Search

This qualitative study aims to contribute to our understanding of how second‐generation immigrants negotiate their multiple identities, and construct their feelings of belonging. We focus on second‐generation ethnic Kurds, a stateless ethnic group with a complex political and social history, who have seldom been investigated in a UK context. Drawing on data from interviews with 14 Kurds living in the UK, this paper outlines the tensions in Kurds' lived experiences of Kurdish and British identity; in particular, experiences of feeling "othered" and how this manifests in relation to their identities. We found that Kurds most commonly dealt with some of the tensions they experienced from not belonging or feeling like an "other" by constructing new identities with more permeable boundaries of belonging; in this study, this was achieved through a "place‐based" identity. In sum, this paper offers a novel contribution to discourses of belonging, by demonstrating how the nuances of belonging and its lived complexities manifest in the experiences of UK‐based second‐generation Kurds, and the resultant strategies that they adopt to navigate tensions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we develop a conceptual and methodological approach that psychologists and other social scientists can employ to study emergence. We consider relevant social psychological approaches and conclude that, for the most part, social psychology has tended to focus on processes of normalisation following disruptions, rather than examining emergence in itself. An exception to this is G. H. Mead, whose work we draw on to theorise emergence with a focus on contemporary "affective politics." In the second part of the paper, we use focus group data on the European Union referendum in the UK to empirically illustrate our theoretical points. We discuss in particular three axes for exploring the emergent politics of Brexit: political values, political authority, and the authority of affect. We conclude our discussion by reflecting on some of the theoretical and political implications of our analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In June 2016, the United Kingdom held a referendum on EU membership; 52% of those who voted, voted to leave, and 48% voted to remain. During the referendum campaign, two identities emerged: "Brexiter" and "Remainer," which remained salient post‐referendum. This study explores how the categories of Brexiter and Remainer were deployed by posters online. Data comprise comment threads collected from four online newspapers both during the campaign and after the vote, which focus on the Brexit campaign promise: "We send £350m a week to the EU. Let's fund our NHS instead." We draw on membership categorization analysis and discursive psychology to analyse when categories were made salient and what responses to the invocation of categories were. Analysis revealed that posters explicitly categorize the out‐group and in doing so implicitly define their group. Posters resisted other political identities when attributed to them in relation to the referendum. The analysis shows how Brexiter and Remainer are new, albeit contested, political categories and identities in their own right, with other political identities resisted when used. The paper highlights implications for the political system in the United Kingdom and for social divisions within U.K. society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the moment of Brexit and its political aftermath in order to challenge dominant academic and popular conceptions of the political subject as singular and coherent. Instead, we suggest that there is an urgent political and analytical need for a view of the subject as multiple, contradictory, and dialogic. As interdisciplinary scholars working on the borders of policy studies and cultural studies, we think this is a critical site for transdisciplinary conversations about such conceptions of the subject. In the political field, such subjects are selectively and unevenly addressed and mobilized by political projects—such as Vote Leave—that invite them to recognize themselves as part of an imagined collective identity. In the twin disturbances of the European Union referendum and the 2017 general election, we suggest that it is possible to see that other voicings, other identifications, and other projects remain possible. Specific political mobilizations are neither singular nor stable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper concerns threats to identity experienced by migrants who have encountered radical socio-political upheaval. We argue that migration, following massive societal change, is associated with disruption that is likely to be undesired and, even when it is desired, because it is substantial, threatens identity definition and evaluation. There is relatively little empirical social psychological research on migrants' perceptions of the threats associated with migration and their impact upon identity. In this study, we investigate the emotional and cognitive experience of threat to identity described by immigrants to Britain (N = 24) from the former Yugoslavia, following the outbreak there of civil war. We examine how these interviewees engage in a meaning-making process, negotiating their position amid a complex system of group categorisations and cultural values in order to retain their sense of self-efficacy, continuity, distinctiveness and self-esteem. Identity Process Theory (Breakwell, 1986) is used to interpret the findings. We also show how strong emotional reactions surround alterations in identity meanings following severe threats that are consequent upon major life changes. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rise of right‐wing populist parties has been widely discussed across the social sciences during the last decade. Taking a social representational approach, we analyse organising principles and anchoring of right‐wing populist thinking across four European countries (France, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom). Using European Social Survey data (Round 7), we compare political attitudes and self‐appraisals of citizens identifying with right‐wing populist, conservative right‐wing, and traditional left‐wing parties. The findings converge across the four countries to show that right‐wing populist identifiers diverge from both left‐ and right‐wing identifiers on vertical (between the "people" and the "elite") and horizontal (between nationals and immigrants) dimensions of differentiation. Depending on the context, right‐wing populist identification was fuelled by material and physical insecurity, low political efficacy, and distrust of fellow citizens. We conclude that right‐wing populism requires multiple strategies of differentiation within and between groups to justify and sustain itself. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]