Transnational childhoods and religious migration: The case of missionary children in Africa and Asia

The transnational aspects of children’s migration have only recently been acknowledged. Historically, children were often treated as the appendix to transnational family mobility that was driven by adults (Edmund, Esser, 2015). This PhD project breaks with that research culture by placing children’s experience of transnational migration at the centre of investigation and examining their agency in the process. This will be achieved through a focus on a group of children who have so far received little attention in the study of childhood and migration: missionary children.

Despite the claims of casual observers, the missionary age is not over. A conservative estimate puts the number of Americans who travel abroad on a mission each year to 1.6 million (Global Issue Survey, 2005). Christians from across the world also travel to foreign countries to evangelise and convert, yet very little is known about this mobile faith force and their role in global migrations (Brickell, 2012). This PhD project focuses on migration that happens because of and for religious beliefs. The particular case study will be on English Protestant missionary societies.

The Global Challenges scholar will examine two aspects pertaining to children, migration and religion:
1) Children and the “social fields” (Basch and Glick-Schiller, 1994) they create in processes of migration: Because social fields have mostly been studied with economic, labour and political transactions at the forefront, tracing the values, expectations and tensions that come with social fields connected to religious migration and mission will be a new area of enquiry.
2) Children continue to be portrayed as burdens weighing down otherwise mobile adults (Orellana, 2001). This project seeks to break away from this view by focusing on children from the ages of 8 to 18 and the important roles they play in the migration, settlement and mission process.

The Global Challenges PhD scholar will therefore approach transnational childhoods and religious migrations in a threefold manner:
- through a focus on children’s agency in processes of transnational migration;
- by investigating the role of missionary children in forging communities in missionary (ODA) countries;
- and by connecting historical research on missionary children with research on mishkids today.


PhD candidate specification:

• hold a Masters degree with Merit or Distinction in Modern History
• hold an undergraduate degree with First-Class or Upper Second-Class Honours in relevant fields or subjects, such as history, sociology, social anthropology
• be able to work collaboratively (with supervisors and peers) and independently
• be willing to conduct historical research in archives as well as conduct interviews
• be available to commence academic studies in the UK at the beginning of October 2017

The scholar should show willingness

• to be trained in the theory and methods of oral history and to conduct interviews in the UK and abroad.
• to be trained in ethical standards in research and interviewing
• to prepare scholarly proficient documentary productions

For more details on the scholarship, please visit our University webpage: http://www.birmingham.ac.uk/postgraduate/pgr/global-challenges-scholarship.aspx