CFP: Gender, Migration and Citizenship: Revisiting Southeast Asian international marriages

Call for Papers

Gender, migration and citizenship: revisiting Southeast Asian international marriages

Publisher: Sussex Academic Press (www.sussex-academic.com/)

In the current context of economic crisis, international marriages and family-related migrations are becoming increasingly restricted in many developed countries in the Global North, whereas countries in the Global South are adopting measures to protect local women from the trafficking and sexual exploitation that may arise from international marriages. These regulations of the “marriage market” pose challenges to single men and women looking for partners of a different nationality and for bi-national couples pursuing a family-formation project. For those who successfully immigrated in the country of their partner, social incorporation and cohesive family life are the next challenges in line. To shed light on the multi-faceted life of marriage migrants in the current age of economic crisis and increased border controls, this edited volume will take a closer look at Southeast Asian international marriages. It will also attempt to capture the dynamics of the interaction among macro-, meso- and microsociological factors that shape migrants’ trajectories, while taking into account their subjectivities and agency.

We invite papers that explore one of the following themes:

1) The politics of love and desire in Southeast Asia

This section of the volume will examine the state policies in Southeast Asian countries regulating the migration of men and women and their marriage to foreigners, and also looks at the gender ideologies and norms related to marriage and the family.

2) Contact paths and routes to family formation

This part will investigate the different canals that facilitate contacts between prospective partners from different countries and the way their family formation project concretises itself despite the current economic uncertainties and tightened migration controls in many receiving countries. The objective here is to find out the strategies, agencies and subjectivities of bi-national partners.

3) Southeast Asians as “marital citizens”

This section will explore the immigration experiences of Southeast Asians in their receiving countries through the lens of citizenship. It will examine their social incorporation and their multi-faceted life as partners, lovers, parents and workers, among others.

For pre-submission, please send a 250-word abstract of your proposed chapter and a short bio to the editors before 15 June 2014.Selected contributions will be announced one month later and should be submitted at the latest on 15 February 2015. The edited volume will be printed and released at the beginning of 2016.

For more information, please contact Asuncion Fresnoza-Flot, Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium,asuncion.fresnoza@uclouvain.be and/or Gwenola Ricordeau, Lille University I, France, gwenola.ricordeau@univ-lille1.fr