Paper Short Abstract:

Migration society is characterised by multiple belongings through remittances and high mobility. But what happens at the end of migrant life when mobility is no longer an option and return is disputed? How do elderly migrants see their new immobility, what are the experiences, practices, hopes and aspirations linked to end-of-life care and dying in diaspora? Ethnographic research shows us not only how topical the issue is but also how deeply it is linked to a sense of belonging.

Paper Abstract:

Governance of migration is focused on mobile young and healthy migrants as workforce. Until the 2000s, migration studies echoed this bias of “guestworker capitalism” in Europe and largely assumed that: “migrant workers […] do not age: they do not get tired: they do not die” (Berger & Mohr 1975, p. 64). In reality, however, 11.8% of international migrants are now aged 65 and over (IOM 2024). This growing group cannot keep up the level of mobility that used to characterize their transnational way of life. Moreover, many migrants do not wish to return and would rather die and be buried where they have spent most of their lives and where their children and grandchildren live (King & Kuschminder 2022; Anghel, Fauser & Boccagni 2019). With this situation, migration research has stated the need for an increased awareness of religious and cultural diversity at the end of life in diaspora: What are the practices, perceptions and aspirations, where do they comply or clash with dominant discourses on migration? How do individuals interact with health institutions and the municipal governance of death?

These questions are particularly urgent in Austria, where the first generation of labor migrants arrived since the 1960s, predominantly from Muslim regions in former Yugoslavia and Turkey. They and their families now face decisions about immobility and about organizing end-of-life care and death in predominantly Catholic Austria. However, although these issues are highly topical challenges, they have so far received little attention in migration research and politics in Austria.