By Oana Ciobanu
Oana Ciobanu is a professor at the School of Social Work and Health in Lausanne. This story tells the story of three migrants and their relationship with their native country.
It is based on the research project called TransAge.
Transnational ageing among older migrants and natives: A strategy for overcoming vulnerability. In this project she collaborates with Iuna Dones and Sarah Ludwig-Dehm.
This story is told in French.
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It is a beautiful summer evening. The square in the centre of a village in southern Italy, not far from Naples, is full: children, young and old people, a joyful noisy evening. After a few years of Covid, people are happy that it is possible to organise village festivities again. There are tables, people eat 'pacotze', traditional pasta with tomato sauce, there is music and some dance.
One of the organisers of the evening speaks up and asks: 'who is from Switzerland' and from Belgium? People in the crowd raise their hands. I'm struck by this awareness that 'the Swiss' and 'the Belgians' from Italy of course come back to the village during the summer holidays.
But do all migrants come back? Do they all have links with Italy or the towns and villages from which they left? No, not necessarily, not all of them and not in the same way.
I invite you now to imagine three characters: Niccolò, Pasqualina and Antonio. They come from southern Italy and arrived in Switzerland, in Geneva, Basel, Ticino or elsewhere, about 50 years ago.
Niccolò has active transnational links with Italy. What does this mean? Concretely, Niccolò often visits Italy where he has a nice little house and even from time to time he thinks about going back to Italy. He still has family there and he keeps in touch with them. Sometimes he even sends them money. He is very interested in Italian politics and he still votes in Italy. Despite the fact that he has been away for a long time, he still celebrates traditional Italian holidays. One evening Niccolò confided to his wife that he reflects if he would like to be buried in his village in southern Italy. Of course he still has the Italian nationality and no, he has not taken the Swiss nationality.
Pasqualina is rather passive in her transnational practices. Again, one can ask how she has ties, but at the same time she is passive? Pasqualina still has Italian nationality and at the same time she has also taken Swiss nationality. She still has close family in Italy and even though she still has her parents' house there, she returns less often. She rarely votes and she does not think about coming back to Italy or being buried there. In other words, once Italian, always Italian.
And Antonio, he is detached from Italy. Very few southern Italians living in Switzerland are in the same situation as Antonio. He decided to take Swiss citizenship and he no longer has Italian citizenship. Yes, he speaks Italian, it's like riding a bike. Unfortunately, Antonio has no family left in Italy, or very few, nor does he own a house there. He visits Italy (or his acquaintances) even less often than Pasqualina. He has forgotten Italian politics and is no longer interested in traditional Italian holidays. The return to Italy is a long-forgotten story and he has never thought of being buried there.
All these links between a here and a there that migrants put in place are different facets of what in the research we call transnationalism; practices through which migrants maintain relationships with the country of origin while integrating into the country of destination.
And remember: there is not one migrant but migrantS, with life courses and stories from here and there.