Overview

What does it mean to a family when parents go abroad for economic gains while leaving their children behind? How do they maintain a family when living in different areas, separated for years? How do emerging digital media like instant messaging, social media, and webcam calls impact the everyday lives of today’s transnational families? Drawing on immersive ethnography conducted among UK-based Chinese labour migrants, their left-behind children and caregivers, this book explores how they employ digital media to negotiate family roles and maintain kinship ties. While virtual connections are indispensable, they are not a panacea for physical separation; rather, they introduce complexity to family dynamics. Probing the bittersweet experiences of various family members, it portrays how mediated familial communications intertwine with transnational socio-economic asymmetries and intra-familial dynamics. This book offers an interdisciplinary perspective for general publics and academics interested in migration studies, family and gender studies, and media and communications.

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9789048559039

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Hong Chen (PhD, Goldsmiths) is an associate professor at Shanghai University of Finance and Economics. His research explores the everyday politics of care, mobility, and communication through ethnographic approaches, with a particular focus on how digital technologies mediate intimate life. His publications appear in Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, British Journal of Sociology, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, and International Journal of Communication, among others. He received the “Top 1st paper” award from Ethnicity and Race in Communication Division at the 2018 International Communication Association (ICA) Conference.

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