Experiences of migration în Romania families

Abstract

Many studies on external migration from Romania point out the emergence of new migration phenomenons like temporary and transnational migration referring predominantly to the community level of Romanian villages. The objective of this article is to bring the social impact of migration to the fore mainly focusing on family life of Romanian migrants with urban residency generating the typology. The starting point of the research were interviews with family members of migrant families 1. Viewed from the theoretical perspective of practice these interviews focused on how family is engaged in the migration process and on structural and functional modifications of family lives due to migration trajectories of family members. Essential elements were the genealogy of a family, its socioeconomic background as well as status and roles of family members. After a brief remark on the context of external migration from Romania and its illustration through exemplary migration experiences the article goes on to explicate several contemporary theories of international migration concluding that they can be faulted for focusing almost exclusively on the explanation of the causes of migration rather than dealing with the social impact of migration.