Cosmopolitan Encounters: Highly Skilled Latvians in London Problematise Ethnicity and ‘Eastern Europeanness’

ABSTRACT

In this paper I analyse the cosmopolitan aspirations of highly skilled Latvian migrants residing in London. In particular, I explore the nuanced modalities of ethnicity and ‘Eastern Europeanness’ and how these inform everyday encounters with people from different ethnicities and races, and when meeting co-ethnics in a global city. These encounters are illustrated with data, drawn from 18 in-depth interviews with Latvian graduates in London. I argue that such encounters are shaped and informed by the post-Soviet heritage, emerging understandings of inter-racial encounters, hegemonic discourses of ‘East’ and ‘West’, all embedded in specific power relations.

KEYWORDS:

• Cosmopolitan encounters
• skilled migration
• Eastern Europe
• Latvia
• London

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes on contributor

Dr Aija Lulle is a lecturer in Human geography, Loughborough University, UK and Adjunct Professor, migration and mobility studies, University of Eastern Finland, Finland. Prior to that she was the EU's Horizon 2020 project's ‘Youth mobility: maximising opportunities for individuals, labour markets and regions in Europe' researcher at the University of Sussex 2015–2018. Her main interests are related to migrant life courses in the contexts of embodied, socio-cultural and political changes.

Notes

1 But see also Ciupijus (2012) who cautions that not all can move so freely. Continuting mobility barriers create certain inequalities within Europe. Importantly, ‘freedom of movement’ has become the most contested issue in the post-Brexit UK.

2 Although Latvia since 1918 does not have a history of colonialism, the Duchy of Courland, where part of western territory of Latvia belonged in the 17th century, did have colonial aspirations in Gambia and Tobago, which are still referred to in literature or songs.