Time and family on the move: ‘Accompanying partners’ in geographical mobility

Abstract

Under conditions of global economy, geographical mobility becomes an important aspect of the working lives for a wider range of professionals. At times, these people move with their families. The relocation to a new country can entail changes for the whole family, in particular for the partner, who can experience a more pronounced alteration of work–family relations. Especially for dual career couples, with both partners employed before migration, the change in the experience of time can be very profound for the accompanying partner who can move from being a full-time professional to being a full-time homemaker. Based on two studies conducted respectively in China and Switzerland with mobile families, we explore how accompanying partners experience and practice time in the context of migration with the family. We discuss how, while time for the contracted partner can still be structured by work, a more ambivalent mixture of personal desire, family relations, cultural values and social expectations seem to affect the subjective experience of time for the accompanying partner.

In their own time: Refugee healthcare professionals’ attempts at temporal re-appropriation

“…For them, starting from zero, professionally, did not mean opening up possibilities; it implied having had lost nearly everything they had built up. In contrast to temporary and more mobile migrants, the interviewed refugee healthcare professionals were not able to reinterpret the permanence of their migration as a ‘time of exception’ (Suter and Cangià, 2020), which allows individuals to re-imagine their transient stay abroad as a transformative and liminal space in which professional and personal identities can be called into question. Instead, they attempted to forge a continuum between their pre- and post-migration lives, where profession represents a crucial cohesive link (see also Mozetič, 2021).…”

Skills on the move: Highly skilled migrants in Switzerland and beyond

“…Accompanying partners, who often live in a relationship where both partners negotiate their work trajectories in order to continue their careers in migration, for example, often need to confront with gendered norms relating to a male breadwinner role (Cangià et al, 2019) or with stereotyped images of the “housewife” (Cangià, 2017). Some people, however, can interpret the temporary experience of migration as a socially acceptable reason to stop working, in the form of investment in family care, as well as alternative and personal interests (Suter & Cangià, 2020; Yeoh & Willis, 2005).…”