Intergenerational differences in the experiences of middle-class Iranian migrant women post-revolution (1979) who are living in the UK

Salimi, Gita (2013) Intergenerational differences in the experiences of middle-class Iranian migrant women post-revolution (1979) who are living in the UK. PhD thesis, University of Nottingham.

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Abstract

The focus of this research is on well educated, middle-class Iranian migrant women who left their homeland at least ten years ago and are now living in the UK. The purpose of this research is to consider the first generation (who individually decided to migrate to the UK) and the second generation (the daughters of the first generation who had no other choice but to live in the country that their parents had selected) of Iranian migrant women according to intergenerational differences in their experiences of the migratory process. This study explores how Iranian women migrants (first and second generation) understand their gender roles in their homeland (Iran) and in their host country (Britain), therefore mapping the impacts of migration onto their gendered subjectivities.

Based on in-depth interviews, this research focuses on the reasons why the first generation Iranian women migrated to the UK, their views on their gender roles within the family and host society, and their attachment to cultural values. Iranian migrant women left their homeland and had to rebuild their lives in a new country. I examine whether their perceptions of gender roles have changed as a result of migrating to a new country. The study attempts to show the extent to which the Iranian women migrating to the UK were affected by the issues surrounding women's status in response to political developments in their homeland during the 1979 Revolution in Iran. I also seek to uncover if these Iranian women import the traditional roles into their new society, in particular how their views about women's status differ from those they held in Iran.

By exploring the migration process among two generations of Iranian women in the same family, the thesis seeks to reveal the gap between the family cultures with regards to protecting the Iranian values, and the effect of the host country's culture on the actual practices of migrant women which lead to shaping their identity. It also examines the extent to which these migrant women have kept their cultural values and transferred them to their daughters.

Item Type: Thesis (University of Nottingham only) (PhD)
Supervisors: Bott, E.
Schneider, J.M.
Keywords: Iranians, middle class women, Great Britain, social conditions, sex role Iran
Subjects: D History - General and Old World > DA Great Britain
Faculties/Schools: UK Campuses > Faculty of Social Sciences, Law and Education > School of Sociology and Social Policy
Item ID: 27623
Depositing User: Airey, Ms Valerie
Date Deposited: 17 Oct 2014 12:47
Last Modified: 13 Oct 2017 16:59
URI: https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/id/eprint/27623

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