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1 – 10 of 738The purpose of this paper is to use the case of white immigrant women domestics’ experiences in migration to demonstrate that their work experiences are different due to…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to use the case of white immigrant women domestics’ experiences in migration to demonstrate that their work experiences are different due to their whiteness. While their racial identity provides them with white privileges, they still face discrimination based on their occupational and immigrant statuses. The case study adds to existing literature on domestic service.
Design/methodology/approach
The case study is based on several years of ethnographic work. The author conducted in‐depth interviews with Polish immigrant women and white female employers. The author also held focus groups with Polish women.
Findings
White immigrant women from Poland do not automatically assume the white racial identity in the USA. Their whiteness is constructed and reinforced through their interactions with their white female employers. Their whiteness renders their experiences different from racial minority women and immigrant women of color. However, Polish domestics construct their positive work identity to counteract the negative images about them and domestic service as an occupation.
Research limitations/implications
The main limitation the author sees is that the author could have conducted interviews with Mexican immigrant women to compare the differences in terms of their working conditions.
Practical implications
While Polish domestics seem to have better experiences than other groups of immigrant women, domestic workers are excluded from the labor law. They are thus without the protection of labor law. It is important for us to work for the right of immigrant workers to eradicate the inequality in society.
Social implications
This case shows that the transnational labor migration contributes to further inequality in society since it is usually the migrant workers who take up the low skilled or unskilled work that has few possibilities for promotion and has few benefits. The government needs to address the transnational migration process and the exploitation of migrant workers ensuing from the process.
Originality/value
Polish immigrant women are a unique group of women mainly because they are among the few white women who perform domestic service. Their experiences are different from racial minority women and immigrant women of color. Merging the whiteness approach and domestic service is an innovative approach.
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This article seeks to bring two hitherto neglected Polish language texts on selling and salesmanship to the attention of marketing historians. In contrast to Bartels'…
Abstract
Purpose
This article seeks to bring two hitherto neglected Polish language texts on selling and salesmanship to the attention of marketing historians. In contrast to Bartels' seminal work, this research aims to show that early marketing writing was not just in the English language and that early marketing thought was disseminated via instruction outside institutions of higher education. The research also intends to explore how marketing education served to acculturate one group of immigrants to American business norms.
Design/methodology/approach
The primary sources are Sprzedawca czyli: Sztuka Prowadzenia Handlu Podług Systemów Amerykańskich (Salesman: The Art of Commerce According to American Norms) by Józef Mierzyński and Sprzedawnictwo Sklepowe (Store Salesmanship), third edition, by Bolesław Z. Urbanski. Both were published in Chicago. Their tables of contents were translated and compared to selected English language texts on selling and salesmanship written about the same time. Additional information on the authors, publishers, and potential audience was also gathered to give context to these texts.
Findings
These Polish language books contained much of the same information as the English language literature on sales from the period, but with more information on personal comportment and more illustrative material. These books provide evidence of sophisticated business thinking among some Polish immigrants. Commercial correspondence courses and self‐instruction brought early marketing thought to this market and thus helped Poles enter the American economic mainstream.
Originality/value
The article shows that these are the first books on selling and salesmanship – or on any other marketing topic – known to be written in the USA prior to 1920 in a language other than English. They are worthy of close scrutiny because they reveal a new dimension to the early creation and dissemination of marketing thought.
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This study examines the educational aspirations of immigrant students, who are descendants of eight different immigrant communities in Germany. First, the article shows…
Abstract
This study examines the educational aspirations of immigrant students, who are descendants of eight different immigrant communities in Germany. First, the article shows that compared to native German students, the educational aspirations of students with migration origin vary substantially. Challenging previous narratives of immigrant optimism and information deficit, the article suggests that the students of Turkish origin develop a conscious appraisal of obtaining an academic high-school qualification (AHSQ), even if they realize they will not be able to receive one by the end of the high-school. The study also shows that the duration of their stay in Germany plays a significant role in attenuating the high educational aspirations of most immigrant communities. However, Turkish students constitute an exception to this finding as they maintain high idealistic aspirations from first- to third-generation. The return migrant students from the former Soviet Union are the only group who report high educational aspirations, when asked about both their idealistic and realistic aspirations. Finally, the findings indicate that the position of the particular immigrant groups within the German social status hierarchy is a strong determinant of the educational aspirations of immigrant students and their parents.
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Melanie Lindsay Straiton, Anne Reneflot and Esperanza Diaz
High socioeconomic status (SES) is associated with better health and lower use of health care services in the general population. Among immigrants, the relationship…
Abstract
Purpose
High socioeconomic status (SES) is associated with better health and lower use of health care services in the general population. Among immigrants, the relationship appears less consistent. The purpose of this paper is to determine if the relationship between income level (a proxy for SES) and use of primary health care services for mental health problems differs for natives and five immigrant groups in Norway. It also explores the moderating effect of length of stay (LoS) among immigrants.
Design/methodology/approach
Using data from two registers with national-level coverage, logistic regression analyses with interactions were carried out to determine the association between income level and having used primary health care services for mental health problems.
Findings
For Norwegian men and women there was a clear negative relationship between income and service use. Interaction analyses suggested that the relationship differed for all immigrant groups compared with Norwegians. When stratifying by LoS, income was not associated with service use among recently arrived immigrants but was negatively associated among immigrants staying more than two years (with the exception of Pakistani and Iraqi women).
Research limitations/implications
Country of origin and LoS should be considered when applying measures of SES in immigrant health research.
Social implications
There may be an initial transition period for recently arrived immigrants where competing factors mask the association between SES and service use.
Originality/value
This study benefits from nationwide coverage, eliminating self-selection biases. It demonstrates the complexity of the relationship between SES and health care use.
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The purpose of this paper is to apply a self‐reflexive interpretive method of writing as a method of analysis of findings from a critical research based on videography…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to apply a self‐reflexive interpretive method of writing as a method of analysis of findings from a critical research based on videography documenting the relationship between ethnicity, consumption, and place.
Design/methodology/approach
An innovative theoretical approach employed is interpretativist ethnography inspired by creative writing. This methodological approach allows the researcher to move beyond the rigidness of academic discourse and consequently enables a more intimate connection with the object of research.
Findings
The main outcome of this paper is realization that the presence of the researcher and her own autobiography affects the results of research and that articulation as much as execution of research is always subjective. A significant implication of this kind of approach is uncertainty and unreliability which questions the positivist objectivism dominating in both consumer studies and marketing. A subsequent limitation is a free reading which evades possibility of definite conclusions.
Originality/value
By providing a film and a commentary to it in one publication, this paper overcomes the traditional separation between the visual and the textual and contributes to the multisensory model of academic practice. It is particularly important for ethnography and visual studies where the application of the senses has both a theoretical and a practical value.
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Jill Pearson, Michelle Hammond, Eithne Heffernan and Tom Turner
In many cases, immigrants work in jobs that are incommensurate with their qualifications and work experience. The aim of this study is to examine the experience of this…
Abstract
Purpose
In many cases, immigrants work in jobs that are incommensurate with their qualifications and work experience. The aim of this study is to examine the experience of this “talent waste” in Polish immigrants working in the Irish labour market.
Design/methodology/approach
The study used a mixed method approach. First, 309 Polish immigrants were surveyed about their employment experiences since moving to Ireland. Second, 12 skilled Polish immigrants – those with third level qualifications – were interviewed. Interviews were semi‐structured and focused on the factors leading to their underemployment and how they responded to it psychologically.
Findings
The interviews revealed that immigrants to Ireland reported fewer barriers to skilled employment than immigrants in other research. Also, most had not sought employment that would utilise their qualifications when they first moved to Ireland. A typology of four psychological responses to employment status was put forth based on immigrant sense of professional identity and experience of dissonance.
Practical implications
The results of the study have important implications for employers, academic institutions, government representatives and skilled immigrants themselves.
Originality/value
Unlike other studies in this area, this study provides rich description and unique insight into the experiences of skilled Polish immigrants to Ireland over a number of years, as well as large‐scale survey evidence of this group of migrant workers.
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Olga Stangej, Inga Minelgaite, Kari Kristinsson and Margret Sigrun Sigurdardottir
The purpose of this paper is to examine how prejudice in a post-migration labor market can be mitigated, specifically, whether education received in the host country can…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine how prejudice in a post-migration labor market can be mitigated, specifically, whether education received in the host country can serve as a signal of social integration for immigrant workers in employment settings.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors conducted an audit discrimination study, using an experimental setup to examine the interplay between prejudice and education as a signal of the social integration of immigrants in employment settings.
Findings
The results of the study indicate that signals of social integration, such as, qualifications acquired in the host country through education, counter prejudice against Polish immigrants in Iceland.
Research limitations/implications
The study provides evidence that immigrants are subjected to prejudice that can restrain their employment opportunities. The acquisition of education in the host country can mitigate this effect, but also diminishes the line between social integration and assimilation. However, the study is limited by a relatively small sample size and a single-country context.
Practical implications
The study offers insights for both countries and organizations worldwide that are facing the need to successfully embrace a mobile workforce and the challenge of a diverse workforce composition.
Originality/value
The study addresses the under-researched effects of education on human capital transferability in the host labor market. More specifically, it uncovers that the differentiation between education acquired in the home country and education acquired in the host country is a signal that can mitigate prejudice and its effects on the employment of immigrants in the host countries.
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Anna Maria Migdał, Łukasz Sułkowski and Aleksandra Zając
Poland has traditionally been perceived as a net emigration country. The scale of the recent inflow of foreigners to the country, however, places Poland among those states…
Abstract
Poland has traditionally been perceived as a net emigration country. The scale of the recent inflow of foreigners to the country, however, places Poland among those states of growing attractiveness to migrants. Therefore, the main aim of this chapter is to present the Polish model of integration policy and describe the development of Poland's migration and integration policy at the national level. As the local perspective on migration and integration has become increasingly important, local policies are also presented through the example of several of the largest Polish cities. Additionally, the role of public discourse in shaping Polish society's attitude towards migrants is discussed. Finally, some aspects of economic migrants' integration are described.
Poland still lacks a long-term and comprehensive migration and integration policy that covers all areas of integration, and all categories of immigrants and so far only once, for a short period, has adopted migration policy at a national level. There is also little coordination among the different governmental bodies that deal with this issue. Therefore, only some of the crucial elements of integration policy at a national level, like the liberalization of the labour market, have occurred successfully. It seems that local policies, especially in large cities, have addressed more precisely various issues faced by immigrants, not only related to employment, and could foster the process of integration.
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A negative framing of immigrants to stir populist sentiment is a widespread tactic repeatedly deployed by the British press. Following the accession of ten new and…
Abstract
Purpose
A negative framing of immigrants to stir populist sentiment is a widespread tactic repeatedly deployed by the British press. Following the accession of ten new and predominantly Eastern European member‐states to the European Union in 2004, this gambit was again utilised to provocatively portray migrant workers newly arriving in the United Kingdom as an external economic threat. The aim of this paper was to uncover the recurrent ways in which Polish migrants were emotively framed by the top daily British newspapers during this period of EU enlargement.
Design/methodology/approach
A bespoke collection of newspaper articles was assembled and examined using a corpus‐based discourse analysis. The analysis was subsequently triangulated with relevant responses to a series of public opinion surveys.
Findings
Results show that the British press conformed to classic media representations of migrants when referring to Poles in particular, by depicting them as an external economic threat “flooding” the country; in addition a novel stereotype of the “Polish plumber” was used to present them arriving to take the jobs of native manual labourers.
Originality/value
The study adds to the understanding of media attitudes towards new migrants in the UK, and demonstrates the utility of triangulated corpus‐based discourse analysis for those who seek to highlight systematic characterisations of migrants in the popular press.
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