Making sense of family and home: multi-generational immigrant families from China to New Zealand

Liu, Liangni Sally; Ran, Guanyu Jason

Abstract

After three decades during which New Zealand has embraced a neoliberal immigration regime, a large number of new Chinese immigrants from Mainland China have arrived in the country with the visible presence of many multi-generational new Chinese immigrant families. The long-established practice of building multi-generational family units to secure the family's financial, cultural, and social future is very much alive among this immigrant population. However, the gradual immigration policy change towards restricting family reunification, especially restricting the immigration of the older parents of first-generation adult immigrants, has effectively resulted in family separation. Consequently, these immigrant families have to make multiple "homes" and find creative ways of maintaining family relationships across national borders. Drawing on key results from a three-year research project on the new Chinese immigrant families from Mainland China in New Zealand, this chapter discusses the dynamics of their family relationships and homemaking in transnational migration.

Citation

Liu, L. S., & Ran, G. J. (2023). Making sense of family and home: multi-generational immigrant families from China to New Zealand. In P. Boccagni (Ed.), Handbook on Home and Migration (635-646). Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing. https://doi.org/10.4337/9781800882775.00065

• Online Publication Date: Jun 15, 2023
• Publication Date: 2023
• Deposit Date: Jul 4, 2023
• Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
• Pages: 635-646
• Book Title: Handbook on Home and Migration
• Chapter Number: 51
• ISBN: 9781800882768
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.4337/9781800882775.00065
• Keywords: Transnational migration, Multigenerational migrant family, Home, China, New Zealand, Intergenerational relationship