The situation of Polish families in Norway is inextricably linked with the situation of Poles on the Norwegian labour market. Polish migrants in Norway have difficulties with finding other jobs than in the following sectors of employment: construction, agriculture/fishing. Another problem is temporary and atypical legal employment. This may influence the situation of the Polish families in Norway – said prof. Krystyna Iglicka, CIR expert, who presented the preliminary findings of CIR in TRANSFAM project – Doing Family in a Transnational Context workshop. Apart from prof. Iglicka, dr Katarzyna Gmaj and Antoni Wierzejski from CIR also took part in the workshop.

On February 13th, the 2nd Workshop of TRANSFAM Project – Doing Family in a Transnational Context was held in the Institute of Sociology of Jagiellonian University in Cracow. Researchers from the Norwegian research institutions: Agder Reserach and NOVA – A Research Institute at Oslo and Akershus University College of Applied Sciences as well as Polish academics from the Institute of Sociology (JU) and CIR participated in the meeting. The workshop was an excellent occasion for exchange of views regarding Polish families in Norway.

During the first part of the workshop several papers were presented. Magdalena Ślusarczyk and Paula Pustulka (JU) introduced preliminary findings from the qualitative research conducted among Polish and Polish-Norwegian migrant families living in Norway. A special focus was given to the issues concerning a category of „care”. Eugene Guribye (Agder Research) gave a paper on preliminary results from the research on social capital among Polish immigrant families in Norway. He talked about the differences between the Polish “Solidarity” migration from 80’s and the more recent one. Stella Strzemecka (JU) reported on her research with migrant children living in Oslo and bordering communes. She centred on a way in which the migrant children construct their identities in the transnational context. Randi Waerdahl from Agder Research examined a problem of invisibility of Polish migrant children to Norwegian education system.

In the second part of the workshop discussion focused on a preliminary version of the questionnaire prepared in WP4 framework by Lihong Huang and Monika Kochowicz (NOVA) in cooperation with Ewa Krzaklewska and Paula Pustułka (JU). The survey will examine parenthood in a migrant life course perspective.

More about the project on TRANSFAM website >>>