Overview

This book explores how young adult migrants in Scotland navigate everyday life through processes of ontological security-seeking, revealing how identity is negotiated in relation to experiences of uncertainty, perceived difference, and political narrative. Drawing on narrative interviews and creative arts methods, it builds a counter-archive of lived experience to examine how macro-narratives of Scottish distinctiveness shape, stabilise, and limit migrant belonging. This book identifies four key coping mechanisms: minimising racism, performing the “good migrant,” adopting Scottish signifiers, and negotiating biographical self-narratives. It shows how these operate as forms of narrative affirmation. By returning to the micro-level foundations of ontological security theory, it reconceptualises security as cyclical, fragile, and dependent on interpretive labour rather than as a fixed and stable end state. Situated at the intersection of migration studies, political sociology, identity studies, and security studies, this book will be of interest to scholars and students of international relations, human geography, nationalism studies, and critical migration research. It will also appeal to those engaged in debates on belonging, minority rights, and the politics of everyday life in contemporary Europe.

Full Product Details

9781032934662

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Reviews

This poignant and powerful book contributes to ontological security and migration studies by examining the overlooked voices of young migrants in Scotland. Nicolson’s ground-level approach and innovative methods creatively disclose how ontological security is a tenuous combination of negotiation, struggle, coping, and, ultimately, the expression of agency. This work is a scholarly achievement, but also a civic and neighborly invitation, to listen to the stories of those in our communities who struggle to become part of them. Brent Steele, University Distinguished Professor of Political Science, University of Utah This book offers a highly original approach to understanding the relationship between macro-level political narratives and the everyday experiences of young adult migrants in Scotland. By showing how young adult migrants constantly negotiate their identities both in the face of everyday racism and ontological insecurity, and in relation to macro-narratives of inclusion, the book delivers an important challenge to the narrative of Scottish distinctiveness. Through its theoretical engagement with ontological security studies and its innovative methodological focus on creative arts visual data, the book provides a very timely and important contribution to the wider literature on migration, identity, and security. Catarina Kinnvall, Professor of Political Science, Lund University

Author Information

Dr Marcus Nicolson is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Institute for Minority Rights, Eurac Research, Bolzano, Italy. His research sits at the intersection of political sociology, migration studies, identity studies, narrative analysis, minority rights, and border studies. He has published in leading international journals, including International Migration (2022), Comparative Migration Studies (2023), Social Inclusion (2023), Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power (2024), Journal of Contemporary European Studies (2025), and European Planning Studies (2026).

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