Papers by Ida Tolgensbakk
Migration Studies
Transnational family living refers to the situation of maintaining relationships across national ... more Transnational family living refers to the situation of maintaining relationships across national borders. It is dependent on a certain degree of flexibility from the state. As part of the crisis response to the COVID-19 pandemic, this flexibility was revoked. As a result, existing mobility inequalities became more visible than ever: while travel restrictions came as a shock to many, they created an additional challenge to those who had been struggling in the past. All persons engaged in transnational family living had to find ways to navigate the new situation. Our project is based on policy review and online ethnography taking Norway as a case. We discuss how individuals tried to maintain cross-border and mixed-status family lives during the first year of the pandemic, reacted to the borders closing, and found solace and advice from others in similar situations. The COVID-19 pandemic and the travel restrictions that followed have exposed vulnerabilities associated with transnationa...
Citizenship and Social Exclusion at the Margins of the Welfare State
Ethnologia Fennica, Mar 11, 2023
Negotiating Early Job Insecurity, 2019
This chapter considers the role of career education, information, advice and guidance (CEIAG) ser... more This chapter considers the role of career education, information, advice and guidance (CEIAG) services. On the one hand, it looks at public policy in England, where such services have a 20-year record of instability; on the other, the chapter considers Norway, where CEIAG services are beginning a new era in supporting young people's entry into employment. As well as examining how effectively CEIAG policy and practice are framed in the two countries, we identify barriers to delivery and explore whether Norway can learn lessons from England in a process of policy transfer. The chapter is informed by NEGOTIATE research findings 1 and by the voices of informants who experienced unemployment in their youth.
Tidsskrift for kulturforskning, Jul 27, 2021
Negotiating Early Job Insecurity, 2019
Tidsskrift for kulturforskning, 2022
As an unintended consequence of the business model of social media companies, a new actor has ent... more As an unintended consequence of the business model of social media companies, a new actor has entered the process where tradition creates new genres: the algorithm. Platform algorithms live dynamic lives in intimate connection with their human users. They sort and filter, rank, amplify and conceal, and they affect what, how and when we share. They are non-humans who enter into the domain of human creativity. As such, they can be used analytically to understand the processual aspect of genre: Algorithms are alteringmechanisms that create continuity. This article will highlight the role of algorithms as actors in the process of tradition and discuss how this can elucidate genre as process. As example, we use the digitally born genre «Internet memes». We suggest a Bakhtinian framework to elucidate what role algorithms play in making the meme one of the most characteristic genres of connective cultures.
JCMRS, 2022
Swedes are almost unambiguously considered White in Norway and, therefore, labeled as non-strange... more Swedes are almost unambiguously considered White in Norway and, therefore, labeled as non-strangers and nonmarked. One of the most striking aspects of studying young Swedish labor migrants to the Norwegian capital is their positioning vis-à-vis the (White) majority and other (Black) minorities; they are immigrants categorized as "not quite" or "not real" immigrants. However, this position is contested in different ways, among other things, by othering processes taking place through the microaggressions of "What are you?" encounters, when linguistic differences are noted. This article argues that Swedes are an invisible, but audible, minority in Norway, categorized as outsiders not through phenotypical difference but through linguistic otherness. This labeling through language takes on extra dimensions when the individual migrants in question do not fit phenotypically with the stereotypical understanding of Swedes as the epitome of Northern European Whiteness. Many Swedes arriving in Norway as migrants are neither blond nor blue-eyed; they may be adopted, be of mixed race, or have Middle Eastern, Asian, or African family backgrounds. This article discusses aspects of the negotiations that take place in the intersection of phenotype and linguistic labeling when Swedes are Black migrants in Norway.
Tidsskrift for kulturforskning, Dec 11, 2015
For the first time in nearly a century, Swedes have become a major migrant group in the neighbori... more For the first time in nearly a century, Swedes have become a major migrant group in the neighboring country. Currently being the second largest immigrant group, their presence in Norway has been perceived as something new. This “newness” is reinforced by the fact that many of the Swedish migrants are young, and often go into unskilled service-related labor. Their visible, or rather audible, presence, especially in the capital, has provided an opportunity to examine notions of both «Nordicness» and of migration. The project has examined images of self and of migration among young Swedes in Oslo – through life history interviews and an in-depth study of one Facebook group. In addition, the project has looked into how Norwegians relate to the young migrants in media and popular culture. The five chapters examine historical Norwegian-Swedish relations and how they live on in contemporary categorizations of whiteness and the Nordic, humor as an arena of negotiation, transnational living online and offline, as well as emerging youth as cultural phenomenon. The analysis forms an image of a migrant group that is popular and, importantly, is considered very similar to the Norwegian general population. At the same time, the group is subject to othering processes that have much in common with what other, more vulnerable minorities are exposed to. The project concludes that relations between the Norwegian majority population and their «new» minority group are currently in flux. There is no final common agreement on how the Swedes in Norway should be categorized or treated. Meanwhile, points of conflict are largely handled through what the thesis calls equality and laughter: a fundamental idea of equality, and through extensive use of aggressive as well as affiliative humor.
Social Policy & Administration, 2020
It is contested to what extent public employment services (PES) help build resilience in young un... more It is contested to what extent public employment services (PES) help build resilience in young unemployed people. Drawing on qualitative interviews with 19 people born in Germany and Norway between 1990 and 1995, the article examines stories about how PES, in two different activation regimes, help young people find meaningful work. The analysis and discussion are carried out within a theoretical framework that combines the capability approach with social resilience literature in a novel way. The findings show that PES are portrayed as being more present in young Germans' lives. The German informants seem to feel undue pressure from PES and they describe differences between personal aims and the "placement priority" of PES. Sanctions imposed by PES were also a much more predominant topic among the German informants. The Norwegian data were dominated by stories about young people in activation programmes who had been demotivated by being trapped in a cycle of programme participation, which did not result in employment. Across the two countries, our data suggest that PES rarely build social resilience: PES provided young people with a means
Negotiating Early Job Insecurity, 2019
Heimen, 2016
In this study, triacontanol (TRIA) and nitric oxide (NO) interaction on arsenic (As)-induced oxid... more In this study, triacontanol (TRIA) and nitric oxide (NO) interaction on arsenic (As)-induced oxidative stress tolerance in coriander (Coriandrum sativum L.) plants was investigated. The results showed that As had a significant adverse effect on the plant's biomass. The seedlings pretreated with TRIA and NO significantly increased growth reduction induced by the metalloid. The obtained results indicated that the application of TRIA and sodium nitroprusside (SNP) generally reduced oxidative markers such as of electrolyte leakage percentage, malondialdehyde and H 2 O 2 contents under As toxicity, while application of As treatment without TRIA + SNP increased these oxidative parameters compared to the control. The non-enzymatic antioxidant contents such as total phenol, anthocyanin, carotenoid, ascorbic acid and reduced glutathione (GSH) were extracted and assayed from both control and treated plants. It was found that TRIA + SNP treatments have a profound effect on the antioxidant metabolism and caused an enhancement in non-enzymatic antioxidant potentials under As toxicity in coriander. Moreover, the results revealed a mutually amplifying reaction between TRIA and NO in reducing As-induced damages.
Dette notatet er en evaluering av hvorvidt Regjeringens integreringskonferanse oppnår målet sitt:... more Dette notatet er en evaluering av hvorvidt Regjeringens integreringskonferanse oppnår målet sitt: å styrke dialogen med innvandrere, og å gi lokale innvandrerorganisasjoner, innvandrerråd og andre aktører anledning til å dele erfaringene og synspunktene sine direkte med sentrale politikere og med forvaltningen. Evalueringen gjennomgår arrangører, deltakere og ikke-deltakeres synspunkter på konferansen slik den er i dag, og på hvordan den kan forbedres
Negotiating Early Job Insecurity, 2019
Generational Tensions and Solidarity Within Advanced Welfare States, 2021
Heimen, Dec 12, 2017
At the centre of attention in local history-as an academic field and as a passion-is the local co... more At the centre of attention in local history-as an academic field and as a passion-is the local community. But what is a local community? As a concept, it rests somewhere between the 'ethnic group' of anthropologists and cultural historians, and the 'neighbourhood' of social geographers. We often understand it as a geographically bounded area, within which residents have more political, administrative, and social contact with each other than they have with others. This article argues that life online needs to be taken into account when writing local history, discusses local communities online, and whether local communities may be born digitally. 1. Begrepsparet pålogga / avlogga, eventuelt online / offline eller tilkobla / avkobla er ment å signalisere at skillet er nøytralt, i motsetning til f eks virtuell / virkelig (Tolgensbakk 2015, s. 14)
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Papers by Ida Tolgensbakk
This report brings together two closely related projects, both commissioned by the Directorate of Integration and Diversity (IMDi). Put together, the projects have enabled a scrutiny of dwelling-related elements along the process through which asylum seekers pass, from arrival in Norway to settlement in a local municipality.
Our focus has been on work processes and co-operation involving different parts of public administration.
Strategic placement of refugees in reception centres in Norway.
The project Strategic placement of refugees in reception centres documented and gave feedback to a pilot project where staff conducted early mapping of information relevant to settlement, and gave recommendations for settlement in a specific municipality and for strategic placement in reception centres. The pilot project was managed jointly by the Directorate of Immigration (UDI) and the Directorate of Integration and Diversity (IMDi).
The following questions guided our research:
• How is the decision-making process organised within the strategic placement of refugees in reception centres?
• What sources of information are available to decision makers within this
process, and how is the flow of information organised?
• What kind of information are the decision makers lacking, and what
management changes need to be in place for them to access this information?
• How is knowledge about individual refugees matched with information
about specific Norwegian municipalities?
When IMDi staff as part of the pilot project issued individual recommendations on strategic reception-centre placement, they tended to recommend integration reception centres (integreringsmottak). These centres offer a more comprehensive education and qualification programme for asylum seekers than other reception centres. Emphasis was also placed on proposing reception centres near the municipality recommended for later settlement. Experiences recounted from
integration reception centres show that when striving to match a refugee’s qualifications and prior work experience with employment opportunities in a specific municipality, the centres find it difficult to access information about local labour markets. It is therefore necessary to analyse how knowledge of the labour market at the municipal and county level can be made available.
(Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Norway, and the Netherlands). This will generate a contextual overview of the integration/exclusion of migrants through foodscapes. Controversy has been used as a tool and a scanner. Each of the six FOOD2GATHER teams provided two relevant controversies that have reached media attention in the last ten
years. One of the two had to be related to halal food. The analysis of the controversies has been conducted by identifying issues they tackled, agents they involved, (public) spaces and situations in which controversies took place and what they produced. A comparative analysis of relevant variables related to migrations, such as the geopolitical position of the countries, organization of reception and food provision, has been conducted as well. The six countries included in the study have different traditions related to migration and have been exposed to the “migrants’ crisis” in different ways. These differences are reflected in the proposed controversies. However, some common traits tend to emerge and reveal power relationships within societies that are different or shared by the countries involved in the project. We show that these power relationships particularly deal with the right to food, citizens’ commitment, identity, the place of religion, animal welfare and political issues. Our study indicates that analysing controversies adds an
important dimension to the study of foodscapes. Food controversies that reach the media attention are seldom something migrants have brought up themselves. The migrants’ representation in the media based on food controversies indicated that migrants are given little opportunity to negotiating values and practices, as norms about “the right” quantity and quality of food tend to reproduce the food model of the country they migrate to, also when there is a “positive” focus on ethnic business. To better understand these dynamics, we propose the concept of “food
encounters” and illustrate how the type of food encounters can play a role in how foodscapes could evolve or even emerge.