Nineteenth International Conference on Interdisciplinary Social Sciences

Abstract

Although many aspects of migration processes are shaped disproportionately by different identity parameters there are few frameworks in social psychology for studying this diversification, in an integrative way. The present paper focuses on intersectionality as an analytical perspective capable of shedding light on the complex relationship between gender and migration. By highlighting the interconnections between power, social marginalization, and identity experiences, intersectionality represents an analytically sensitive concept for exploring how women from different cultural, social, and phenomenological backgrounds are affected by the dominant immigration policies. The paper comprises two parts: a theoretical and an applied part. In the theoretical part, we elaborate on the epistemological strengths of intersectionality in studying the gendered aspects of global migration. In the applied part, we present four levels of intersectional qualitative analysis, based on discursive extracts on Muslim women’s migration collected from the Greek press. Against this backdrop, we suggest that integrative and interdisciplinary frameworks that combine intersectionality and discourse analysis can help us explore the hierarchization of migrant women in the dominant representations of the western public sphere.