Beyond appreciation: How people without migration background engage with difference in majority–minority contexts

Over the past decades, migration scholars have primarily focused on how migrants and their children integrate into society. The integration of people without migration background has rarely been the subject of scrutiny. In line with scholars who critique this one-sided focus, this thesis shifts its attention to the role of people without migration background, while moving away from the traditional, normative concept of integration. Instead, it explores how people without migration background perceive, experience, and engage with difference in their everyday lives, in a setting in which they are no longer a numerical ethnic majority. Focusing on the neighbourhood and primary school context, this thesis pays particular attention to people without migration background who not only express an appreciation for difference, but who also put this into practice by choosing a majority-minority school for their child(ren). Drawing on qualitative methods and interview data, this thesis shows what happens from the moment they enter this local majority-minority setting. The subsequent chapters demonstrate how both societal norms and discourses and everyday life experiences shape the way people engage with difference. The thesis introduces the concept of ‘micro labour’ to argue that engaging with and across difference for people without migration background does not happen automatically and often requires uncomfortable work. While such work can be observed in the majority-minority school setting, middle-class parents also reveal the limits of their labour, especially when it concerns perceived difference regarding progressive norms important to them. Everyday life experiences and encounters in this majority-minority context can enable middle-class parents without migration background to gradually learn to adapt to difference, sometimes even in less hierarchical ways. Yet, this thesis argues that their labour of adapting to difference as well as learning from difference appears situational. It depends on what is considered to be at stake and on the compromises it requires.