This article examines migrants’ lived experiences with racism in Wrocław, Poland. Drawing on qualitative research conducted among high-skilled migrants, it analyzes various ways migrants encounter, understand, and cope with racism. Our case study broadens discussion about migration and racism by analyzing an Eastern European, post-socialist, predominantly “white” receiving society seldom researched in terms of racism. The article problematizes the assumption that high-skilled migrants experience only minor problems with incorporation. Furthermore, it suggests the importance of racial boundaries in a non-Western society that lacks a colonial background and long-standing relations with migrants. Therefore, our article contributes to a better understanding of how local settings inform the experiences of high-skilled migrants, which are often lost in abstract concepts of global flows and spaces.

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This article explores the lived experiences of Polish nurses’ transition into the Norwegian healthcare system and analyses the emerging differences in nursing practices and professional identities between Poland and Norway. It draws on ethnographic findings and argues that nursing is a complex practice, which involves not only nursing knowledge, but also less obvious and often taken for granted nursing imaginaries and actions. In doing so, the article looks at different ways of walking, speaking and listening, which are not merely nurses’ daily habits, but also the embodiments of hierarchical relations, agency and empowerment in healthcare settings. This kind of analytical perspective of the existing differences in nursing practices and professional identities between Poland and Norway raises crucial questions about transitional contexts of nurse migration and shows that nursing is not static, but rather a dynamic and processual way of conduct.

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Theorizing Polish migration across Europe: perspectives, concepts, and methodologiesWith the focus on the post-2004 mobility of Polish citizens, in this article we discuss two interrelated questions; namely, what are the most productive ways to theorize contemporary Polish migration, and what are the most fruitful methodologies aimed at understanding Polish migration and Poles on the move? In the first part of this article we unpack three interrelated theoretical frameworks: ‘liquid migration’, ‘regimes of mobility,’ and ‘transnationalism’. The methodological discussion in the second part of the article focuses mainly on outlining and contextualizing the most common approaches to migration phenomena. By critically introducing quantitative and qualitative methodologies, we explore and indicate the advantages of the ethnographic perspective and the merits and predicaments of research engagement in multiple sites. Polskie migracje w Europie: perspektywy, koncepcje, metodologieZ naciskiem na mobilność obywateli polskich po przyłączeniu Polski do Unii Europejskiej w 2004 roku, w niniejszym artykule staramy się odpowiedzieć na dwa powiązane ze sobą pytania: jakie są najbardziej wydajne sposoby teoretyzowania współczesnej migracji polskiej oraz jakie są najbardziej owocne metody badawcze mające na celu zrozumienie polskiej migracji po akcesji do UE? W pierwszej części artykułu przedstawiamy więc trzy powiązane ze sobą koncepcje teoretyczne: „płynna migracja”, „reżimy mobilności” oraz transnarodowość. Dyskusja metodologiczna w drugiej części artykułu skupia się natomiast głównie na przedstawieniu najczęściej stosowanej metodyki i metodologii w badaniach zjawisk migracyjnych. Wprowadzając krytyczną perspektywę na temat ilościowych i jakościowych metod badawczych, staramy się wskazać wartość poznawczą perspektywy etnograficznej oraz wady i zalety etnograficznego zaangażowania badawczego w wielu miejscach.