Maja Korac is Reader in the School of Social Sciences, Media and Cultural Studies at the University of East London. She is author of Captives of Their Sex: Social Identity of Young Rural Women Between Traditional Culture and Contemporary Values (1991, Belgrade: Institute of Sociological Research, University of Belgrade; published in Serbo-Croatian), Linking Arms: Women and War in post-Yugoslav States (1998, Uppsala: Life & Peace Institute), and co-editor of Feminists under Fire: Exchanges across War Zones (2003, Toronto: Between the Lines).

Acknowledgements

Introduction: Reconstructing Life, Place and Identity


Problems with Centring on the State

Rethinking Refugeehood: Focusing on Processes, Intersections and Agency

Liminality and Refugee Agency

Lived-In Worlds of Refugees: From Contexts to Processes

Policy ‘Solutions’ and Types of Agency They Engender

A Note on Method: Focus on Refugee Voices

An Outline of the Book


Chapter 1. The Question of ‘Home’: Place-making and Emplacement


Place, Home and Homeland

Territorially Bounded Places and Identities: Importance and Meanings

Orientation to Place and the Politics of Belonging

Links between Peoples, Places and Cultures: The Question of Community

Group and Cultural Identity as an Organising Principle for Incorporation

The Question of Community Organisations

Transnational Practices of Place-Making

Transnationalism and ‘Homelessness’

Ties with the New Home

Taking Control and Reconstructing Life


Chapter 2. Experiences of Displacement: Force, Choice and the Creation of Solutions


The Mass Exodus of People from War-torn Yugoslavia: The Quest for Ethnic Purity and Territorial Cleansing

How One Makes a Decision to Leave and Where to Go?

Flight and Creation of Solutions: Agency and the Role of Social Networks


Chapter 3. Regaining Control over Life: Dependency, Self-sufficiency and Agency


Following the Rules in the Netherlands

Struggling to Survive in Italy

Problems with Refugee Assistance


Chapter 4. Negotiating Continuity and Change: The Process of Reconstructing Life


Bonding Networks and the Emplacement of Refugees in Rome and Amsterdam

Bridging Social Networks and the Emplacement of Refugees in Amsterdam and Rome

Social Networks and Emplacement: The Process of Becoming ‘of Place’


Chapter 5. Transnational Lives of Refugees, Questions of Citizenship, Belonging and Return


Transnational and ‘Glocal’ Ties – a Sense of Continuity and Belonging

Transnational Strategies of Survival and Betterment

Transnationalism and the Changing Notion of Return

Citizenship: A Status or a Practice?

New Meanings of Citizenship, Belonging and Emplacement

Emplacement: A Process of Pluralisation


Appendix I


Refugees Interviewed in Rome

Refugees Interviewed in Amsterdam


Appendix II


Community Organisations of Nationals from the Yugoslav Successor States in Rome and Amsterdam


Appendix III


Contacts Made with NGOs, Church Organisations, Governmental and International Organisations in Italy and the Netherlands


Appendix IV


The Social Characteristics and Legal Status of the Refugees in Rome and Amsterdam


Appendix V


The Ethnic Background of the Refugees Interviewed


Bibliography
Index