1. Objectifs

Intentions :
This chapter presents «an internationally comparative project entitled “New (educational) migration as a family project and as a challenge for two different educational systems: Germany and Canada”. In particular, [it] focus[es] on the research design and its methodological challenges, as well as on our questions with regard to the living conditions and experiences of newly immigrated families and their (school-age) children in two different migration societies.» (p. 95-96)

Questions/Hypothèses :
The research aims to answer «the following two questions: firstly, how does day-to-day family praxis or “doing family” relate to biographical interpretations of the migratory experiences of individual family members? Secondly, what familial negotiation and interpretation processes can be observed in the context of families’ transitions to new educational institutions in Germany and Canada?» (p. 101)

2. Méthode

Échantillon/Matériau :
«Between 2014 and 2018, research data were collected in Canada and Germany through biographical interviews with […] families who left Greece after 2008 in the wake of the so-called financial crisis.» (p. 96) More specifically, as «of June 2018, [the] sample consists of 31 families, some of whom are from a so-called working class background, while others are from an (upper) middle class background. The project began with data collection in Canada’s Quebec province in April 2014, where [authors] interviewed the first four families. Between 2015 and 2018, [they] then interviewed 23 further families in Germany’s North Rhine-Westphalia region and in addition four families in Canada’s Quebec.» (p. 102)

Instruments :
Guide d’entretien semi-directif

Type de traitement des données :
Analyse de contenu

3. Résumé

Authors «interpret the “new” migration of families with (pre-)school age children as an attempt to safeguard their prior life projects and maintain the “family support strategies” […] they had elaborated even before migrating. In the wake of the socio-economic changes in Greek society resulting from the financial crisis, parents with [c]hildren are opting for educational migration as a means of securing the next generation’s mobility and future prospects. What they are seeking today is a specific social system, and above all a “meritocratic education system”, as a mother of two school-age children from Montreal puts it. That such an education system should ensure, “by means of personal achievement” […], both social advancement for so-called working class families and social stability for (upper) middle class families is one of the central hypotheses [the] project systematically investigates.» (p. 105) Moreover, the «parents in a Montreal-based family remarked on the success of their children’s transition to the secondary level of their French-language school, though the family members do not use either of the official languages (French and English) in their family life. Through [the] analyses of family socialisation conditions, educational expectations, and educational strategies, together with the experiences of family members in two different, strongly migration-influenced societies, [authors] aim to help trace the genesis of the different educational pathways taken by “lateral entrants”—in part by attending to their parents’ [p]erspectives.» (p. 106)