Ambivalences of the emotional logics of migration and family reunification: emotions, experiences and aspirations of Bangladeshi husbands and wives in Italy

ABSTRACT

This article analyses the relational and emotional logics of migration, separation and reunification of Bangladeshi families in Italy. Migrant husbands are separated from their wives, with whom they have had little family life due to their migration, and seek family reunification. Wives’ migration due to family reunification, however, means separating them from their familiar environments and social networks. For this reason, some wives press for onward migration to the UK, where they hope that a larger Bangladeshi community and more social and cultural opportunities may provide a more fulfilling life compared to what they experienced in Italy. However, this means uprooting their husbands once again. The article observes the emotionally divergent dimensions among men and women as an element that can transform and redefine biographical projects and the migration trajectories in Europe of Bangladeshi families in Italy.

KEYWORDS:

• Family reunification
• Bangladeshi diaspora
• emotional logics of migration
• gender conflicts
• onward migration
• transnational marriage

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Acknowledgements

I am grateful to the anonymous referees and Luca Trappolin for helpful suggestions.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. In Bangladesh, the emigrants are called londoni or probashi. The first term derives from one of the first great destinations in the history of migration from Bangladesh – London – and, by extension, the whole of the UK. The second term means ‘external inhabitants’ or ‘those who went abroad’.

2. Five women in the sample (30 families) had this experience.

3. This is partially in line with the results of other researchers of other Indian subcontinent migrant communities (Gulati 1993) that show the increased mobility outside the homes and the greater financial autonomy of left-behind wives, albeit with some contradictions.

4. In this context, it will simply be pointed out that, in Italy, citizenship can be obtained after 10 years of regular and continuous residence in the country. It is then transferred to children and spouses.

5. This article was written before the 2016 referendum on UK membership in the EU.

6. This onward migration could meet the expectations of reunified women or, on the contrary, lead to further disappointment. Unfortunately there is no scientific research on recently arrived Italian-Bangladeshi migrants to London, which might cast light on their situation. On the Italian-Bangladeshi families in London, it has been published just a journalistic investigation (The Independent 29 November).