Master thesis | Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology (MSc)
open access
The inefficiencies of the Greek healthcare system, the trafficking networks and the fact that the majority of the nurses of exclusive duty are women and immigrants, challenge the validation of...Show moreThe inefficiencies of the Greek healthcare system, the trafficking networks and the fact that the majority of the nurses of exclusive duty are women and immigrants, challenge the validation of their skills, position and contribution to the society. Drawing on three months of remote ethnographic research with Greek and immigrant nurses of exclusive duty, this study examines their practical and emotional challenges, and their perceptions of their caregiving role adding the connection with the gender stereotypes on care and the social inequalities. The resulting thesis comprises a written text and an ethnographic film. The text offers a reflection on methodological issues and critically explores how my conceptual framework connects with my research findings, while the ethnographic film focuses upon the subjective experiences and the emotions of three nurses of exclusive duty and juxtaposes theirs with my own experiences as a granddaughter of grandparents that were taken care of by a ‘stranger’. My key research finding is that the precarity of this profession, the stereotype of women as ‘natural’ caregivers, the inequalities because of ethnicity and socio-economical status and the consequent crossing of the personal/professional boundaries impact their physical and mental health since they supplement the challenges of this job. The nurses constantly try to negotiate their position and prove their value to the society while working without governmental provision and support. Thus, I argue that their gender, ethical positions, ethnicity and socio-economical status affect the perceptions of their caregiving role and identity.Show less
Master thesis | Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology (MSc)
open access
This research sees the act of "going abroad for work" from two perspectives. One is leaving home and then conducting a cross-cultural life. The other is the expansion or adjustment of a career...Show moreThis research sees the act of "going abroad for work" from two perspectives. One is leaving home and then conducting a cross-cultural life. The other is the expansion or adjustment of a career trajectory. This research examines how recent Chinese migrant workers cope with their overseas life when working in the catering industry in the Netherlands. By doing so, I have tried to understand what is the “social world” of my participants and how they interact with it. During 3 months of fieldwork, I talked with 8 participants and closely yet remotely studied social media content from this group. Our online conversations were based on getting along even virtually. The outcome comprises a written text and a film. The text discusses how these migrant workers engaged with labor and explores how the self was lost and rebuilt. As a trajectory pursuing success, and through daily practices in break times, I gradually gained insight in these migrant workers’ migration journey and witnessed their awareness and sacrifice of self. Sacrificing leisure life and prioritizing work, men I engaged with, can hardly think of their own feelings and needs or reflect on who they are. Yet their practice and narration indicated s certain expectation on self-presentation. The film portrays narratives of “labor migration” from several perspectives as a polyphonous testimony. Overall, the key findings are that for recent Chinese migrant workers who come to the Netherlands and work in the catering industry, the act of migration and adjusting to cross-cultural life are reported to be experienced as a "normal" process: It is experienced as natural that one needs to adjust to different coworkers and to the new work environment. As it is for money that they came overseas, they perceive it as normal to bear difficulties. Rather than entering in a process of trans-national transition and adjustment as I imagined, their journeys can be seen as a continued precarious yet independent career trajectory that illustrates how they, as labor migrants, do not relate more than necessary with their new environment. At the same time, these labor migrants seek and create breathing space for themselves in their daily break-times, and single free weekday, to maintain a sense of self. Also, bearing the uncomfortable, their tendency is to normalize it, and tend to talk about the self in a positive and independent way, together composing a sense of self.Show less
Master thesis | Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology (MSc)
closed access
This research project about the construction of safe space for people of colour and LGBT+ people at Leiden University utilizes the theory of W.E.B. Du Bois (1903) and his metaphor of 'the veil'....Show moreThis research project about the construction of safe space for people of colour and LGBT+ people at Leiden University utilizes the theory of W.E.B. Du Bois (1903) and his metaphor of 'the veil'. Even though there are diversity and inclusion policies in place at Leiden University, it does not necessarily feel like a safe environment for many people. This thesis aims to illustrate that for the diversity practitioners at Leiden University, students and staff, both private and public safe spaces play a role in establishing agency and empowerment under conditions of oppression. Private safe spaces (queer and coloured spaces 'behind the veil') are created by marginalized people for marginalized people – atmospheres where people can process racialized and sexualized experiences together. Public safe spaces (mixed spaces 'beyond the veil') are collaboratively created – atmospheres where people can be themselves and voice their opinions. Ideally, these spaces are experienced as 'brave space', where people feel comfortable enough and confident enough to contribute to the social setting. This thesis aims to explore safe space – both physical and emotional – and desires to contribute to a safe and inclusive learning and working environment at Leiden University.Show less
Master thesis | Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology (MSc)
open access
By considering food making as a way to reenact diasporic memories and cultural identity among Indo-Surinamese migrants in the Netherlands, this project elaborates on the mutually constitutive...Show moreBy considering food making as a way to reenact diasporic memories and cultural identity among Indo-Surinamese migrants in the Netherlands, this project elaborates on the mutually constitutive relationship between bodies and food, and on cooking as a performative way to generate and transmit knowledge. The research yielded a textual output, combining academic and creative writing, a short film, and a series of ceramics. While the text builds on the parallel between material culture theories and ethnographic fieldwork, the film explores the relationship between people and objects in a non-linear way. With the production of Surinamese traditional food in ceramic, furthermore, findings about embodied knowledge were transposed in physical form. The research points toward the potential allocated to materials to trigger the recollection of individual and collective histories, aligning with a non-anthropocentric, non-objectivist anthropological approach.Show less
Master thesis | Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology (MSc)
open access
Throughout the last 50 years the Spanish countryside has emptied due to the rural migration from villages to main industrial cities such as Madrid, Bilbao or Barcelona. Now, after decades of...Show moreThroughout the last 50 years the Spanish countryside has emptied due to the rural migration from villages to main industrial cities such as Madrid, Bilbao or Barcelona. Now, after decades of demographic decline, depopulation has become central in public and academic debate about rural development. This growing concern of emptying villages has raised questions about the precarious life and the sense of threat to people who live in these spaces and who are exposed to a loss of services and stable livelihood. This research is an ethnographic analysis of locals’ perspective living in the depopulated village of Yanguas, in Tierras Altas in the province of Soria, the most depopulated area in Spain. Departing from the concept of precarity within global capitalism I will focus on how people of Yanguas sustain a livelihood and how they perceive the village’s livability, while addressing the future perspective of development based on infrastructure creation. The findings in this research suggest that the struggles some people experienced while living in a depopulated village were not derived strictly from the fact that they live in a small community. On the contrary, the experience of depopulation, rather than being the source of precarity, was very often a symptom of other large-scale issues and social changes such as industrialization, delocalization, and patterns of social mobility and migration. This thesis combines audiovisual and text, and the outcome is this article and a film.Show less
Master thesis | Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology (MSc)
open access
Within the context of over-saturated cities and global exponential urban growth, the context of Gentrification has gained increasing academic and interdisciplinary momentum. This ethnographic...Show moreWithin the context of over-saturated cities and global exponential urban growth, the context of Gentrification has gained increasing academic and interdisciplinary momentum. This ethnographic research engages with the notion of the Gentrification of Place, by analyzing the way redevelopment programs are experienced by neighborhood inhabitants of Amsterdam North. The research encompasses a multimodal approach, as both literary and audiovisual component encompass the way inhabitants of historic neighborhoods experience urban change bound to Gentrification. The findings suggest that institutional place-making practices bound to the past, have generated collective notions of disregard, and stigmas that are accentuated when experienced through new place-making practices today, employed as part of ongoing neo-liberal policies, manifested through Gentrification. To further engage with the political aspects of the Gentrification of Place, Lefebvre’s urban spatial theory will be engaged with. Urban changes crystalize through altered notions of livability of neighborhood inhabitants, that lead to the experiencing of a precarious state of experiencing Place. The audio-visual component, composed by a collaborative photo project and by the ethnographic film Tijd voor Noord (Time for North) engages with similar notions, and functions as an ethnographic bike ride through Amsterdam North. The film explores perspectives of neighborhood brokers, who are affected by the changes bound to their neighborhoods.Show less
Master thesis | Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology (MSc)
open access
In a world where globalization is reshaping the way we understand mobility, communication, and self-identification, the study of migrants learning and using the language of their host community is...Show moreIn a world where globalization is reshaping the way we understand mobility, communication, and self-identification, the study of migrants learning and using the language of their host community is of increasing academic interest. The concept ‘new speaker’ is being used in European minority language communities to study the linguistic niches that these migrants are creating through the use of these languages they learn, questioning traditional concepts such as “native speaker” and “non-native speaker”. In this thesis I explore the challenges that New Speakers of Papiamentu experience learning this creole language on the island of Bonaire (Caribbean Netherlands), and the strategies they develop to make pragmatic use of this cultural capital they acquire. This thesis proposes a methodology that draws from Linguistic Ethnography and Visual Anthropology that results in a multimodal thesis which comprises an ethnographic documentary and this article. The documentary portrays how several individuals from different nationalities who are learning Papiamentu navigate Bonaire’s multilingual environment using this language. The results of this research suggest that new Papiamentu speakers are actors of social change in Bonaire, as they are creating and expanding a ‘contact zone’ between Papiamentu first language speakers and new Papiamentu speakers, stimulating new forms of identification, belonging and intercultural communication in the context of a creole language communityShow less
Master thesis | Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology (MSc)
open access
Venezuela’s economic and political crisis has exponentially increased the transnational migration of Venezuelans to Colombia. Many migrants have established in central locations of Bogotá and the...Show moreVenezuela’s economic and political crisis has exponentially increased the transnational migration of Venezuelans to Colombia. Many migrants have established in central locations of Bogotá and the surrounding area searching for economic stability and healthcare services. Undocumented pregnant immigrants who need to access these services sometimes face roadblocks based on their documentation status. This thesis will explore and analyze undocumented migrants arriving in Bogotá and the surrounding area experience the process of pregnancy, and childbearing. To further understand how they negotiate and navigate policies and healthcare services using their social networks. This research took place over the course of two and a half months, using written analysis and audiovisual methods consisting of semistructured interviews and participant observation in non-profit organizations, hospitals, and homes of pregnant Venezuelan immigrants. The result is a film and text that work side by side to argue how pregnant immigrants navigate barriers of local policy and healthcare and acquire goods and services through the practice of bonding and bridging social networks. These networks allow them to obtain goods and services while also developing strong connections that provide emotional support.Show less
Master thesis | Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology (MSc)
open access
The music genre of psytrance has been localised throughout the globe. Especially now we can see that in postmodern times, where identities have become increasingly fluid and fractured, populations...Show moreThe music genre of psytrance has been localised throughout the globe. Especially now we can see that in postmodern times, where identities have become increasingly fluid and fractured, populations are looking for a place where they can find community and belonging. And it seems that in a post-Apartheid Cape Town where segregation was such a big part of life, being able to have a space to come together away from the structure of racial categorisation is important. Cape Town has a large following of the psytrance outdoor festival scene, however, not much has been written about the psychedelic trance scene in Cape Town. This study examines the psytrance scene in Cape Town, South Africa. Two months of research attending and observing at psytrance outdoor festivals in the Cape Town area, using audio visual recordings, and semi-structured interviews. The thesis comprises of a text and ethnographic film. The text touches upon the outdoor psytrance festival culture in Cape Town, looking at the need that people have to attend these multiple day outdoor festivals. Escape, reconnecting with nature and the active meditation that comes with dancing to repetitive and psychedelic music. My key research finding is that the outdoor psytrance festivals give Capetonians a space where they can escape their daily lives, work through problems that they might have, and create a sense of community and identity.Show less
