1. Security and identity: threats and anxieties for the internationally mobile student.
- Author
-
Li, Zhen
- Subjects
CHINESE students in foreign countries ,CHINESE students ,ONTOLOGICAL security ,ASSIMILATION (Sociology) ,ANXIETY ,SOLIDARITY - Abstract
The paper reports on an empirical study of Chinese international students' experiences of personal safety and security at universities in a UK city. After locating these concerns in relation to current political, social and epidemiological contexts, it reviews the developments that have taken place in our understanding and theorisation of 'safety' and, in particular, 'security' of international students, noting the powerful implications of Marginson's most recent conceptualisation of the issues. The paper proposes the addition of Giddens's notion of ontological security to this developed conceptual framework. Findings from the empirical study make it clear that many students in the study remain concerned over their safety and security, and feel that their concerns are not fully appreciated by the 'authorities' to whom they might be expected to turn for support. For information and support on matters of personal safety, therefore, these Chinese students' first recourse is to compatriot fellow students, reinforcing a sense of inter-dependence based on shared subjective identities. Rather than treating this 'in-community' solidarity as potentially undermining wider cross-cultural contact and communication, this paper proposes that a strengthened sense of 'ontological security' provides a foundation for cross-cultural functioning that does not entail cultural assimilation and a 'subaltern' status. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2022
- Full Text
- View/download PDF