The Promises of the Free World : Postsocialist Experience in Argentina and the Making of Migrants, Race, and Coloniality

This study examines the narrations of a number of individuals who migrated from Russia and Ukraine to Argentina between 1996 and 2001. How did the collapse of the USSR and the culmination of the economic crisis in Argentina affect individuals who would, during the course of their lifetime, experience both first hand? How did these events condition their social positions and selfunderstandings, as well as their understanding of the past and dreams for the future? Based on qualitative ethnographic material this thesis investigates personal narrations about reorientation at a social and affective level. The author works with political discourse theory, critical race studies, autoethnography, and theories on coloniality to examine questions of migration, social mobility, race, class, and gender in the processes of re-establishing a life in a new context. Particular attention is paid to the making of racialized subject positions, and identifications, as well as constructions of whiteness and Europeanness. Jenny Ingridsdotter is an ethnologist working at the School of Historical and Contemporary Studies at Södertörns högskola (Södertörn University, Sweden).