Academic literature on the topic 'Immigrant families – Greece'

AbstractThis study examined growth patterns in adaptation of immigrant youth from a risk and resilience perspective. Students from first- and second-generation immigrant families living in Greece and their nonimmigrant classmates (N= 1,057) were assessed over the first 3 years of secondary school (ages 13–15). Three-level hierarchical linear models were used to disentangle individual and classroom-level effects on initial level and change in academic achievement, conduct, peer popularity, and psychological well-being. At the individual level, adaptation was more related to self-efficacy and parental school involvement (resources) than immigrant status and social adversity (risks). Only for academic achievement did risks explain variance when resources were controlled. Parental school involvement moderated the effect of immigrant status for initial level and growth in achievement. For all students, achievement and conduct worsened over time. At the classroom level, socioeconomic and ethnic composition of the classroom moderated the effects of self-efficacy and immigrant status on academic achievement and peer popularity, respectively. Second-generation immigrants were more popular than first-generation immigrants, but showed a larger decrease over time in school achievement. Results support a developmental, differentiated, and contextualized approach to the study of immigrant youth adaptation.

Migration to Germany has been a fact of life for the average German since the 1960s. Immigrants started arriving from countries like Turkey, Spain, Greece, or Italy as a post-war labor force was invited to Germany to address workforce shortages. Many of these immigrants ultimately brought their families to live in Germany. One group of these newcomers was Aramean families of Syriac Orthodox faith, forced to flee the Tur Abdin region in southeast Turkey via Syria, Lebanon, and Northern Iraq. This paper will discuss the background and impetus for moving to the West for this immigrant group in detail. It will review the impacts on the life of devout Syriac Orthodox families while living in Germany, a secular country. It will also take an initial look at whether evangelical communities in Germany can come alongside this group, still suffering from a different kind of persecution: the “otherness” of living in Germany.

We examined behavioral school engagement trajectories of immigrant and non-immigrant early adolescents in relation to their academic achievement. Data were based on teacher judgments and school records. Students from immigrant families living in Greece and their non-immigrant classmates ( N = 1057) were assessed over the three years of middle school (ages 13 to 15). Academic achievement influenced later school engagement more strongly than vice versa for both immigrant and non-immigrant students. Low achievement, being an immigrant student and social adversity were found to be risk factors for the initial level of behavioral engagement. An overall increase in students’ absenteeism over the course of the study was stronger for immigrant students. The immigrant status effect was due to immigrant students’ lower achievement. The results suggest that immigrant youth may disengage from school to protect themselves from academic failure. This would also be a plausible explanation for earlier findings that immigrant and non-immigrant students do not differ in psychological well-being, even though immigrant students have significantly lower academic achievement. Implications for interventions to promote academic achievement and to prevent disengagement in immigrant students are discussed.

The reasons that prompted the Albanian exodus were numerous and varied. While if we take a look on its consequences will see that they have a dual nature. Among the positive aspects of exodus we can mention the fact that it helped Albania economically meeting the needs of a considerable part of the population in the moment of political and social crisis transition enabling the survival of many families. On the other hand it had a negative impact not only becouse of spending vital energies of the nation abroad, but also because it led to the formation of a bad opinion about Albanians, opinion spread almost all over Europe, especially where their presence was bigger. For this reason we got to study precisely the image of immigrant in two countries ( Italy and Greece ), where they have the largest flow of migration in 1990-2000. We should note that in recent years in both countryes in Italy and in Greece prevails the same closed mentality against foreigners. Also it is accompanied ( especially in Italy with the malfunctioning of the structure that handles issues of migratory movements, not like in the other states like Germany, England or France where, besides the small number of immigrants, there were laws and better functioning of the state that associated with emigration’s problems. On the other hand we can say that in this period, whether in Greece the fortunes of the Albanian immigrants depended from the relations of the Greek-Albanian state, in Italy they depend mainly on the behavior of immigrants.

Objective: In this study, we assessed Greek and immigrant kindergarteners’ and their families’ body mass index (BMI), nutritional habits, and level of adherence to the Mediterranean diet during the Greek austerity period beginning in 2009. Methods: A cross-sectional study in Attica, Greece, during the school year 2016-17, enrolling 578 guardian parents and 578 kindergarteners aged ≥ 5-6 years, from 63 public kindergartens in 36 municipalities in Attica’s prefecture. Results: Immigrant mothers experienced twice as high the unemployment rate (21.3%) than Greek mothers (10.5%), with consequent degradation in food products purchasing (p = .03)(non-Greeks 54.3%, Greeks: 49.1%). BMI rates between Greeks and immigrant participants were similar, with significant variations in several lifestyle habits, including Greek parents’ heavier smoking and higher physical activity in parents of different ethnic origin. KIDMED score was “poor” in both Greek and other identity kindergarteners, with slight differences in some of the Mediterranean dietary habits and patterns; strong correlation was expressed between the child’s BMI and KIDMED score, guardian parent’s age, BMI, and overall lifestyle. Conclusions: This study could be a springboard for further research in the understudied population of native and immigrant kindergarteners, reflecting on national and international initiatives and action plans to ensure that their similarities and differences are noted.

The multiethnic environment of Ptolemaic Alexandria resulted in cross-cultural transmission of funerary practices and associated material culture that introduced many traditions to Egypt from the Mediterranean world. Along with an influx of mercenaries serving in the Ptolemaic army came cultural and artistic knowledge from their places of origin, which they (or their families) incorporated into their burials. One motif, which appears on late 4th–3rd-century painted funerary monuments from Alexandria, is that of a soldier on horseback, alluding to images of the heroic hunter or warrior on horseback found in tombs in the regions of northern Greece. These Alexandrian monuments commemorated members of the Ptolemaic cavalry, some of whom are identified as Macedonian or Thessalian by accompanying Greek inscriptions. The image of a soldier astride his rearing horse not only emphasized the deceased’s military status, but also established a link with Macedonian and Ptolemaic royal iconography. This type of self-representation served a number of purposes: to signal the deceased’s cultural and geographic origins, demonstrate his elite role in Ptolemaic society and imply connections to the Ptolemaic court, all of which were important to the immigrant inhabitants of early Alexandria as they sought to express their identity in a new geographical, cultural, and political setting.

This article discusses cultural considerations and approaches to working with bereaved immigrants who cope with traumatic loss. A clinical case is used to elaborate on issues related to cultural identity, level of acculturation as well as religious beliefs and rituals among Filipinos living in Greece. Considerations for clinicians, who provide services to culturally diverse families that experience traumatic deaths, are discussed.

The present study focuses on families of Indian immigrants. The subjects in question come from the state of Panjab and have a Sikh religion. Purpose of the study is to show the linguistic and sociocultural conditions that the Indian preschoolers experience in their family life in Greece. As long as the family is the basic area of the children’ socialization, the culture that the children experience in their family environment specifies the linguistic and cultural background when they start attending the Greek preschool. The data of the case-study in question were gathered through the interviews given by eleven parents of the preschoolers and three kindergarten teachers. What the data analysis has shown is a tendency of linguistic and sociocultural separation of the families from the dominant language and culture. This separation has a direct impact on the children’ adaptation at school. The tendency that the analysis has shown is related to the desire of the family to preserve the ethnocultural and religious identity of their country and is increased due to the restricted role of the woman inside the family and the community. It is also supported by the social role that the temple built by the Indian community at Rethymno plays.

Temporary or permanent, local or international, voluntary or forced, legal or illegal, registered or unregistered migrations of individuals, whole communities or individual groups are an important factor in constructing and modifying (modern) societies. The extent of international migrations is truly immense. At the time of the preparation of this publication more than 200 million people have been involved in migrations in a single year according to the United Nations. Furthermore, three times more wish to migrate, mostly from sub-Saharan Africa towards some of the most economically developed areas of the world according to the estimates by the Gallup Institute (Esipova, 2011). Some authors, although aware that it is not a new phenomenon, talk about the era of migration (Castles, Miller, 2009) or the globalization of migration (Friedman, 2004). The global dimensions of migration are definitely influenced also by the increasingly visible features of modern societies like constantly changing conditions, instability, fluidity, uncertainty etc. (Beck, 2009; Bauman, 2002).The extent, direction, type of migrations and their consequences are affected by many social and natural factors in the areas of emigration and immigration. In addition, researchers from many scientific disciplines who study migrations have raised a wide range of research questions (Boyle, 2009, 96), use a variety of methodological approaches and look for different interpretations in various spatial, temporal and contextual frameworks. The migrations are a complex, multi-layered, variable, contextual process that takes place at several levels. Because of this, research on migrations has become an increasingly interdisciplinary field, since the topics and problems are so complex that they cannot be grasped solely and exclusively from the perspective of a single discipline or theory. Therefore, we are witnessing a profusion of different “faces of migration”, which is reflected and at the same time also contributed to by this thematic issue of the journal Ars & Humanitas.While mobility or migration are not new phenomena, as people have moved and migrated throughout the history of mankind, only recently, in the last few decades, has theoretical and research focus on them intensified considerably. In the last two decades a number of research projects, university programs and courses, research institutes, scientific conferences, seminars, magazines, books and other publications, involving research, academia as well as politics and various civil society organizations have emerged. This shows the recent exceptional interest in the issue of migration, both in terms of knowledge of the processes involved, their mapping in the history of mankind, as well as the theoretical development of migration studies and daily management of this politically sensitive issue.Migration affects many entities on many different levels: the individuals, their families and entire communities at the local level in the emigrant societies as well as in the receiving societies. The migration is changing not only the lives of individuals but whole communities and societies, as well as social relations; it is also shifting the cultural patterns and bringing important social transformations (Castles 2010). This of course raises a number of questions, problems and issues ranging from human rights violations to literary achievements. Some of these are addressed by the authors in this thematic issue.The title “Many faces of migration”, connecting contributions in this special issue, is borrowed from the already mentioned Gallup Institute’s report on global migration (Esipova, 2011). The guiding principle in the selection of the contributions has been their diversity, reflected also in the list of disciplines represented by the authors: sociology, geography, ethnology and cultural anthropology, history, art history, modern Mediterranean studies, gender studies and media studies. Such an approach necessarily leads not only to a diverse, but at least seemingly also incompatible, perhaps even opposing views “on a given topic. However, we did not want to silence the voices of “other” disciplines, but within the reviewing procedures actually invited scientists from the fields represented by the contributors to this volume. The wealth of the selected contributions lies therefore not only in their coherence and complementarity, but also in the diversity of views, stories and interpretations.The paper of Zora Žbontar deals with the attitudes towards foreigners in ancient Greece, where the hospitality to strangers was considered so worthy a virtue that everyone was expected to “demonstrate hospitality and protection to any foreigner who has knocked on their door”. The contrast between the hospitality of ancient Greece and the modern emergence of xenophobia and ways of dealing with migration issues in economically developed countries is especially challenging. “In an open gesture of hospitality to strangers the ancient Greeks showed their civilization”.Although the aforementioned research by the United Nations and Gallup Institute support some traditional stereotypes of the main global flows of migrants, and the areas about which the potential migrants “dream”, Bojan Baskar stresses the coexistence of different migratory desires, migration flows and their interpretations. In his paper he specifically focuses on overcoming and relativising stereotypes as well as theories of immobile and non-enterprising (Alpine) mountain populations and migrations.The different strategies of the crossing borders adopted by migrant women are studied by Mirjana Morokvasic. She marks them as true social innovators, inventing different ways of transnational life resulting in a bottom-up contribution to the integrative processes across Europe. Some of their innovations go as far as to shift diverse real and symbolic boundaries of belonging to a nation, gender, profession.Elaine Burroughs and Zoë O’Reilly highlight the close relations between the otherwise well-established terminology used in statistics and science to label immigrants in Ireland and elsewhere in EU, and the negative representations of certain types of migrants in politics and the public. The discussion focusses particularly on asylum seekers and illegal immigrants who come from outside the EU. The use of language can quickly become a political means of exclusion, therefore the authors propose the development and use of more considerate and balanced migration terminology.Damir Josipovič proposes a change of the focal point for identifying and interpreting the well-studied migrations in the former Yugoslavia. The author suggests changing the dualistic view of these migrations to an integrated, holistic view. Instead of a simplified understanding of these migrations as either international or domestic, voluntary or forced, he proposes a concept of pseudo-voluntary migrations.Maja Korać-Sanderson's contribution highlights an interesting phenomenon in the shift in the traditional patterns of gender roles. The conclusions are derived from the study of the family life of Chinese traders in transitional Serbia. While many studies suggest that child care in recent decades in immigrant societies is generally performed by immigrants, her study reveals that in Serbia, the Chinese merchants entrust the care of their children mostly to local middle class women. The author finds this switch of roles in the “division of labour” in the child care favourable for both parties involved.Francesco Della Puppa focuses on a specific part of the mosaic of contemporary migrations in the Mediterranean: the Bangladeshi immigrant community in the highly industrialized North East of Italy. The results of his in-depth qualitative study reveal the factors that shape this segment of the Bangladeshi diaspora, the experiences of migrants and the effects of migration on their social and biographical trajectories.John A. Schembri and Maria Attard present a snippet of a more typical Mediterranean migration process - immigration to Malta. The authors highlight the reduction in migration between Malta and the United Kingdom, while there is an increase in immigration to Malta from the rest of Europe and sub-Saharan Africa. Amongst the various impacts of immigration to Malta the extraordinary concentration of immigrant populations is emphasized, since the population density of Malta far exceeds that of nearly all other European countries.Miha Kozorog studies the link between migration and constructing their places of their origin. On the basis of Ardener’s theory the author expresses “remoteness” of the emigratory Slavia Friulana in terms of topology, in relation to other places, rather than in topography. “Remoteness” is formed in relation to the “outside world”, to those who speak of “remote areas” from the privileged centres. The example of an artistic event, which organizers aim “to open a place like this to the outside world”, “to encourage the production of more cosmopolitan place”, shows only the temporary effect of such event on the reduction of the “remoteness”.Jani Kozina presents a study of the basic temporal and spatial characteristics of migration “of people in creative occupations” in Slovenia. The definition of this specific segment of the population and approach to study its migrations are principally based on the work of Richard Florida. The author observes that people with creative occupations in Slovenia are very immobile and in this respect quite similar to other professional groups in Slovenia, but also to the people in creative professions in the Southern and Eastern Europe, which are considered to be among the least mobile in Europe. Detailed analyses show that the people in creative occupations from the more developed regions generally migrate more intensely and are also more willing to relocate.Mojca Pajnik and Veronika Bajt study the experiences of migrant women with the access to the labour market in Slovenia. Existing laws and policies push the migrants into a position where, if they want to get to work, have to accept less demanding work. In doing so, the migrant women are targets of stereotyped reactions and practices of discrimination on the basis of sex, age, attributed ethnic and religious affiliation, or some other circumstances, particularly the fact of being migrants. At the same time the latter results in the absence of any protection from the state.Migration studies often assume that the target countries are “modern” and countries of origin “traditional”. Anıl Al- Rebholz argues that such a dichotomous conceptualization of modern and traditional further promotes stereotypical, essentialist and homogenizing images of Muslim women in the “western world”. On the basis of biographical narratives of young Kurdish and Moroccan women as well as the relationships between mothers and daughters, the author illustrates a variety of strategies of empowerment of young women in the context of transnational migration.A specific face of migration is highlighted in the text of Svenka Savić, namely the face of artistic migration between Slovenia and Serbia after the Second World War. The author explains how more than thirty artists from Slovenia, with their pioneering work in three ensembles (opera, ballet and theatre), significantly contributed to the development of the performing arts in the Serbian National Theatre in Novi Sad.We believe that in the present thematic issue we have succeeded in capturing an important part of the modern European research dynamic in the field of migration. In addition to well-known scholars in this field several young authors at the beginning their research careers have been shortlisted for the publication. We are glad of their success as it bodes a vibrancy of this research area in the future. At the same time, we were pleased to receive responses to the invitation from representatives of so many disciplines, and that the number of papers received significantly exceeded the maximum volume of the journal. Recognising and understanding of the many faces of migration are important steps towards the comprehensive knowledge needed to successfully meet the challenges of migration issues today and even more so in the future. It is therefore of utmost importance that researchers find ways of transferring their academic knowledge into practice – to all levels of education, the media, the wider public and, of course, the decision makers in local, national and international institutions. The call also applies to all authors in this issue of the journal.

Temporary or permanent, local or international, voluntary or forced, legal or illegal, registered or unregistered migrations of individuals, whole communities or individual groups are an important factor in constructing and modifying (modern) societies. The extent of international migrations is truly immense. At the time of the preparation of this publication more than 200 million people have been involved in migrations in a single year according to the United Nations. Furthermore, three times more wish to migrate, mostly from sub-Saharan Africa towards some of the most economically developed areas of the world according to the estimates by the Gallup Institute (Esipova, 2011). Some authors, although aware that it is not a new phenomenon, talk about the era of migration (Castles, Miller, 2009) or the globalization of migration (Friedman, 2004). The global dimensions of migration are definitely influenced also by the increasingly visible features of modern societies like constantly changing conditions, instability, fluidity, uncertainty etc. (Beck, 2009; Bauman, 2002).The extent, direction, type of migrations and their consequences are affected by many social and natural factors in the areas of emigration and immigration. In addition, researchers from many scientific disciplines who study migrations have raised a wide range of research questions (Boyle, 2009, 96), use a variety of methodological approaches and look for different interpretations in various spatial, temporal and contextual frameworks. The migrations are a complex, multi-layered, variable, contextual process that takes place at several levels. Because of this, research on migrations has become an increasingly interdisciplinary field, since the topics and problems are so complex that they cannot be grasped solely and exclusively from the perspective of a single discipline or theory. Therefore, we are witnessing a profusion of different “faces of migration”, which is reflected and at the same time also contributed to by this thematic issue of the journal Ars & Humanitas.While mobility or migration are not new phenomena, as people have moved and migrated throughout the history of mankind, only recently, in the last few decades, has theoretical and research focus on them intensified considerably. In the last two decades a number of research projects, university programs and courses, research institutes, scientific conferences, seminars, magazines, books and other publications, involving research, academia as well as politics and various civil society organizations have emerged. This shows the recent exceptional interest in the issue of migration, both in terms of knowledge of the processes involved, their mapping in the history of mankind, as well as the theoretical development of migration studies and daily management of this politically sensitive issue.Migration affects many entities on many different levels: the individuals, their families and entire communities at the local level in the emigrant societies as well as in the receiving societies. The migration is changing not only the lives of individuals but whole communities and societies, as well as social relations; it is also shifting the cultural patterns and bringing important social transformations (Castles 2010). This of course raises a number of questions, problems and issues ranging from human rights violations to literary achievements. Some of these are addressed by the authors in this thematic issue.The title “Many faces of migration”, connecting contributions in this special issue, is borrowed from the already mentioned Gallup Institute’s report on global migration (Esipova, 2011). The guiding principle in the selection of the contributions has been their diversity, reflected also in the list of disciplines represented by the authors: sociology, geography, ethnology and cultural anthropology, history, art history, modern Mediterranean studies, gender studies and media studies. Such an approach necessarily leads not only to a diverse, but at least seemingly also incompatible, perhaps even opposing views “on a given topic. However, we did not want to silence the voices of “other” disciplines, but within the reviewing procedures actually invited scientists from the fields represented by the contributors to this volume. The wealth of the selected contributions lies therefore not only in their coherence and complementarity, but also in the diversity of views, stories and interpretations.The paper of Zora Žbontar deals with the attitudes towards foreigners in ancient Greece, where the hospitality to strangers was considered so worthy a virtue that everyone was expected to “demonstrate hospitality and protection to any foreigner who has knocked on their door”. The contrast between the hospitality of ancient Greece and the modern emergence of xenophobia and ways of dealing with migration issues in economically developed countries is especially challenging. “In an open gesture of hospitality to strangers the ancient Greeks showed their civilization”.Although the aforementioned research by the United Nations and Gallup Institute support some traditional stereotypes of the main global flows of migrants, and the areas about which the potential migrants “dream”, Bojan Baskar stresses the coexistence of different migratory desires, migration flows and their interpretations. In his paper he specifically focuses on overcoming and relativising stereotypes as well as theories of immobile and non-enterprising (Alpine) mountain populations and migrations.The different strategies of the crossing borders adopted by migrant women are studied by Mirjana Morokvasic. She marks them as true social innovators, inventing different ways of transnational life resulting in a bottom-up contribution to the integrative processes across Europe. Some of their innovations go as far as to shift diverse real and symbolic boundaries of belonging to a nation, gender, profession.Elaine Burroughs and Zoë O’Reilly highlight the close relations between the otherwise well-established terminology used in statistics and science to label immigrants in Ireland and elsewhere in EU, and the negative representations of certain types of migrants in politics and the public. The discussion focusses particularly on asylum seekers and illegal immigrants who come from outside the EU. The use of language can quickly become a political means of exclusion, therefore the authors propose the development and use of more considerate and balanced migration terminology.Damir Josipovič proposes a change of the focal point for identifying and interpreting the well-studied migrations in the former Yugoslavia. The author suggests changing the dualistic view of these migrations to an integrated, holistic view. Instead of a simplified understanding of these migrations as either international or domestic, voluntary or forced, he proposes a concept of pseudo-voluntary migrations.Maja Korać-Sanderson's contribution highlights an interesting phenomenon in the shift in the traditional patterns of gender roles. The conclusions are derived from the study of the family life of Chinese traders in transitional Serbia. While many studies suggest that child care in recent decades in immigrant societies is generally performed by immigrants, her study reveals that in Serbia, the Chinese merchants entrust the care of their children mostly to local middle class women. The author finds this switch of roles in the “division of labour” in the child care favourable for both parties involved.Francesco Della Puppa focuses on a specific part of the mosaic of contemporary migrations in the Mediterranean: the Bangladeshi immigrant community in the highly industrialized North East of Italy. The results of his in-depth qualitative study reveal the factors that shape this segment of the Bangladeshi diaspora, the experiences of migrants and the effects of migration on their social and biographical trajectories.John A. Schembri and Maria Attard present a snippet of a more typical Mediterranean migration process - immigration to Malta. The authors highlight the reduction in migration between Malta and the United Kingdom, while there is an increase in immigration to Malta from the rest of Europe and sub-Saharan Africa. Amongst the various impacts of immigration to Malta the extraordinary concentration of immigrant populations is emphasized, since the population density of Malta far exceeds that of nearly all other European countries.Miha Kozorog studies the link between migration and constructing their places of their origin. On the basis of Ardener’s theory the author expresses “remoteness” of the emigratory Slavia Friulana in terms of topology, in relation to other places, rather than in topography. “Remoteness” is formed in relation to the “outside world”, to those who speak of “remote areas” from the privileged centres. The example of an artistic event, which organizers aim “to open a place like this to the outside world”, “to encourage the production of more cosmopolitan place”, shows only the temporary effect of such event on the reduction of the “remoteness”.Jani Kozina presents a study of the basic temporal and spatial characteristics of migration “of people in creative occupations” in Slovenia. The definition of this specific segment of the population and approach to study its migrations are principally based on the work of Richard Florida. The author observes that people with creative occupations in Slovenia are very immobile and in this respect quite similar to other professional groups in Slovenia, but also to the people in creative professions in the Southern and Eastern Europe, which are considered to be among the least mobile in Europe. Detailed analyses show that the people in creative occupations from the more developed regions generally migrate more intensely and are also more willing to relocate.Mojca Pajnik and Veronika Bajt study the experiences of migrant women with the access to the labour market in Slovenia. Existing laws and policies push the migrants into a position where, if they want to get to work, have to accept less demanding work. In doing so, the migrant women are targets of stereotyped reactions and practices of discrimination on the basis of sex, age, attributed ethnic and religious affiliation, or some other circumstances, particularly the fact of being migrants. At the same time the latter results in the absence of any protection from the state.Migration studies often assume that the target countries are “modern” and countries of origin “traditional”. Anıl Al- Rebholz argues that such a dichotomous conceptualization of modern and traditional further promotes stereotypical, essentialist and homogenizing images of Muslim women in the “western world”. On the basis of biographical narratives of young Kurdish and Moroccan women as well as the relationships between mothers and daughters, the author illustrates a variety of strategies of empowerment of young women in the context of transnational migration.A specific face of migration is highlighted in the text of Svenka Savić, namely the face of artistic migration between Slovenia and Serbia after the Second World War. The author explains how more than thirty artists from Slovenia, with their pioneering work in three ensembles (opera, ballet and theatre), significantly contributed to the development of the performing arts in the Serbian National Theatre in Novi Sad.We believe that in the present thematic issue we have succeeded in capturing an important part of the modern European research dynamic in the field of migration. In addition to well-known scholars in this field several young authors at the beginning their research careers have been shortlisted for the publication. We are glad of their success as it bodes a vibrancy of this research area in the future. At the same time, we were pleased to receive responses to the invitation from representatives of so many disciplines, and that the number of papers received significantly exceeded the maximum volume of the journal. Recognising and understanding of the many faces of migration are important steps towards the comprehensive knowledge needed to successfully meet the challenges of migration issues today and even more so in the future. It is therefore of utmost importance that researchers find ways of transferring their academic knowledge into practice – to all levels of education, the media, the wider public and, of course, the decision makers in local, national and international institutions. The call also applies to all authors in this issue of the journal.

The present thesis deals with the immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers’ right to family life. It approaches the right to family life as a right that is wider than family reunification and includes cases of expulsion of foreigners who have family ties in the host country, as well as regularization issues. The present dissertation examines the foreigners’ right to family life from an international human rights law perspective, from an EU law perspective but also includes a comparative study of the legislation of three EU Member States, namely Spain, Greece and Germany. The main research question concerns the impact that the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty and the enhancement of fundamental right in Europe should have on family life related legislation at EU and national level. Not least, the present study aims at assessing the effect and effectiveness of the EU Directives approximately ten years after the deadline for their implementation and focuses on the case law of International, EU and national courts. It concludes that the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty and the fact that the ECFR has gained the same legal values as the Treaty directly affects the Directives which relate to family life and, consequently, the domestic legislations of the Member States which participate in the present study. That being said, the dissertation reaches the conclusion that the applicable family reunification regimes follow a strictly ‘formal’ model which is not compatible with the new fundamental rights scene, as it is formed at EU level. It proposes a new reunification model which will be more ‘substantial’ and will be based on an individual assessment of each application both as regards the family members who may qualify as such, and with respect to the requirements that are imposed for the exercise of the right to family reunification.
La present tesi tracta sobre el dret a la vida familiar dels immigrants, refugiats i sol·licitants d'asil. El dret a la vida familiar s'aborda com un dret més ampli que el reagrupament familiar i inclou casos d'expulsió d'estrangers que tenen vincles familiars al país d'acollida, així com casos de regularització. La tesi analitza el dret a la vida familiar dels estrangers des de la perspectiva del dret internacional de drets humans, i de la perspectiva de la legislació comunitària, però també inclou un estudi comparatiu de la legislació nacional de tres estats membres de la UE, Espanya, Grècia i Alemanya. La principal pregunta de recerca de la tesi es refereix a l'impacte que l'adopció del Tractat de Lisboa i l'ampliació dels drets fonamentals a Europa han de tenir en la legislació relacionada amb la vida familiar a nivell comunitari i nacional. A més a més, la tesi té com a objectiu avaluar l'efecte i l'eficàcia de les directives de la UE aproximadament deu anys després de la data límit per a la seva transposició i es centra en la jurisprudència dels tribunals internacionals, comunitaris i nacionals. La present tesi conclou que l'adopció del Tractat de Lisboa i el fet que la Carta Europea dels Drets Fonamentals hagi guanyat el mateix valor jurídic que el Tractat afecta directament a les directives que es refereixen a la vida familiar i, en conseqüència, a les legislacions nacionals dels Estats membres que participen a l'estudi. Dit això, la tesi arriba a la conclusió que els règims aplicables de reagrupament familiar segueixen un model estrictament "formal" que no és compatible amb la nova escena dels drets fonamentals a nivell comunitari. Es proposa un nou model de reagrupació familiar que serà més "substancial" i es basarà en una avaluació individual de cada sol·licitud, tant pel que fa als membres de la família que poden qualificar com a tal, com pel que fa als requisits que s'imposen per a l'exercici del dret al reagrupament familiar.

This study examined the intergenerational conflict between Greek immigrant parents and their Greek-Canadian children caused by differences in beliefs and practises concerning core cultural values (Greek language, Greek Orthodox religion, and Family ties). Data collected consisted of responses to open-ended, semi-structured interview questions.
Interpretation of the data revealed that parents and children held congruent beliefs concerning the Greek language, yet differed in their practises of language usage. Their differing practises led to a breakdown in parent-child communication.
With regard to the Greek Orthodox religion, parents and children held parallel beliefs and practises, and no apparent conflict on this issue existed. Parents' and children's opinions and actions on family solidarity were in harmony. Divergent opinions and practises emerged on issues of intermarriage and family hierarchy. Conflict manifested itself when issues of family hierarchy arose, while intermarriage was considered a potential source of conflict.
The nature and amount of conflict expressed was found to be influenced by (1) parents' educational levels, and (2) gender roles of family members.

Defence date: 21 June 2001
Examining board: Prof. Floya Anthias (University of Greenwich) ; Prof. Christian Joppke (EUI - Supervisor) ; Prof. Anastasia Karakasidou (Wellesley College) ; Prof. Peter Wagner (EUI)
PDF of thesis uploaded from the Library digitised archive of EUI PhD theses completed between 2013 and 2017

This narrative is about Greek immigrants to America from 1880 to 1930. Unlike previous studies focusing on immigrant communities in major cities, this is a rural study, examining the Greeks who settled in central Illinois’s small towns and opened confectioneries and soda fountains. The author’s grandfather Gus Flesor was one of these, coming to Tuscola, Illinois, in 1901 and taking over the candy shop there. Gus’s shop is still in business today, run by the author and her sister. Gus’s experience serves as a case study that informs the stories of more than 100 other Greek confectioners who settled in over forty towns in central Illinois. The author describes why the Greeks came to America and recounts the obstacles they faced after arrival and their attempts to acculturate and assimilate and become confectioners. A significant amount of the narrative recounts the ethnic and racial hostility the Greeks faced, especially from the Ku Klux Klan. But the bulk of the text is about the Greek immigrant confectioners themselves who fulfilled the American dream by settling in a new land, raising families, operating profitable businesses, and contributing to their communities. As the author’s father once observed, “It’s a good story.”

AbstractThis chapter reports on a qualitative study investigating a particular type of Greek-language education abroad, namely non-mixed or Greek state schools in Germany, and the impact ‘new’ migration has had on their operation. These schools (K-12) follow the Greek curricula and employ teachers seconded from the Greek Ministry of Education. They were originally set up in the 1970s as an educational setting which would help immigrant students in Germany to develop Greek language skills and a Greek ethnocultural identity, eventually facilitating transition in the case of repatriation. Their graduates have the additional benefit of gaining access to Greek universities with relatively low grades, and, as a result, such schools have been a popular option for Greek immigrant families for the last forty years. Following the decision of Greek authorities to start abolishing them in 2011, Greek non-mixed schools saw their students’ numbers wane. ‘New’ migration to Germany (post 2010), however, has led to an important rise in enrolments and a change in the student population profile. According to the findings of a small-scale exploratory study presented in this chapter, teachers in these schools perceive new arrivals as young people traumatised by the migration experience and in need of a familiar physical and symbolic setting. As a result, non-mixed schools are once again considered as important institutions in the current circumstances on the grounds that they offer their students a number of advantages.

The “100 percent Americanism” and anti-hyphenation rhetoric that had been building since before the Great War rapidly escalated into ugly and violent attacks on immigrants after it. Chapter 5 specifically focuses on the Ku Klux Klan’s role in promoting racism and extreme anti-immigrant hostility in the mid-1920s. In 1923 the KKK burned a cross in front of Gus Flesor’s store in Tuscola. He did not give in to the violence, however, nor did any of the Greeks in central Illinois, and their resistance to attacks on their families and businesses is also part of this story.

Through information about specific recordings and musicians, Joseph Graziosi’s essay on “Turkish Music in the Greek American Experience” delineates how many immigrants from the former Ottoman Empire embraced Turkish music and song as a familiar aspect of their home culture. This again challenges theories promoted by some twentieth century scholars who portrayed Greek music as highly differentiated from that of surrounding musical cultures—and perhaps harkening back to a glorious ancient past. Many of those theories assume the continuing purity of Greek musical forms, genres, or contexts—yet when we honestly examine any musical lineage, it is clear that everything changes and evolves in response to a variety of influences.