Croatian Migrant Families: Local Incorporation, Culture, and Identity

Abstract

So far, Croatian migrant families have been predominantly studied within the scope of theoretical questions oriented toward ethnicity and their role as the guardians of ethnic/national identity. Going beyond the ethnic lens of those studies, the article focuses on an exploration of family structures and the social functioning of wider kinship networks in the migration context as well as an understanding of how migrants conceive of ethnic/national identity. By highlighting the complex entanglements of traditional family patterns (patrilocality, seniority, and gender roles), transnational kinship networks and “a little tradition of ethnic/national identity” held by migrants, this article seeks to establish autonomous research into family processes among Croatian migrants and to make a rapprochement between classical anthropological research of family and kinship and migration studies.