Norms and contestations. Ethnicized and minoritized students as space invaders in Dutch higher education

Abstract

Spaces such as the domain of education are not mere mute, neutral and external backdrops of knowledge circulation and identification, but distinct expressive cultures filled with ideologies, hierarchies and politics. In this article we mobilize the figure? of space invaders to acknowledge the everyday experiences of migrant, ethnic minority and international exchange students, exposing challenges and changes in educational institutions and knowledge domains. Transposing space invaders to the Dutch context we scrutinize intersecting ethnic, gendered and religious post-secular exclusionary norms these students experience in Dutch higher education, institutional strategies adopted for dealing with these invasions, the type of tactics migrant, ethnic minority and international exchange students pursue in order to contest them. The argument builds on empirical, ethnographic-inspired fieldwork among 40 students conducted in the context of the EU Framework 7 funded project Mig@Net: transnational digital networks, migration and gender.