What MIGDIA?

Our project, Migration, Transnational Educational Pathways, and Diasporic Multilingualism, examines questions related to education, democracy, and immigration in Finland and Lebanon. Our perspective draws from sociolinguistics, anthropology, and world politics. Migration shapes societies in various ways, both in the global South and North. A central question everywhere is how transnational educational pathways can be constructed to provide individuals with avenues for societal participation, further education, and employment. Transnational educational pathways also challenge us to consider whose voices are heard and should be heard when building such pathways.

Our research context spans from Arabic native language classrooms to the everyday lives of immigrant families in Finland and Lebanon. The focus of our examination is on daily life, everyday multilingualism, and the educational policy constraints within which these occur. These constraints are explored both from the perspective of Finnish educational policy and by delving into the ideological delineations of organizations working in refugee education in Lebanon, from the perspective of world politics and global governance.

The project is funded by the Kone Foundation, with additional support from the Finnish Institute in the Middle East, both financially and administratively.