Wed, 18 Sept
|Building 19, Room 310, Waseda Campus
An epistemological exploration of cross-border divorces: the example of Filipino (non-)migrants
A Seminar with Dr. Asuncion Fresnoza-Flot How can we describe and capture the divorce experiences of couples in these social spaces while considering different intersecting factors/dimensions in their lives? What conceptual tool(s) can we use, and in what context(s)?
Date and Venue
18 Sept 2019, 14:00 – 15:30 GMT+9
Building 19, Room 310, Waseda Campus, Japan, 〒169-0051 Tokyo, Shinjuku City, Nishiwaseda, 1-chōme−21−１ 早稲田大学 西早稲田ビルディング
About the Event
Date and venue:
18th of September, 2019 14:00-15:30
Building 19, Room 310 Waseda Campus
Free attendance, no registration required
Speaker:
Dr. Asuncion Fresnoza-Flot
Senior Lecturer at the Laboratory of Anthropology of Contemporary Worlds (LAMC) at the Université libre be Bruxelles (ULB), and Tenured Associate Researcher of the Belgian National Fund for Scientific Research (FRS-FNRS).
Dr. Asuncion Fresnoza-Flot examines the contextual mobility of Belgian-Asian couples in Belgium and in Asia in her current research programme. Her important works include the edited Special Issue "Transnational perspectives on intersecting experiences: gender, social class and generation among Southeast Asian migrants and their families" (with Kyoko Shinozaki, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 2017); and the two edited volumes Mobile childhoods in Filipino transnational families. Migrant children with similar roots in different routes (with Itaru Nagasaka, Palgrave 2015) and International marriages and marital citizenship. Southeast Asian women on the move (with Gwénola Ricordeau, Routledge 2017).
Abstract:
Nowadays, divorce often takes place in social spaces transcending national borders. How can we describe and capture the divorce experiences of couples in these social spaces while considering different intersecting factors/dimensions in their lives? What conceptual tool(s) can we use, and in what context(s)? This presentation addresses these questions by focusing on a conceptual issue that arises in cross-disciplinary studies of divorce: the difficulty to choose among the concepts 'international divorce,' 'transnational divorce' and 'cross-border divorce.' To enlighten the distinction between these concepts, I exploit secondary and primary data obtained respectively through documentary/case research and interviews with Filipino migrant women in the Netherlands and in Belgium. Analytical results suggest that unlike 'international divorce' that has mainly a legal dimension, 'transnational divorce' encompasses various intersecting dimensions (legal, familial, social, economic, religious...), but when one or some dimensions of divorce traverse other forms of frontiers (religious, national, socio-cultural bounds..., 'cross-border divorce' appears an appropriate conceptual tool given its inclusiveness and the fact that it does not specifically focus on the 'national' aspect.