Power relations, gender, race and the migration experiences of inter-cultural marriage couples: The case of Thai-European marriage migrants (Working title)

In this talk, I will share my experience presenting a working paper at the Ninth EuroSEAS Conference at the University of Oxford, UK. The paper (co-authored with Pattraporn Chuenglertsiri) aims to understand how Thai-European couples engage with the host society on four core dimensions; cultural, emotional, social, and structural. Analysis is based on 20 semi-structured interviews with Thai marriage migrants (returnees) who moved to Europe, and European marriage migrants in Thailand. We initially focused on the issue of integration, but based on the comments we received at the conference, we decided to shift our focus to exploring how marriage migrants engage with the host society using the ‘gendered geographies of power’ framework. We seek to understand how global position, power and gender inequalities shape the marriage migrants’ experiences in the host society. We find that being a ‘white man’ comes with certain privileges that place them at the top of social hierarchy in the Thai society, which may put them in a vulnerable position in the longer run. We are currently revising the paper and would be grateful for any additional inputs.

 

Moderator: Dr. Dusita Phuengsamran