The Language of (Im)mobility: time and the language politics of migrant integration

基于在德国柏林长达15个月的人种学田野调查，我的博士论文研究了国家批准的语言融合要求对新来者社会经济流动性的影响。在这样做的过程中，我发现，尽管这些计划的宣称目标是加快新来者的社会经济融入，但实际上，它们大大推迟了他们获得工作、接受高等教育、获得公民身份和融入社会的感觉。这意味着，在很大程度上是因为这些政策，大多数新来者在德国的头几年都是在长期的社会经济不确定和早熟中度过的。鉴于我的博士研究获得了紧迫的学术和政策见解，拟议的研究旨在(A)发展和参与影响活动，通过这些活动影响未来的政策决策，以及(B)促进目前关于欧洲移徙和融合的跨学科学术研究。我进行了广泛的实地考察，发现了一些只有通过人种学工作才能了解的关键问题，这些问题应该让当地行为者和政策制定者了解，以便：(A)向政策制定者提供新形式的专业知识；(B)为未来的政策制定确定新的重点。因此，这种研究金将使我能够在政策制定者和受融合政策制约的人之间建立一座仍然缺乏但迫切需要的桥梁。(A)我将与当地非政府组织举行会议，这些非政府组织在移民和难民寻找工作的过程中帮助和咨询他们，并在语言融合系统中导航；(B)我将与我现有的对话者网络安排一次焦点小组会议。步骤(A)和(B)将涉及与当地行动者和直接受融合政策制约的人分享我的核心研究成果，以便起草关键的政策建议，并传达给地方、国家和欧盟一级的政策制定者。(C)我将与联邦难民和移民办公室(BAMF)的成员和柏林一体化部长一起召开一次研讨会，通过研讨会交流我的博士研究得出的人种学结论。这将让我有机会重新审视我的研究的核心发现，并将移民和难民在德国的生活经历传达给设计和实施融合政策的国家行为者。因此，我将创建一个平台，通过定性研究来影响当前的政策决策。(D)我与地方和州行为者以及我现有的对话者网络的会晤将导致编写政策报告并将其提交给联邦难民和移徙者办公室、移徙和融合委员会以及平等就业机会委员会关于移民和融合问题的专题研究小组。这一计划产出将影响获得公民身份、永久居留权、高等教育和就业的监管方式，通过定性的跨学科证据表明，国家规定的语言学习要求对在德国的难民和移民产生的社会-时间和经济后果。此外，与当地非政府组织建立网络将使我能够为进一步的研究开发新的研究途径。(E)我将提交两篇基于我的博士研究的学术文章，这将填补在欧洲移民、语言学习和未来建设问题上迫切的经验空白。(F)除了在国际会议上介绍我的工作外，我还将在伦敦大学学院组织和召开一次关于语言、移民和时间交叉的跨学科研讨会。这不仅可以让我巩固我的学术生涯，还可以让我在社会科学研究方面建立现有的关系网。(G)我将在面向公众的场所交流和传播我的调查结果。这将有助于更好地了解难民和移民在欧洲的经历，并有助于在更广泛的范围内围绕这些问题进行公开讨论。

Based on over 15-months of ethnographic fieldwork in Berlin, Germany, my doctoral thesis examined the impacts of state-sanctioned language-integration requirements on newcomers' socioeconomic (im)mobility. In so doing, I found that while the stated aim of such programmes is to accelerate newcomers' socioeconomic incorporation, in practice, they significantly delay their access to work, higher education, citizenship and a sense of inclusion. This means that largely because of these policies, most newcomers spend their first few years in Germany in prolonged periods of socio-economic uncertainty and precarity. Given the urgent academic and policy insights gained from my PhD research, the proposed research aims to (a) develop and engage in impact activities through which to influence policy decisions going forward, and (b) contribute to current interdisciplinary academic scholarship on migration and integration in Europe. My extensive fieldwork has uncovered key issues that are only accessible through ethnographic work, and these should be made visible to local actors and policy makers in order to (a) contribute new forms of expert knowledge to policy makers and (b) identify new focus points for future policy development. This fellowship will, thus, enable me to forge a still absent, though urgently necessary bridge between policy makers and those subject to integration policies.(a)I will convene meetings with local NGOs who aid and consult migrants and refugees in their employment search and to navigate the language-integration system,(b)I will schedule a focus group meeting with my existing network of interlocutors.Steps (a) and (b) will involve sharing my core research findings with local actors and those directly subject to integration policies in order to draft key policy recommendations to be communicated to local, national and EU-level policymakers. (c)I will convene a workshop with members of the Federal Office for Refugees and Migrants (BAMF) and the Berlin Integration Minister, through which to communicate ethnographically derived findings from my PhD research. This will give me the opportunity to revisit the core findings of my research, and to communicate the lived experiences of migrants and refugees in Germany to state actors who design and implement integration policies. I will thus create a platform through which to impact current policy decision-making through qualitative research. (d) My meetings with local and state actors, as well as my existing network of interlocutors will result in the development and submission of policy reports to the Federal Office of Refugees and Migrants, the Committee on Migration and Integration, and the EESC Thematic study group on immigration and integration (IMI). This planned output will impact the ways in which access to citizenship, permanent residency, higher education, and employment is regulated, by demonstrating, through qualitative, interdisciplinary evidence, the socio-temporal and economic consequences state-mandated language learning requirements have on refugees and migrants in Germany. Building my networks with local NGOs will, furthermore, allow me to develop new avenues of inquiry for further research.(e)I will submit two academic articles based on my PhD research, which will fill urgent empirical gaps on questions of migration, language learning and future building in Europe. (f)Next to presenting my work at international conferences, I will organise and convene an interdisciplinary workshop at UCL on the intersections of language, migration and time. This will, not only allow me to bolster my academic career, but it will also allow me to build upon my existing networks in social science research. (g)I will communicate and disseminate my findings in public-facing venues. This will contribute to greater awareness around the experiences of refugees and migrants in Europe, and contribute to public discourses around these matters, more broadly.