zealand society.
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    When evocative things travel : the roles of material objects in the process of Muslim migrants' settlement : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Sociology, Massey University, Albany, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2022) Sultana, Shahnaj
    This thesis examines materiality, migration and settlement through the roles objects play in supporting Muslim migrants, to negotiate the uncertainties associated with settlement in an unfamiliar location. It focusses on the objects which Muslim migrants bring with them when they immigrate. This study occurs amidst challenges faced by members of the Muslim community following the Christchurch Mosque attacks on 15th March 2019. I approach the roles played by material objects by putting a lens on the past, present, and future biography of those thing. This focus upon the biography of objects supports a narrative inquiry into participants’ experiences, of six Muslim men and women living in Auckland, New Zealand. Using in-depth interviews with an open-ended interview schedule, my study explores the complex meaning those objects hold for the participants. Regarding ‘the past’ it finds that migrants chose objects with which to travel based on the utility of those objects, on the memories those objects hold, their status as gifts or as inheritance, and of the culture and faith they symbolise. Regarding ‘the present’, the findings indicate that the objects support the exercise of faith, the acquisition of knowledge and the holding to tradition within the migrants’ new environment. Regarding ‘the future’, the findings indicate that migrants want to pass their objects to their next generation for the maintenance of their identity, beliefs, memories and practices. This desire is shared by men and women. This thesis concludes that the objects with which Muslim migrants travel assist in the constant negotiation of the self, as occurs with the journey from migration to settlement.
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    South African immigrants constructions of Māori-Pākehā relations in Aotearoa-New Zealand : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Psychology at Massey University, Albany, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2021) Wheeler, Kylie
    Discursive studies of Māori-Pākehā relations in New Zealand (NZ) have typically contemplated the everyday talk of Pākehā, although more recently, a small number of studies have considered the discourse of Māori in relation to racism. This investigation contemplates a unique perspective of bicultural interactions in New Zealand by examining the discourse of South African immigrants concerning Māori-Pākehā relationships. The data for this analysis was gathered as part of a larger research project at Massey University concerning immigration and settlement of South African immigrants to New Zealand. Semi-structured interviews were completed with 16 participants. Questions were raised regarding identity and belonging, displacement, prejudice, Māori-Pākehā relations, as well as te Tiriti o Waitangi and the data for this project was analysed by way of discourse analysis. Four core themes were identified: neoliberal aspirations, racism concealed under the guise of te Tiriti o Waitangi, naturalised whiteness, and cultural affiliation. This study contributes insight into Māori-Pākehā relations in Aotearoa-New Zealand from the unique perspective of South African immigrants. Moreover, this research uncovers some alternate and unique interpretations of Māori and Pākehā relationships, as well as several typical constructions that support the current literature. This will add to the rich array of literature regarding indigene-settler relations globally and within Aotearoa-New Zealand. This study is of value for educationalists, researchers, psychologists, and policy makers.
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    Mosaic tapestries : influence of folklores and cultural mores on career choices of refugee populations - a secondary analysis : a thesis presented in fulfilment of the requirement for the degree of Master of Education without specialisation, Massey University, Institute of Education
    (Massey University, 2020) Nucci, Antonio P.
    The number of refugees is rising dramatically around the globe. Among the key determinants of displacement, refugees are displaced due to violence, brutality, persecution, torture among other crises such as extreme poverty and climate change. Refugees forced to flee their homelands experience numerous challenges when resettling in their host countries. Cultural stories are powerful transmitters of tradition and heritage, they function as a solid knowledge base and motivators for future generations. For displaced communities, cultural stories create a bond through shared stories that serves to enhance their resilience and motivation. Stories are an effective means of reclaiming the past and organising one's future. Subsequently, shaping identity and impacting decision making related to selecting a career path. This study is focused on exploring the influence of folklores and cultural mores on career choices in refugee populations. The initial methodology of interviewing refugees in tertiary studies was modified into a secondary analysis of existing literature due to lack of gaining participants despite contacting tertiary providers nation-wide. The secondary analysis from a very sparse field of literature identified three global themes that were most influential in the career choices of refugees: 1) Familial traditions and cultural heritage both shape identity and are shaped by identity; 2) Agency is acquired through education; and 3) Adversity is relational and transformative. Implications from the study are discussed. The lack of New Zealand based study on refugee population is highlighted along with an overall dearth in literature internationally on the topic.
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    Family finds a way : experiences of multigenerational transnational new Chinese immigrant families in New Zealand : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at Massey University, Albany, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2021) Ran, Guanyu
    The Immigration Act 1987 fundamentally transformed New Zealand’s immigration policy from one that was race-based to one based on economic needs of New Zealand society. It opened the borders to immigrants from much wider regions. As a result of this “open-door” immigration policy, a substantial new Chinese immigrant community from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) was established in New Zealand. Building a closely-tied multigenerational family is an important feature of family life for this immigrant group. Often, multiple generations live together or within close proximity with one another in highly interdependent relationships. However, a growing number have also started to maintain their family lives transnationally, with different family members across generations living apart but maintaining close ties, with frequent interactions across national borders. Given this transnational family arrangement is very different from Chinese traditional practices of family maintenance, the impact of this change on the wellbeing and functioning of these families and their individual family members is an issue of increasing academic interest. This thesis responds to these concerns and explores the relationship between people’s experiences of transnational migration and their multigenerational family dynamics. Through engaging with individual life stories and perspectives of 45 participants across generations from new PRC immigrant families living in New Zealand, this thesis seeks to understand how those families with closely-tied multiple generations cope with dislocation and relocation during the process of transnational migration. It also investigates how transnational migration experiences contribute to new emergent domestic dynamics, including the development of new strategies and practices to maintain family traditions, interests and coherence across national borders, as well as shifting intergenerational relationships. The empirical data demonstrates that despite the increasing proportion of new PRC families living transnationally, their experiences of managing family lives vary. I argue that this diversification of transnational family experiences is largely attributed to the interaction of various impact factors associated with both the internal dynamics of immigrant families themselves and external contexts where those families are closely related. My research also attests that family members’ transnational migration experiences accelerate changes to the way they perform family life, particularly amplifying intergenerational differences and altering intergenerational dependency. Even though those changes introduce vital challenges towards multigenerational family maintenance and coherence, my research reveals that families are resilient and able to actively forge multistranded resources as well as engage various transnational activities in response to those challenges. While this thesis poses intriguing perspectives and culturally-specific scenarios to study immigrant families in New Zealand society, more importantly, it also contributes to the broad theorisation of transnational family formation and maintenance in the increasingly globalised world.
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    For the love of it : encountering te ao Māori : a thesis presented in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Social Anthropology at Massey University, Manawatū, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2020) Heard, Natasha
    Te Tiriti o Waitangi (Te Tiriti) and the principles developed from it have increasingly been included in strategic plans, legislation, job descriptions, and interview questions, creating a bridge between te ao Māori and te ao Pākehā. This research aims to look at the encounters of those who are non-Māori within te ao Māori, through their work and their process of decolonisation. There are three participants involved in this research who are all storytellers, and their storytelling became methodology and theory, as well as influencing the structure of the thesis itself. Their stories of encounter shifted the research to focus on decolonisation, experiences of whiteness, and what it takes to support Te Tiriti principles in practice. In encountering te ao Māori they shared their experiences with constant reference to Mātauranga Māori, leading to the theory being drawn from within te ao Māori. Their experiences thread their way through the thesis from start to finish rather than being confined to a section on findings, honouring that each step of the process was guided by the participants’ recognitions, their ‘aha’ moments, and what had meaning for them. The participants’ stories revealed a deep commitment to the principle of rangatiratanga - to Māori having the right to sovereignty – and their encounters showed that this came through their love of te ao Māori. Love wove its way through the project, asking what it takes to work in love and how this relates to decolonisation. The research occurred at a time of fermenting ideas and actions around anti-racism work, bookended by the Ōtautahi mosque attacks and the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis at the hands of police. These events took this work from the fringes of the participants’ workplaces to the front page of newspapers and right across social media feeds. These events inspire an ongoing question of the relevance of this research to those affected by racism concluding that only in redefining love as a verb, will this research reach those who inspired it.