Boundaries of National Belonging in Ingrian Finnish Return Migration: <i>A Multi-level Perspective</i>

Abstract

This study examines the discursive construction of Finnishness within the context of Ingrian Finns' return migration from Russia to Finland. The focus is on how characteristics of Finnishness, especially ancestry and language, are employed at institutional, community and interpersonal levels of text and talk. The results show how the same characteristics can be used to both in-and exclude Ingrian Finns from the national ingroup, and how essentialist notions of ethnonational belonging can be used strategically by both state authorities and Ingrian Finns themselves to make claims about their Finnishness and right to remigrate.

Memory, Heritage, and Tradition in the Museum Exhibition <i>Ingrians – The Forgotten Finns</i>

“…Over these 20 years, the qualifications for returning migrants became increasingly restrictive, and at the beginning of the 2010s the application queue was closed (e.g., Varjonen, Arnold & Jasinskaja-Lahti 2013;Mähönen et al 2015;Prindiville & Hjelm 2018).…”

“…After this brief and inevitably reductive description we are obliged to remark that labels such as "Ingrian Finn," "Ingrian," and "Finn," as well as their links to identities, are somewhat ambiguous and bound to socio-historical contexts (e.g., Anepaio 1999;Hakamies 2004;Varjonen, Arnold & Jasinskaja-Lahti 2013;Mähönen et al 2015;also Raudalainen 2004). In the Soviet Union, the Finnish-speaking population -including people living in Ingria -were typically labeled and self-identified as "Finns.…”

Exclusive Citizenship-Membership? Meanings of Finnish-Russian Bonds and Belonging

“…A relevant comparative survey conducted among immigrants in 14 Western states found that Finnish citizenship was considered to entail least national belonging to its bearers (Simonsen 2017:9). Similarly, interview studies with Ingrian Finns who moved to Finland from Russia as (ethnic) repatriates after 1990 suggest that for the Finnish majority the language and ancestry are important markers of "Finnishness," making it very difficult for immigrants to adapt (Varjonen, Arnold, and Jasinskaja-Lahti 2013;Mähönen et al 2015).…”

Claims to whiteness: Young unemployed Russian-speakers’ declassificatory struggles in Finland

“…In 1990 Soviet nationals of Finnish descent, 'Ingrian Finns' 1 who were displaced in the post-Second World War Soviet Union, got the right to apply for repatriation status. While Finland expected to receive 'Finns' through this repatriation programme, many of the returnees were perceived as 'Russians' who were not considered Finnish enough and deemed to have problems with 'integration' (Mähönen, Varjonen, Prindiville, Arnold, & Jasinskaja-Lahti, 2015). In addition, researchers have argued that since the fall of the socialist system in the 1990s, Eastern and Central Europe has been portrayed as underdeveloped and as being the Other in relation to Western Europe (Mulinari et al, 2009).…”