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In this paper, I give voice to Latin Americans' ideas about belonging in Aotearoa New Zealand society. As a small, low-profile migrant community in Auckland, their self-positioning in the urban social matrix is especially interesting because of New Zealand's official policy as a bicultural nation, aspiring to an equal partnership between indigenous Maori and Pakeha (European New Zealanders). This study is situated in the context of transnational migration research which stresses the potential for migrants to use transnational linkages to negotiate 'belonging' in the receiving society. Due to New Zealand's revised immigration laws in the late 1980s, the cultural composition of Auckland has changed enormously in the last decades. Increasing non-white immigration has challenged New Zealand's national identity as a bicultural, but predominantly white, society in the South Pacific. However, it is unclear where other ethnic groups are situated in this bicultural framework. Based on fieldwork and discursive accounts, I scrutinise Latin American migrants' understanding of biculturalism in a multicultural context. I am particularly interested in their self-positioning in the wider social matrix and in the contested forms of (self-)inclusion and exclusion. I situate these practices in migrants' biographies as they are shaped by political ideas, class and economic opportunities. I argue that these conditions are key in migrants' perceptions of 'belonging' and self-positioning in the urban ambit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Immigration is arguably a contentious issue in New Zealand. A major shift in immigration policy and patterns of immigration has witnessed an anti-immigration backlash and debate over a 'crisis of national identity'. Drawing data from the 1995 and 2003 National Identity modules of the International Social Survey Programme, this paper examines New Zealanders' attitudes toward immigration. The results of hierarchical cluster and multiple correspondence analyses show how attitudes toward immigration highlight important social group (i.e. class and ethnicity) differences in beliefs about social incorporation and conceptions of national identity. Positive or negative attitudes toward immigration, therefore, have different meanings depending on broader social and cultural divisions in society. I conclude by relating the findings to processes of social incorporation among immigrants and their descendants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Auckland's ethnic composition has diversified rapidly since the introduction of a new immigration policy in 1987. The policy targets migrants with skills and investment capital, and while it has attracted many asset-rich migrants, it has also resulted in the immigration of many with relatively little wealth, from a range of countries. Thus, much of the media attention which once focused on disadvantaged migrant groups shifted its attention to apparently wealthier groups such as the Chinese from Hong Kong and Taiwan. At the same time, the transformation of suburbs with high average socio-economic status was conspicuous, but other suburbs considered less prestigious have also been transformed. This paper considers the situation of the Indian transnational group in New Zealand which is in the 'middle' socio-economically. Further we consider the emerging transnational spaces in one of the suburbs within Auckland which is also in the 'middle' in terms of its historical transformation and the (re)construction of place which has taken place there. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The optimism that accompanies the voyage into social science-related fieldwork is sometimes confronted by the 'unanticipated' of the field, which surges out of a perceived (in)congruence between the researcher and the settings of the site of fieldwork. Using theoretical framings from Pierre Bourdieu, I show how my habitus as a 'Black African Male' was perceived in a field of research that is both racialized and gendered, accounting for the several surprising and awkward moments that marked my fieldwork in Denmark and New Zealand. I begin by showing how the origins of migration studies effected the racialized composition of this field of scholarship, as well as its subsequent gendered turn. I then present my sites of fieldwork and the several encounters of the 'unanticipated' that engendered fieldwork reflexivity, especially as regards the unequal power relations existing in various sites of research engagements. I suggest a few fieldwork navigation strategies for researchers with comparable identities and lastly recommend that fieldwork's awkward moments engendered by stereotypes of race and gender be made productive by way of 'creative confrontations'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The concept of chain migration has played a central role in the study of international migration over several decades. Recent developments in the ease of movement and international transmission of information may have made the social networks that are at the heart of such migration redundant, especially for skilled individuals and their households. To investigate this claim, a small panel study of recent migrants to New Zealand from China, India and South Africa is used to explore both the importance of social networks in promoting their moves and their subsequent involvement in encouraging and assisting family and friends to join them. The findings show that most of their moves did not involve the typical chain migration process, but the participants who remained in the study for the full five years assisted on average 1.25 others to move to New Zealand also. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]