The Sociology and Social Anthropology Seminar Series: Magdalena Nowicka

Family geopolitics: Ukrainian women’s aspiration of stay and return

Prof. Dr. Magdalena Nowicka

Head of the Integration Department at the German Centre for Integration and Migration Research (DeZIM), guest professor in Sociology at the Faculty of Social Sciences at Lund University.

Abstract

This talk explores how family relationships shape the decisions of displaced Ukrainians in Germany to return home or remain abroad. As the country hosting the largest share of Ukrainians under temporary protection, Germany offers a key setting for understanding these choices. While surveys show that having relatives in Ukraine affects return intentions, we know far less about how decisions are negotiated within families, especially when some members are in Germany and others remain in Ukraine.

Drawing on five waves of qualitative panel research and inspired by feminist geography’s view of the family as a “domestic site of geopolitics,” I trace how return aspirations evolve over time. I show how competing responsibilities to family members across borders often lead to a “transnational option” that keeps multiple futures open. The findings highlight the need to better understand how accompanying partners and the age of children shape refugees’ long-term plans.

Bio

Prof. Dr. Magdalena Nowicka is sociologist and expert in transnationalism, conviviality and racism. She currently serves as Head of the Integration Department at the German Centre for Integration and Migration Research (DeZIM), where she leads research on integration processes and social inequalities in migration contexts. She is also an honorary professor at the Institute of Social Sciences at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. From March 2026, Nowicka holds a guest professorship at the Faculty of Social Sciences at Lund University in Sweden.

Her recent publications include co-authored Revisualising Intersectionality (2022), a key volume advancing intersectional approaches across discipline, “Fluid yet sticky? Exploring social class through the lens of transnational migration” (2025), in Current Sociology, which argues for a nuanced, transnational understanding of class, co-authored articles on transnational elderly care in Europe, as well as various publications on qualitative methodologies.  Nowicka is the PI of the VISION Project that uses visual, sensory, and multimodal methods to explore contemporary commuting labour migration in Europe.

• When: Thursday 24 March
• Where: Gamla lungkliniken, Room 101

The Seminar Series

The Sociology and Social Anthropology Seminar Series (Allmänna seminariet) invites international and national researchers to present and discuss on-going research. Each presenter talks for about an hour, followed by about an hour's discussion.

Find more research seminars in this series at soc.lu.se/en/research.

All are welcome, especially students!