Southern reconfigurations of the ageing-migration nexus

Abstract

This article intervenes in the fields of migration and ageing studies by examining complex social experiences and local manifestations of ageing and mobility in regions of the world that remain at the margins of such debates. Specifically, it foregrounds groups that are less visible in existent scholarly and policy work: namely, ageing adults from low- and middle-income regions of the world moving across regions of the South, and to places in the North. In doing so, the article critically reflects and approaches ‘South’ and ‘North’ not as essentialised or discrete categories, but as shifting, relational categories that encompass much diversity and varying marginalities. The article introduces a set of contributions that qualitatively investigate translocal intersections of ageing and migration across Central Africa, South, East and Southeast Asia, and Latin America, and in some cases in connection to places in the North. The collection advances debates on the ageing-migration nexus with a southern focus by examining three key themes that display geographical unevenness and social diversity: (Im)mobilities of ageing, retirement and kinship strategies in light of restrictive mobility and citizenship regimes; multidirectionality of care across borders and generations; and the temporalities and spatialities of home, belonging, and displacement.