Greek Migrants Research Articles

Going English: Anglicisation of Family Names in Greek Migrant Communities in Australia

Greek migration to Australia over the last 200 years has necessarily meant a confluence of cultures: European to Antipodean; Greek to British-Australian. Across this period Australia has devolved from a Fortress Australia mentality, exemplified by the softening of the racially exclusionary White Australia policy years into a period of assimilation in the 1940s, to integration (1970s) to multiculturalism from the 1980s onwards. Nevertheless, attitudinal remnants of the race-based exclusionary policies of the pre-war era continued to be felt even in the more inclusionary late 20th century. Across these periods many Greek migrants to Australia felt the need to anglicise their family names. For this paper Australian Greeks and their children are surveyed to assay how and why these anglicisations were done, with the questions also aiming to assess whether such anglicisation is as prevalent now as it was in the post-war period and, as a result, have migrants’ perceptions of Australian attitudes changed over the last two generations. On a sociological level, for a name-proud Greek culture, this is a study central not only to migratory and cultural issues but to the broader question of personal identity and how that may change when moving from one country to another.

Language practices and identity construction on Facebook in the aftermath of Brexit: The case of a group of British migrants in Greece applying for Greek citizenship

This article examines the digital language practices in a Facebook group of seven British migrants, who live in Greece and have applied for Greek citizenship, throughout March 2021, in the aftermath of the United Kingdom’s decision to leave the European Union. More specifically, it uses online ethnography to analyse the ways with which group members use language and construct identity through their public posts and comments. Although research into the digital language practices and identity construction of Greek migrants has been carried out, no such research exists in the case of British migrants residing in Greece. It will be shown how group members’ use of both Greek and English, as well as creative examples of code switching for the purpose of conveying concepts to other members, offers insight into how the group under study use language to position themselves in relation to both Greece and the Greek citizenship application process, as well as to other members who possess varying degrees of linguistic competency in Greek.

Integration, urban citizenship, and spatial aspects of (new) mobilities: Greek migrants' constructions of integration in European cities.

This study aims at casting light on the ways in which spatial aspects of mobility and belonging serve as social-psychological discursive resources used by Intra-European Greek immigrants in order to account for integration. For the purposes of the study, 17 virtual interviews with Greek migrants in European cities were analysed. Interview discussion was facilitated by photographs of participants' meaningful places. In the analysis, accounts of belonging to the community 'in general' were juxtaposed to accounts of bonding with specific places. Participants, using spatial discursive resources and constituting complex relationships between political participation, citizenship and place, developed competing arguments and positioned themselves as integrated or excluded from local, national or supranational communities. Accounts of attachment to private and public places mobilized constructions of citizenship based on place appropriation and people-environment relations and constructed spatial or symbolic boundaries. The conclusions underscore the benefits of understanding migrant integration through multilevel (local, national and supranational) constructions of political participation and urban and localized perspectives of citizenship.

Migrant Lives on First Nation Land: Greek-Australian Memories of Titjikala in the 1960s

ABSTRACT Via ethnographic and oral history methods and transcultural memory work, this article presents the complex, ambiguous and at times contradictory relationship between a Greek family and an Aboriginal community, including the traditional landowners, in Central Australia in the 1960s. Within a commonplace narrative of colonists and pastoralists buying, owning and selling First People’s land, ownership by Greek migrants and the historical presence of Aboriginal people provides an entry point into a microhistory that illustrates and reveals under-acknowledged, fraught and fragmented facets of transcultural life in 1960s rural Australia, and the place of ethnic-settler-colonisers in Australia’s history of settler-colonialism, dispossession, and pastoralism. Through this case study, we argue the importance of uncovering, recovering and reclaiming the history of Mediterranean migrants’ transcultural relationships with First Nations people.

Enlightening the darkness: The potential of charcoal analysis for the study of vegetation dynamics and relative exploitation at Krania during the Iron Age Greece

In the framework of the NWO project “What went into the melting pot? Land-use, agriculture, and craft production as indicators for the contributions of Greek migrants and local inhabitants to the so-called Greek colonization in Italy (ca. 850–550 BC)”, science-based methods are employed to analyze and compare the organization of subsistence strategies in the Greek motherland and in the indigenous and colonial milieus of Italy (Crielaard et al. 2020). As a part of the subproject ‘Flora & Fauna’, which focuses on farming practices, subsistence strategies and surplus production, Iron Age material from the settlement of Krania in the Pieria region of Greece was analyzed. The site was excavated in 2001 and revealed occupation phases from the 3rd millennium BC to the Hellenistic period. The amount of ceramics recovered demonstrates the importance of trade with the rest of Greece, in particular Corinth, providing evidence for long-standing contacts and networks. Two pit structures contained a high concentration of material, notably charcoal and ceramics dating to the 9th-8th centuries BC. This material constitutes an interesting case study in itself but also as a regional comparandum with other Greek assemblages. This paper discusses how anthracological analysis can contribute to our understanding of human-environment interactions, anthropogenic practices and environmental management.

Exploring subject positions in Greek migrants' discourse on mobility decisions

AbstractThe current study explores the ways in which Greek migrants in their early adulthood position themselves in discourse on mobility decisions. For the purposes of the study, 17 virtual interviews with Greek migrants (aged between 25–40 years old) in European cities were conducted. Analysis, based on the principles of critical discursive social psychology, indicated that, in their accounts of migration decision‐making, participants positioned themselves in various ways: as career/job seekers, as adventurers, as well as (personal or institutional/economic) crisis‐ridden individuals. Multiple subject positions were constituted by an amalgam of rational/practical and affective repertoires which depicted migration as a multifaceted, dynamic and non‐linear project. Analysis also highlighted the multiple spatial (transnational, national and local) and dynamic temporal constructions mobilized by participants, in order to construct their motivations for migrating. Discussion of findings suggests that social psychology (a) can vitally contribute to migration literature, by considering ways in which social actors position themselves by the use of historically and culturally specific resources and by their orientation to local interactional concerns in the context of accounting for their mobility and (b) can be benefited by considering spatial and temporal aspects in the analysis of migration.

Innovation as a cause of highly skilled migration: Evidence from Greece

AbstractThis study investigates innovation as a cause of highly skilled migration. Drawing on a totally new database that includes all the Greek PhD holders, combined with panel data from the Global Innovation Index covering 57 countries over the 2009–2020 period, we find that innovation constitutes a strong determinant for highly skilled migration. That is, a rise in innovative performance is positively associated with an increase in the number of highly skilled Greek migrants. We further find a two‐way causality between innovation and highly skilled migration. Namely an increase in the number of highly skilled Greek migrants positively affects innovative performance. While most of the recent studies have comprehensively addressed the positive effects of skilled migration on innovation, they have not looked at innovation as a determinant of highly skilled migration. We further discuss the potential implications of our findings on countries displaying low innovative performance coupled with brain drain.

Migrating from Greece to Germany after 2010: a qualitative approach

Greece was severely hit by financial crisis in 2009. Outward migration flows that already existed for decades were then intensified and escalated. Those flows were, mostly, towards other European countries and also others. Among all those countries, Germany has been receiving many new Greek migrants, and is widely considered a top destination for Greek migrants. Though a qualitative approach (online interviews) and with references to existing scholarship, the study attempts to investigate five main topics concerning Greek migrants in Germany. First, the reasons that motivated, pushed or made the participants emigrate to Germany. Second, their reflections on their life in Germany. Third, whether their decision to migrate to Germany is a permanent one. Forth, what would make repatriation a possibility for them. Finally, what are their desires and plans for the future. Push and pull factors seem to be very important in the decision-making processes of the informants. Family and social networks also play major role for members of the sample in terms of deciding to migrate, choosing Germany as destination, and adjusting to their new social environment in the receiving country. The empirical evidence from the research, confirm existing theory to a great extend and raise many important parameters. Such parameters are specific economic and social factors, along with participants’ personal perceptions.

Highly educated skilled migrants are attracted to global cities: The case of Greek PhD holders

AbstractIn this paper, we investigate to what extent highly educated skilled Greek migrants are attracted to global cities. With the use of a novel database, we find that highly educated Greek migrants are attracted more to cities indexed as global than to cities that are not indexed as global. Moreover, the more the international indexes that list a city as global, the greater the number of such migrants this city receives; that is, these migrants prefer to live in those global cities that are considered to have the most attributes to be classified as such. We provide information on which specific cities these migrants live in, thus filling a gap in the relevant literature. Our data further support a well‐documented argument that there is a mutual beneficial relationship between skilled migrants and global cities to the extent that global cities create a favourable socio‐economic environment that attracts highly skilled migrants.

New Greek migrant (dis)identifications in social media: Evidence from a discourse-centred online ethnographic study

Since the eruption of the Greek crisis in 2010, thousands of highly educated and skilled Greeks have chosen or have been forced to migrate abroad in pursuit of better career prospects and living standards. This recent migratory wave has been termed ‘new’ Greek migration (Panagiotopoulou et al., 2019). Considering the transformative impact of social media on the lives and experiences of migrants as well as the pivotal role of social media in (dis)identification and identity construction processes, this paper aims at exploring the ways in which new Greek migrants construct their identities in their social media discourse. Based on a synergy between the constructionist approach to identity, discourse studies, and online ethnography, the paper presents and discusses empirical data (social media content and interviews) from five selected new Greek migrants settled in the UK and Germany, who write about and capture their migration experiences on their blogs, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram accounts. As shown in the analysis, new Greek migrant identities are hybrid and multifaceted, constructed and negotiated through a gamut of discursive means, including stance-taking, intertextuality, entextualization, and coupling. Having the migrants’ own voice and perspective at the heart of the analysis brings to the forefront significant socio-cultural dimensions of new Greek migration, often downplayed in economic and political analyses of the phenomenon. In this fashion, the potential of social media to heighten awareness of new Greek migrants’ (dis)identification processes is verified.

Linguistic (il)legitimacy in Migration Encounters

Linguistic differences between groups of co-ethnic and/or co-national migrants in diasporic contexts can become grounds for constructing and displaying identities that distinguish (groups of) migrants on the basis of differences in the sociohistorical circumstances of migration (provenance, time of migration) and/or social factors such as class, socioeconomic status, or level of education. In this article, I explore how language became a source of ideological conflict between Greek Cypriot and Greek migrants in the context of a complementary school in north London. Analysing a set of semi-structured interviews with teachers, which were undertaken in 2018 as part of an ethnographically oriented project on language ideologies in Greek complementary schools, I show that Greek pupils and parents, who had migrated to the UK after 2010 pushed by the government-debt crisis in Greece, positioned themselves as linguistic authorities and developed discourses that delegitimised the multilingual and multidialectal practices of Greek Cypriot migrants. Their interventions centred around the use of Cypriot Greek and English features, drawn from the linguistic resources that did not conform with the expectations that “new” Greek migrants held about complementary schools and which were based on strictly monolingual and monodialectal language ideologies. To these, teachers responded with counter-discourses that re-valued contested practices as products of different linguistic repertoires that were shaped by different life courses and trajectories of linguistic resources acquisition.

Twenty-First Century “New” Greek Transnational Migration to Canada

This article derives from a qualitative study of the “new” migration from Greece to Canada, resulting from a severe socioeconomic crisis in Greece. Starting from the migration narratives of 20 “new” Greek migrants in Halifax and Toronto, this research focuses on how the “new” migrants make and carry out the decision to leave and immigrate to Canada. A heuristic use and reconceptualized understanding of the classic “push-pull” model, in conjunction with a transnational migration perspective, allows mapping out, through rich qualitative data, the structure—agency articulation in the “out-of-Greece-and-into-Canada” mobility of 21st century “new” Greek migrants.

Diet quality in an ethnically diverse population of older men in Australia.

To compare the Australian Dietary Guideline Index (DGI-2013) and the Pyramid-based Mediterranean Diet Score (pyrMDS) as measures of diet quality in an ethnically diverse group of older men. Seven hundred and ninety-four older men aged ≥75 participated in wave 3 (2012-2013) of the Concord Health and Ageing in Men Project. Dietary intake was assessed using a validated diet history questionnaire. Ethnicity was based on self-reported country of birth and categorised as Australian-born (418 men), Italian or Greek migrants (188), and other migrants (188). Incident cardiovascular outcomes until March 2018 were measured using the composite of major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE), which comprises all-cause mortality, acute myocardial infarction, congestive cardiac failure, coronary revascularisation and/or ischaemic stroke. Ability to predict incident cardiovascular outcomes and all-cause mortality were compared between standardised DGI-2013 pyrMDS scores by comparison of hazard ratios, discrimination (Harrell's C-statistic) and calibration (calibration plots). Italian and Greek migrant men had significantly lower DGI-2013 scores (91.7 vs. 93.9; p = 0.01) but significantly higher pyrMDS scores (8.8 vs. 8.2; p < 0.0001) than Australian-born men. In the whole sample (794 men), the pyrMDS was a better predictor of both MACE (age-adjusted HR = 0.84; 95% CI = 0.75-0.94 vs. HR = 0.92; 95% CI = 0.82-1.03 for DGI-2013) and all-cause mortality (age-adjusted HR = 0.69; 95% CI = 0.60-0.80 vs. HR = 0.86; 95% CI = 0.74-0.99). The pyrMDS also demonstrated superior discrimination for predicting all-cause mortality and superior calibration for MACE and all-cause mortality. The DGI-2013 appears to underestimate diet quality in older Italian and Greek migrant men. The pyrMDS appears superior to the DGI-2013 for prediction of incident cardiovascular disease and mortality regardless of ethnic background.

Emotions and migration in social media discourse: A new Greek migrant case study

Since the onset of the Greek economic crisis in 2010, thousands of highly educated and skilled Greeks have migrated abroad in search of better career prospects and living standards. This recent migratory wave has been termed ‛new’ Greek migration (Panagiotopoulou et al., 2019). The lives of new Greek migrants are characterised by a mélange of conflicting emotions: loss of belonging, irritation at Greek policies and mentalities, and suffering for the family who remains in Greece facing the crisis, on the one hand; hopes of new beginnings and potential for new opportunities and fulfilling one's goals in the host country, on the other. Drawing on insights from the constructionist approach to emotions, discourse analysis, and online ethnography, this paper looks at how a new Greek migrant in the UK conveys across social media his emotions towards specific events and people both in Greece and the UK. The findings showcase social media's vital role in allowing, mobilising and sharing affective expression. They also shed light on the broader discursive and emotional aspects of new Greek migration.

“Greeks are different to Australians”: understanding identity formation among third-generation Australians of Greek heritage

ABSTRACT The Greek-born population in Australia increased from 15,000 in 1930 to well over 300,000 by 1970. Over the next fifty years, first-generation Greek migrants successfully sustain an identity that promotes difference within Australia while maintaining strong connections to their “homeland”. Their Australian-born children, while identifying as Greek-Australian, have integrated successfully into Australian society. There is evidence to suggest that children of second-generation Australian-born Greek migrants or the third generation continue to identify as Greek rather than Australian. Of interest to this paper is an examination of why third-generation Australia’s of Greek heritage adopt a Greek identity and what aspects of Greekness they value. It appears that the third generation’s steadfast identification as Greek is marked by a desire to distance oneself from assumed Australian traits that they find unappealing and that are contrary to their perception of being Greek.

Transnational Practices and Emotional Belonging among Early 20th-Century Greek Migrants in the United States

This article aims at studying transnational families dispersed among Greece and the United States in the first half of the twentieth century. It examines the ways in which transnationalism was a common way of being, acting and feeling strongly associated with the available “technologies” of those times, namely photographs, letters and private financial and judicial records. The focus is purposefully micro-historical, analyzing the private collections of two families in a small mountainous village community of the Greek south. Its purpose is to manifest the ways in which transnational families communicated, exchanged items, thoughts and emotions, fulfilled economic obligations and marital aspirations and, overall, created “proxy” transnational spaces. At the same time, shifting the focus to individuals, it aims at presenting the diversities of transnationalism as a lived experience, as unfolded in the personal records of migrants and their kin. Further, it explores transnationalism as a holistic, multi-faceted and all-encompassing ground, with its dynamics influencing not only migrants, but also their families and societies back in the homeland.

Caring for a family member with intellectual disability into old age: Applying the sociocultural stress and coping model to Italian and Greek migrants in Australia.

Little is known about how older parent caregivers from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds experience caring for their family member with intellectual disability into late life. In-depth semi-structured interviews were carried out with N=19 family caregivers aged 50-91 from ten Italian and four Greek families. The Sociocultural Stress and Coping Model was used as a framework to interpret their experiences. A number of stressors including the need to make sacrifices, physical and emotional demands, uncertain futures and challenges associated with "the system" were identified. While family members play a key role in providing support, changing values around filial responsibility were evident. Further attention needs to be given to CALD families to address challenges associated with caring for their family member with intellectual disabilities as they age. This study also challenges assumptions that CALD families prefer to keep caring within the family long-term.

Migrant-cum-Settler: Greek Settler Colonialism in Australia

Representations of early Greek migrants in Western Australia constituted a process of Greek migrant-cum-settler colonialization. This process was informed by the exclusionary operations of Australian race-making and the transnational dynamics of Greek labor migration. By claiming an exemplary attachment to whiteness and alerting immigration authorities to the fact that Greek proprietors were breaching labor laws, Greek migrants who wrote to Australian local presses and government agencies articulated a settler sense of belonging that aligned with the cultural and legal contours of the Australian settler state. Inspired by the Australian example of the self-sufficient and law-abiding settler, Greek migrant-cum-settler colonialism took shape in the context of Greek migrants' lived experience as a racialized minority in White Australia.

Corruption and Dispossession in Middlesex

Jeffrey Eugenides’s Middlesex is a story of Greek migrants who find refuge in America after their dispossession and displacement. The dislocation is compounded by moral corruption of the characters associated with breakdown of familial and social values along with the new found liberty they enjoyed in the new land unleashing specter of recessive mutation giving birth to family problem. The study traces the root of corruption by analyzing the text to establish events that take place in remote space and time can have far reaching consequences affecting the present life.

Reconstructing the contemporary Greek diaspora in Italy: Second World War and student mobility

ABSTRACTIn light of the poor and fragmented literature on contemporary Greek diaspora in Italy, not yet adequately covered by the historical and social disciplines, this article attempts to fill that void, thus providing an essential contribution to the studies on the Greek diaspora. Using the results of a field research, we analyze the two main push and pull factors of Greek migration to Italy in the second half of the twentieth century, namely the student migration and the migration related to the Second World War. Through the narrative reconstruction by the second generation members, we retrace the most important phases that have characterized the migratory experience of Greek migrants in Italy within a wider historical framework of analysis, also by using unpublished documents collected in Greek, Italian and American historical archives. We use an analysis method that combines the narratives of second generation members with the statistical analysis of the variables, by reconstructing the family history through the use of data derived from both questionnaires and life stories.