‘Travelling with the traveller’: an ethnographic framework for the study of migrants’ digital inclusion

Abstract

This paper argues that researchers who study migrants' digital inclusion need to shed light on migrants' use of digital technologies within the time frame and context of 'migration travel' and while migrants are in transition to a new or safer place for resettlement. In support of this argument, the paper proposes a 'travelling with the traveller' research framework that applies an ethnographic methodology and aims at the researcher experiencing or even becoming an integral part of the migration travel. The paper presents this travelling with the traveller framework and discusses the implications of digital inclusion (or the absence of it) for migrants' experience, to combat or alleviate of all sorts of adversities, volatile emotions, unanticipated problems and moments of uncertainty and crisis migrants so often encounter on the move from homeland to another land, from one life setting to another. Further, the paper presents the fieldwork processes and data collection techniques of the proposed travelling with the traveller framework, such as participant observation, informal and open-ended interviews, as well as the use of video and photographic footage.