Finding One's Place
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Finding One’s Place Finding One’s Place An Ethnological Study of Belonging among Swedish Migrants on the Costa del Sol in Spain Annie Woube Dissertation presented at Uppsala University to be publicly examined in Geijersalen, Engelska Parken, Thunbergsvägen 3H, Uppsala, Friday, 5 December 2014 at 10:15 for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. The examination will be conducted in Swedish. Faculty examiner: Docent Sverker Hyltén-Cavallius (Stockholms universitet, Institutionen för etnologi, religionshistoria och genusvetenskap). Abstract Woube, A. 2014. Finding One’s Place. An Ethnological Study of Belonging among Swedish Migrants on the Costa del Sol in Spain. Etnolore 35. 209 pp. Uppsala: Institutionen för kul- turantropologi och etnologi, Uppsala universitet. ISBN 978-91-506-2424-3. This study explores how Swedish migrants on the Costa del Sol in Spain create belonging and how this is expressed in migration stories and practiced in the daily life. The migrants are part of a migration phenomenon that is conceptualized as lifestyle migration, often to destinations in association with tourism and leisure. Based on ethnographical fieldwork carried out among Swedish migrants within the Swedish infrastructure of institutions, organizations and private enterprises on the Costa del Sol, the thesis examines how belonging is created adopting a phenomenological and constructivist perspective on transnational and diasporic practices. This is accomplished through studying migration stories, where the migration experience is being told, structured and made meaningful for the migrants. In addition, it focuses on internal and external identification and positioning on location on the Costa del Sol. Another concern is the study of how the migrants relate to notions and practices of new home, and old home. The thesis presents how belonging is shaped on a collective basis within the Swedish infra- structure, despite the fact that the interviewees make up a diverse group in different ages, with different reasons for dwelling along the coast, with different migrant experiences, with differ- ent approaches to living a transnational migrant life in-between the old and the new country, and with different degrees and range of incorporation to the local society. The study shows how a transnational position is created with a plurilocal frame of reference. It is marked by simultaneously expressing attachments and affiliations to several localities and contexts across territorial borders, shaped by past and recurrent travels and communication, and con- nected to the Swedish diasporic collective that can function as a compensatory source of national affiliation for the Swedish migrants on the Costa del Sol. Keywords: lifestyle migration, belonging, transnationality, diaspora, identification, ethno- graphic fieldwork, migration stories, materiality, Costa del Sol, Sweden Annie Woube, Department of Cultural Anthropology and Ethnology, Ethnology, Box 631, Uppsala University, SE-75126 Uppsala, Sweden. © Annie Woube 2014 ISSN 0280-9559 ISBN 978-91-506-2424-3 urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-233920 (http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-233920) Printed in Sweden by Elanders Sverige AB, 2014 To Andy, Elias, and Esther Contents Acknowledgements ....................................................................................... 11 1. Introduction ............................................................................................... 13 Background .............................................................................................. 13 Objective .................................................................................................. 15 Theoretical orientations ............................................................................ 16 Identification theory ................................................................................. 18 Transnational perspective ......................................................................... 20 Diasporic practices ................................................................................... 22 To capture the field .................................................................................. 24 Participant experience .............................................................................. 24 Serial interviews ....................................................................................... 26 To observe and describe ........................................................................... 28 Analysis and interpretation of migration stories ...................................... 29 Material culture ........................................................................................ 33 Ethnography in writing ............................................................................. 34 Outline ...................................................................................................... 36 2. Narrating Migration Stories ...................................................................... 38 Margareta—narrating against convention ................................................ 39 Lars—a success story in line with collective norms ................................ 43 Markus—the successful migration touched by fate ................................. 45 Andreas—narrating a strategic life plan ................................................... 47 Simon—a life of fortunes and failures ..................................................... 50 Karin—turning life around through love .................................................. 54 Lena—narration of transnational ambivalence ........................................ 58 Conclusion ................................................................................................ 62 3. Positioning Oneself and Others ................................................................ 66 Swedish migrants permanently residing on the Costa del Sol.................. 67 Being Swedish? ........................................................................................ 68 Time changing affiliations ....................................................................... 71 Transnational positionings in-between Swedish and Spanish contexts .... 72 Position: el extrañjero ............................................................................... 74 Strategies of incorporation ....................................................................... 77 Transnational differences ......................................................................... 80 Family-in-law ........................................................................................... 82 The internal other ..................................................................................... 84 Refraining from the Swedish collective ................................................... 87 The jet set of Swedes ................................................................................ 89 In a favorable light ................................................................................... 91 “Fish-and-chips tattoo tourists” ................................................................ 92 The annoyance along the beach promenade ............................................. 94 Positioning through the use of language .................................................. 97 A practice of inclusion ............................................................................. 98 A practice of exclusion ........................................................................... 102 Conclusion .............................................................................................. 103 4. Home on the Costa del Sol ...................................................................... 106 The Costa del Sol as home ..................................................................... 107 Local sensations that interfere with home-making ................................. 108 Activities outdoors enable feelings of being at home ............................ 110 Making home by starting anew .............................................................. 111 An apartment of one’s own .................................................................... 113 Los Boliches—a neighborhood of significance for home-making ......... 116 Creating national belonging through the home ...................................... 120 Being and belonging transnationally through furniture .......................... 121 Objects making home through border crossings .................................... 123 Technology making transnational home ................................................ 125 Home-making through objects as life companions ................................ 127 Making home, making the self ............................................................... 129 Past and present life through objects ...................................................... 131 Conclusion .............................................................................................. 133 5. Homeland Sweden .................................................................................. 135 Virtual and annual transmobilities between homes ................................ 135 Detachment from homeland ................................................................... 137 Distant home, disappearing home .......................................................... 139 Homesickness ......................................................................................... 142 Short trips to Sweden