Intertwined therapeutic mobilities: knowledge,plants, healers on the move between Laos and the U.S.

ABSTRACT

We investigate the notion of therapeutic mobilities through the case study of transnational health care practices and medicinal flows within the Hmong diaspora between Laos and the U.S. Drawing upon narratives of traditional healers, pickers, and plant sellers, as well as a collection of postal registers, we highlight how therapeutic mobilities follow the routes of migration and organize the practices of healing among Hmong in receiving countries, particularly in the U.S. Through the different and multidirectional aspects of therapeutic mobilities, we illustrate how transnational healing touches upon questions of cultural identity within the Hmong diaspora. Therapeutic mobilities not only involve border-crossing, they also strengthen existing bonds within the Hmong diaspora. Similarly, herbal treatments not only achieve a therapeutic function, they also represent a range of meanings and values for patients. We explore the fabric of therapeutic mobilities through the prism of translocality and medical pluralism.     

Everything changes to stay the same: persistent global health inequalities amidst new therapeutic opportunities and mobilities for Filipino nurses

ABSTRACT

The global migration of Filipino nurses has received significant attention, yet little is known of these healthcare workers’ experiences and mobilities within the Philippines. I explore the experiences and narratives of Filipino nurses living in Manila, some of whom have no desires to migrate. I uncover the often novel forms of therapeutic mobilities undertaken by these nurses, focusing on call centre nursing and entrepreneurship as key alternative career pathways within the realms of ‘therapeutics’. Through interrogating the various mobilities undertaken by nurses – physical mobilities and migration, socioeconomic mobilities and occupational mobilities in the form of a career change – it becomes clear that international physical mobility is no longer key. Nevertheless, Filipino nurses continue to provide care in global contexts in novel ‘therapeutic’ industries and doing so allows them to increase their socioeconomic mobility.     

Between the village and the global city: the production and decay of translocal spaces of Thai migrant workers in Singapore

This paper explores the mobilities and structural moorings of Thai labour migrants in Singapore from a translocal perspective. We argue that combining the mobilities paradigm with the concept of translocality offers a fruitful avenue of investigation not only of the production of translocal spaces, but also of their temporality and mutability. Through a multi-sited research approach we shed light on the genesis as well as the decay of translocal connections. This paper shows that translocal structures are important moorings of migration, and raises the question of what happens to translocal spaces when migration flows dissolve.     

The politics of leisure and labor mobilities: discourses of tourism and transnational migration in Central Java,Indonesia

This article presents narratives and tropes of transnational tourism from a less considered perspective: rural migrant-origin villagers of Central Java. Drawing from ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Cilacap and Yogyakarta, I analyze how and why some former temporary labor migrants depict their typically harsh experiences in terms of tourism and leisure. Addressing the tendency in current research to approach labor migration and tourism as mutually exclusive or unrelated class categories and experiences, I consider the ways in which former migrants and non-migrant villagers evaluate or identify labor migration in terms of gender, class, religious, and ethno-national subjectivities associated with ‘tourist’ and/or ‘migrant’ categories. Popular and commercial imaginations of leisure travel and tourism importantly shape the subjectivities and positionalities of precarious labor migrants. Foregrounding the relations between tourism and labor migration reveals the multi-scalar ways in which associated discourses and infrastructures of both mutually shape and constitute global socio-economic inequalities.     

Sociodicies of (im)mobility: moral evaluations of stasis,departure and return in an emigrant village (Shenzhen,China)

Inhabitants of Pine Mansion, a former emigrant village in a present-day Chinese megacity, hold an ambivalent and nuanced morally laden discourse about migration. This paper takes up several of the challenges issued by the ‘regimes of mobility’ approach, and focuses on people’s moral justifications of (im)mobility. I build upon Boltanski’s sociology of critique to analyze how these narratives constitute sociodicies, explanatory schemes that retrospectively justify and evaluate past ‘choices’ and compare the destinies of those who stayed in the village and those who migrated abroad. Paying attention to sociodicies of (im)mobility fosters an understanding of the dynamics of change in the representations of migration and of the interplay between local understandings and state nationalist discourses. They furthermore reverse the tendency to present stasis and departure as the respective expressions of a deprivation and a manifestation of agency.     

Driven to Care: The Car,Automobility and Social Work

Abstract

Welfare practices are invariably represented in static and sedentary ways and their mobilities ignored. This paper corrects for this by examining the car and auto‐mobility in social work. The car is not just a means to reaching vulnerable children and other service users quickly, and a mobile office, but a space where significant casework goes on and deeply meaningful ‘therapeutic journeys’ happen. The car carries similar emotional meanings and possibilities for workers as a space within which to contain the anxieties and emotions they routinely confront in their work. Drawing on mobile social science and psychoanalytic theory, the paper shows how the power and meanings of auto‐mobility in ‘car therapy’ are products of the design of cars and the distinct rhythms and mobilities they produce in themselves. The car in social work is conceptualised as a ‘fluid container’ for the processing of personal troubles, emotion and key life changes. The theoretical implications of this argument for the social science of mobilities are drawn out.     

Mobilities,mobile work and habitation: truck drivers and the crisis in occupational auto-mobility in the UK

This paper examines the relation between mobilities and mobile work through a focus on occupational auto-mobility and habitation. Drawing on qualitative research conducted on truck drivers/driving in South-east England, it shows habitation emerges when driving stops; that it is cab-based dwelling-in-transit and nomadic dwelling rooted in and bounded by the material culture of the cab; and that it is displaced to the margins and interstices of the road and logistical network. The paper highlights the discomfort of cab-based habitation and its limits, in sanitation, and examines how recent developments at distribution centres intensify discomfort by denying cab-based habitation. These developments recast the relation of occupational auto-mobility and habitation through transient dwelling and are key to understanding the current crisis in labour supply in truck driving.     

Migration as hope and depression: existential im/mobilities in and beyond Egypt

ABSTRACT

Recent scholarship has asserted that prolonged periods of ‘waiting’ or ‘stuckedness’ are becoming the condition of modern capitalism for many people. This article complicates this assertion by interrogating the affective life of migration, an act which offers the possibility of overcoming, but also reinforces, existential stuckedness. Using two ethnographies with young aspiring male migrants in Egypt, and older migrant men in the Netherlands, we reveal how migration, both before and after physical movement, is experienced through constant existential oscillation: between ‘‘amal’ (hope) that the good life is arriving, and ‘ikti’āb’ (an Egyptian understanding of depression) when a new blockage is met. Developing existing understandings of migratory experience and governance, the article argues that oscillation emerges out of ‘cruel’ migratory regimes which perpetually offer up the promise of the good life to aspiring migrants, while inhibiting the means of achieving it for the majority.     

Fortress Europe’s far-flung borderlands: ‘Illegality’ and the ‘deportation regime’ in France’s Caribbean and Indian Ocean territories

ABSTRACT

This article argues that the French overseas territories of the Caribbean and Indian Ocean, which are also European ‘outermost regions,’ make up the first borders of ‘Fortress Europe,’ geographically, historically and legislatively. Since the 1980s, a set of laws, described as ‘laws of exception,’ place the majority of the foreign residents in a state of ‘illegality.’ These overseas territories are in the vanguard of a French ‘regime of deportation’ that targets foreign nationals, indigenous populations and former colonial subjects. They are places of experimentation for legal exceptions, which are then implemented in metropolitan France. This paper will analyze how the reinforcement of borders contradicts the popular and scholarly representation of the Caribbean and the Indian Ocean as sites of mobility.     

Mediated Piety in Contemporary Syria: Women,Islam, and television

Dr Rufayda al-Habash is a prominent female preacher (da‘iya) in Syria today and is a representative of the Islamic revivalist movement. The channel Iqraa and her personal website are the main visual venues through which her message and knowledge are disseminated. By analyzing her as an exemplar, this study examines how da‘iyas use media to augment their religious authority, engage with the discursive tradition of Islam, and address everyday issues of ordinary women. The paper argues that the use of media allows Dr al-Habash to become more visible and active in the religious field that is dominated by male preachers and theologians. Although she functions within religious, media, and interpretivist frameworks that have been designed, put in place, and regulated primarily by men, she creatively utilizes available resources to achieve multiple goals.     

长三角地区国内移民的总效果及对区域城市结构的影响

国内移民有两种形式,第一是长三角地区内部与地区外部的相互移民,第二是长三角地区内部不同城市之间的移民,在此基础上研究城市群空间结构的基本状况和演变。研究表明,长三角地区的城市体系正逐步强化以上海、南京、杭州、苏州和宁波为核心的5个城市组团,并对长三角地区城市结构的未来演化做了初步分析,对区域发展的整体规划和区域移民政策提出一些分析思考。     

农村劳动力流动及其对收入的影响——来自内蒙古赤峰市农村地区的证据

大量闲置的剩余劳动力从农村中流动出来 ,显著地提高了农村居民的收入。其影响机制是 :　　虽然外出劳动力户的家庭总收入低于非外出劳动力户 ,然而 ,外出劳动力对家庭收入的贡献 ,却要大于非外出劳动力。在影响劳动力外出决定的因素中 ,交通条件的影响并不大 ,而那些信息基础设施条件比较好的地区和教育程度高的劳动力 ,更容易外出打工     

Transnational Mobilties in Snowboarding Culture: Travel,Tourism and Lifestyle Migration

Abstract

Drawing upon global ethnographic methods conducted in six countries over seven years, this paper offers the first in-depth examination of the transnational flows and corporeal mobilities in the contemporary physical culture of snowboarding. Focusing on the travel and migration experiences of various groups of snowboarders (that is, tourists, professional athletes and lifestyle sport migrants), and engaging recent work by human geographers, as well as Pierre Bourdieu’s key concepts of field, capital and habitus, this paper reveals fresh insights into the lived transnationalism and global migration of contemporary youth facilitated by the ‘action’, ‘alternative’ or ‘extreme’ sports economy.     

The Relationship Between Socioeconomic Factors,Wellbeing, and Homosexuality in the Theatrical Profession

This article relates to the theory suggesting that there is a prevalence of male homosexuality within the theatrical profession that can be explained through male performers becoming homosexual due to their low socioeconomic position. In a questionnaire-based study, the socioeconomic status (SES) is measured of 121 homosexual performers who considered themselves to have been heterosexual at the time of joining the profession, and results are compared with a control group of 121 heterosexual male performers. The experimental group was chosen in this way due to the suggestion of the hypothesis that the change in sexual orientation occurs after the man begins performing professionally. Results were not significant and little difference was noted in any of the parameters of SES, including annual earnings and home ownership. However, a marginal though insignificant increase in SES was noted in the experimental group of homosexual men. Consequently, existing theories for homosexuality and possible reasons for the high prevalence within the performing profession are discussed; the notions of adult performing and creativity being extensions of childhood gender atypical behavior are considered and possible links between sexual orientation and these traits. Elements of genetic heritability of homosexuality are likewise implicated.     

Barefoot and in a German kitchen: federal parental leave and benefit policy and the return to work after childbirth in Germany

Since 1979 German federal maternity leave and benefit policy has given women incentives to stay at home and take care of their newborn and youngest children. In 1986 this leave and benefit policy was changed in several ways, turning it into a powerful instrument for delaying mothers' return to work after childbirth. Using a flexible duration dependence estimation technique for proportional hazards due to Prentice and Gloeckler (1978) and applied to grouped durations by Meyer (1987, 1990), we estimate post childbirth return to work hazards for women during the federally protected leave protection period and immediately upon completion of this leave period. During the leave mothers are less likely to return to work the longer is the time left in the leave protection period; however, this result cannot be attributed generally to high levels of maternity benefits. When the leave protection period ends, mothers with strong labor force attachment who are still on leave return to their jobs.The second author gratefully acknowledges financial support by the National German Science Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft) (Grant No. Wa 547/2-1). The authors would like to thank Richard Burkhauser, Barbara Butrica, John F. Ermisch, Joachim Frick, Siv Gustafsson, Philip Merrigan, Johannes Schwarze, Eileen Trzcinski, Jan-Dirk Vlasblom, Gert Wagner, Sheng Zhu and two anonymous referees for their help and suggestions. Remaining errors are of course, our own. Responsible editors: Siv S. Gustafsson, John F. Ermisch.     

Including people with intellectual disabilities in the mobilities turn: mobile interviews in Toronto,Canada

ABSTRACT

Geographic research about disability and mobility often foregrounds the built environment as a site of in/exclusion. People with intellectual disabilities (IDs) have been mostly absent from this scholarship. To respond to this gap, we draw from an in-depth set of ‘mobile interviews’ with people with IDs in Toronto, Canada. Using a thematic approach, this paper suggests that more-than-material relations matter to the everyday mobilities and immobilities of people with IDs in urban settings. We aim to centre the participants’ experiences and call for greater inclusion of people with IDs in critical-geographic studies of the disability-mobility nexus. We highlight participants’ regular, planned, and spontaneous mobilities; their attitudes towards their own movement, stillness, and ‘stuck-ness’; and their experiences of staring in public spaces. The contingencies of belonging/exclusion, choice/regimen, and fitting/mis-fitting – as well as the more-than-material, varied, and contextual nature of those tensions – are present in many of the participants’ (im)mobilities in and through the city.     

新疆移民问题研究——新中国成立后新疆人口迁移、定居及类型研究

运用＂社会行动-情境分析＂理论视角来分析新疆人口迁移、定居的理想类型,发现新疆人口迁移具有多元化、复杂性和历史传承性的特点,不能用单一人口迁移类型来解释。在新时期,新疆人口迁移类型面临新的转型,主动自愿移民会不断增加,这既体现了社会对人的主体性的关注与尊重,同时也说明社会的自由度在不断增强。面对新疆人口迁移问题,要因势利导,顺应人口迁移类型演变的趋势。     

Longevity, flight ability and reproductive performance of the diamondback moth,Plutella xylostella (L.) (Lepidoptera: Yponomeutidae), related to adult body size

Plutella xylostella in the temperate zone shows a clear seasonal change in adult body size. In the laboratory, large and small moths were produced during immature stages at 15°C and 25°C, respectively. These moths were then used to evaluate longevity, age-specific flight ability, flight ability of mated and unmated females, and the influence of flight experience on the subsequent reproductive success. The large moths lived longer and displayed a greater flight ability over 3 weeks. Irrespective of body size, unmated females flew for a longer time than mated females, and flight experience affected their subsequent reproductive success. Females of both sizes mated and laid eggs soon after emergence, without any obvious pre-reproductive period. More flight experience did not delay oviposition, but did reduce egg production. It is likely that large moths with a longer adult life span and greater flight ability are better fitted for long-distance flight and more fecund than small ones. These experimental results may explain why long-distance migration ofP. xylostella is mostly seen during cool seasons, when relatively large moths with long forewing appear in the field.     

Imagined Rural/Regional Spaces: Non-Normative Sexualities in Small Towns and Rural Communities in Croatia

This research aims to critically examine how the complexity of the ongoing process of “coming out” in small towns and rural spaces in Croatia undermines the imagined hierarchical distinction between rural/urban spaces. The narratives of LGBQ individuals living in these spaces subvert imaginaries of their communities as homogeneously hostile and threatening. Some participants did, however, perceive other spaces as either “gay-friendly” or “deeply homophobic.” As Croatia is transnationally perceived to be a part of a larger “homophobic region,” the construction of the rural/urban hierarchical distinction is (re)produced and (re)configured within discourses that signify Western countries and so-called more developed regions within Croatia as “more open and liberal” as opposed to “more homophobic and backward” spaces. These distinctions between countries, regions, and the rural/urban spaces come into contradiction with each other and are undermined by my interviewees’ own incongruous experiences.     

Rethinking network capital: hospitality work and parallel trading among Chinese students in Melbourne

Drawing on an ethnographic study of Chinese female tertiary students’ work practices in Melbourne, Australia, this article engages critically with John Urry’s concept of network capital. I show how these students’ work practices link them both into relatively fixed, localized, diasporic employment networks in Melbourne’s Chinese restaurant sector; and into relatively mobile, transnational, digitally mediated trading networks in the micro-entrepreneurial activity of daigou or parallel trading: buying local goods on behalf of customers in China. Based on this case study, I develop three main inter-related claims. First, I argue that geographic and social mooring in place, as well as mobility, can generate benefit for individuals and groups, just as both fixity and mobility may generate disadvantage or risk. Second and relatedly, I propose that social capital cannot operate entirely independently of geography, as Urry’s proposal of network capital as a replacement for the concept of social capital implies. Third, through my development of the concept of ‘feminine network capital’, I show how network capital may take ‘weak’ and tactical, as well as ‘strong’ and strategic forms.