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Paper short abstract:

Based on ethnographic work among international scholars in Latvia, I examine the uncertainties embedded in the work and personal lives of transnationally mobile research workers, especially in research contexts that tend to be considered marginal.

Paper long abstract:

In this paper, I highlight and examine the uncertainties embedded in the work and personal lives of transnationally mobile research workers. All over the world, the dominant regimes of knowledge production increasingly prioritize short-term employment contracts, with the expectation that the “ideal” researcher would be ready for and even enthusiastic about movements across borders from one position to another. At the same time, the lived reality for many scholars is quite different, as they attempt to balance various aspects of their lives in the face of the multitude of uncertainties engendered by the contemporary regimes of knowledge production.

Based on semi-structured interviews with international scholars in Latvia as well as other ethnographic data, I examine how this kind of uncertainty is experienced by transnationally mobile scholars in research contexts that tend to be considered marginal. As one such locale, the Latvian research landscape is characterized by the unpredictability of research careers as well as the lack of funding and fierce competition for the available resources. How, then, do international scholars in the country make sense of their work and personal lives there—and how do they envision their future? I suggest that, while international scholars may arrive in Latvia with the hope of gaining a measure of certainty in their lives, the country’s research system compounds the already prevalent sense of uncertainty and pushes the researchers out in search of certainty elsewhere.