The article explores the distinct upward social mobility trajectories of six high-achieving Dalit women in government services in Chennai in south India. Their mobility, primarily driven by education, makes them a very 'select' group given the larger relatively abysmal social, educational and occupational inequality of the Dalits as minority caste…

Occupationally mobile families exist in multiple forms globally. While these families contribute significantly to the socioeconomic life of the locations that they traverse, sometimes their mobilities generate hostility in those locations. This hostility in the form of an anti-nomadic/sedentarist ideology creates corresponding difficulties for the…

This article examines the relationship between the upward educational and social mobility processes of young men and women of Moroccan descent in Catalonia, Spain. Through data obtained from two ethnographic research projects and life stories, we analyse and compare the experiences of twenty-four young men and women of Moroccan descent who are…

Globally, countries often view PhD training as building research capacity and may encourage international mobility of potential PhDs as they expect them to return home -- not considering individuals as agents negotiating their own intentions. We examined the interaction between such structural factors and 36 PhD graduates' efforts (from 13 African…

Gypsy, Roma and Travellers (GRT) are a highly marginalised UK higher education minority with patchy targeted policy interventions. Drawing on qualitative interview data with education professionals working with GRT and with GRT young people, families and activists, the article compares attitudes, expectations, and desires around higher education.…

This paper aims to demonstrate the analytical potential of initial vocational education and training (iVET) in the debate on the costs of social mobility. It is based on extensive qualitative fieldwork with over 250 young people in Romania's iVET (around 20% of whom were Roma). Central to the discourses of young Roma are the experiences of…

This international, phenomenological study involved marginalised individuals who completed higher education despite their socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds. Two subsamples included first-in-family college graduates; 16 Roma professionals in the Czech Republic and 29 Native American academics across the United States. Due to the…

This study aims to explore the factors that influence Asian student mobility using a life planning model, which focuses on students' lifelong planning and restricting factors in decision-making. As a result of macro data analysis of student mobility from six Asian source countries to eight major destinations from 1999 to 2017, the income gap…

This research examines Latino economic elites in Los Angeles who engage in "ethnoracial philanthropy" -- giving to or creating ethnic-centric organisations that focus on alleviating socioeconomic inequalities. We draw on 65 in-depth interviews to provide insights into the ethnoracial educational structures created by Latino elites to…

This paper introduces a relatively novel theoretical approach to investigate cross border student mobilities in East Asia, a region growing in importance as a provider of international education. It does so by bringing Sara Ahmad's writings on the sociality of emotions, with Jacques Derrida's analyses of hospitality. We draw on empirical data from…

Motivated by increasing Colombian immigration in Chile, this paper aims to understand the production of Colombian students attuned with the geopolitical discourses on immigrants in Santiago. Inspired by feminist geographers, it considers the nation as an affective device and geopolitics as the power asymmetries resulting from the encounter of…

Increasing numbers of Cigano people in Portuguese schools show that this is the most educated generation to date. However, according to recent data only 2.6% are enrolled in secondary education. Using an intersectional approach examining gender, ethnicity, and family socioeconomic status to explore the youngsters' academic trajectories, and…

This article explores how first-in-family-graduate Roma and non-Roma Hungarians from the working-class experience education-driven social mobility and reconcile the dislocation of their primary-habitus due to changing class through transiting a "third space." Drawing on Bhabha's and bell hooks' development of this concept, we aim to…

Formal education has all too often been portrayed as a means of achieving social and economic mobility, there is a need to address the unequal footing for adolescents in the Global South attempting to achieve social mobility through education. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted in Sri Lanka, this article considers the impact of upward…

The global landscape of higher education is an uneven field where players like nation-states are placed in hierarchical and centre-periphery relations. This paper focuses on the global field of international student mobility (ISM) and investigates China's place in the field using an analytical framework consisting of three key categories of…