An Infrastructural Gaze toward Academic Migration: Chinese Academic Immigrants in the U.S.

Abstract

With the rise of globalization in education and transnational knowledge networks, academic mobility has become increasingly common, making academic migration a distinct focus in migration studies ( Wang & Chen, 2021 ). As China is the largest sender of international students, and the U.S. hosts the most Chinese students ( U.S. Embassy & Consulates in China, 2022 ), this research empirically focuses on Chinese academic migrants in the U.S. Existing studies have mainly explored academic migration through political economics and human capital perspectives, with limited attention to how migration infrastructure shapes migrants’ everyday experiences and their agency in redefining these infrastructures. With this in mind, this study aims to address these gaps by examining the role of migration infrastructure in the privileges, aspirations, and challenges faced by academic migrants. Drawing on qualitative research with early-career Chinese academic immigrants in the U.S., the paper explores how migration infrastructure both facilitates and complicates the personal and professional lives of mobile scholars from the Global South to the North. With a theoretical focus on “migration infrastructure,” it first investigates how migration infrastructure both empowers and hinders the personal and professional lives of academic immigrants. Second, it explores how seemingly mundane infrastructural elements play a critical role in shaping everyday migration experiences. Third, it investigates whether and how mobile scholars exercise agency to overcome these obstacles and reshape their infrastructural surroundings for a better quality of life ( Wang, 2022 ). Ultimately, the aim is to offer an effective approach to understanding the lived experiences of highly skilled migrants.