Abstract
Studies into media and migration have offered significant contributions but often emphasise short-term research, assuming migrants’ nationalism is sustained over time. To address this gap, this study adopts an ‘ethnographic returning’ method to further develop the theory of long-distance nationalism. It examines how Japanese cultural migrants in New York City and London negotiated their sense of national identity during the early migration phase and 20 years later. Findings show that migrants did not necessarily maintain nationalist sentiments but renegotiated them into a moderate sense of belonging to Japan, developing a sense of belonging to the host city through local inclusion – rather than the host nation. Digital technologies introduced in the past 20 years shape this process by providing frequent and rapid affective circuits, transforming migrants’ relationship to ‘home’. Migrants use digital platforms to access Japanese content and communicate with families in Japan, facilitating everyday nationhood while not necessarily fostering transnational identities.
Keywords
Introduction
With growing transnational mobility, recent decades have seen a surge in research exploring the link between media and migration (see King and Wood, 2001; Smets et al., 2019). Influential theories underpinning this debate were proposed in the 1990s. For example, Anderson's (1992) ‘long-distance nationalism’ describes how migrants maintain strong allegiances to their homeland while living abroad. He notes that despite eventually settling in new locations, many migrants dreamed of circulatory migration through telex and telephone, moving back and forth between home and host countries – as a way to remain connected to their roots (Anderson, 1992: 9). Meanwhile, Appadurai (1996) presents a contrasting view, suggesting that the interplay between electronic media and international migration fosters what he terms a ‘post-national’ political structure. He argues that not only electronic media but also print media and other forms of cultural expression can foster new forms of imagination and connectivity that transcend the boundaries of the nation-state. Although the nation-state retains the power to shape and regulate media within its territory, opportunities for producers and audiences to engage across national borders have expanded. These transnational interactions give rise to what Appadurai (1996: 8–10) refers to as ‘diasporic public spheres’ – spaces where dispersed populations engage in shared dialogues and cultural practices not confined to national frameworks. Through these spheres, diverse transnational organisations, movements, ideologies, and networks can emerge, reshaping forms of community identity and modes of collective mobilisation.
Building on these theories, studies on migration and media (e.g., Georgiou, 2013; Kim, 2011; Robins and Aksoy, 2001; Vico, 2020) have demonstrated that migrants negotiate their national identities through their engagement with television or digital media in everyday life. This finding resonates with research on national identity (Madianou, 2005; Schneider, 2018; Skey, 2009), which argues that national identity is constructed through everyday practices and emerges through ongoing interactions between media texts and user interpretations. In contrast, other scholars have discussed the emergence of transnational identities among migrants, which typically refers to new identities constructed through the experiences of migrants with two (or more) ‘homes’ in their countries of origin and host countries (Basch et al., 1994). Diasporas do not simply transition from one national identity to another but cultivate national identities by maintaining multiple networks (Marino, 2015).
In this way, some studies discuss migrants’ nationalist sentiments as sustained over time. However, many of these studies are based on research conducted over relatively short timeframes and offer only a partial view of how such nationalist sentiments may shift in the long term. This study addresses this gap by employing an ‘ethnographic returning’ approach to examine the experiences of Japanese cultural migrants in New York City and London. It argues that although nationalist sentiment tends to intensify during the early stages of migration, it may gradually weaken as migrants’ everyday lives unfold. However, what emerges is not necessarily a transnational identity. Instead, the case examined here demonstrates an identification that ‘juxtaposes’ (Vico, 2020) the local and the national, producing a layered and situated sense of self. This study further argues that this process of identity negotiation is shaped by engagement in everyday nationhood, particularly using digital platforms to access Japanese content and communicate with their families in Japan. This process interacts with sociocultural factors that influence migrants’ everyday lives.
Television, digital media, and national identity
Drawing on the theories of Anderson and Appadurai, scholars have explored how media contribute to the construction of national imaginaries, with particular attention to the role of television. Building on this perspective, Madianou (2005) examines how television news in Greece constructs national identity through everyday reporting, crisis narratives, and symbolic rituals. This study shows that while Greek audiences often align themselves with such national narratives, Turkish and Cypriot minorities frequently experience feelings of alienation. This finding underscores the media's dual role in unifying and dividing citizens and highlights how identity is not static but is constantly performed and negotiated. Similarly, Skey (2009) conceptualises ‘everyday nationalism’ as a daily routine and often an unconscious reproduction of national identities. These identities remain contingent and subject to negotiations among different groups, reinforcing the need to understand nationhood as a dynamic and context-sensitive process. Meanwhile, the advent of satellite TV in the 1990s sparked academic interest in transnational television, national identities, and migrants’ sense of home (Morley and Robins, 1995). For example, second-generation Turkish women engaged in hybrid media practices by watching British and Turkish television as they navigated multiple cultural spaces. Aksoy and Robins (2003) refer to this phenomenon as ‘banal transnationalism’. Georgiou (2013) frames identity negotiations through transnational media as more strategic. ‘Strategic nostalgia’ signals sentimental attachment to a lost homeland, whereas ‘banal nomadism’ denotes detachment from national identities and identification with a ‘third space’ beyond national binaries. These studies show that migrant identities are actively constructed and negotiated through selective, critical engagement with media in daily life.
However, since the late 2000s, scholarly attention to media and migration has shifted from television to digital media, with a growing focus on how digital platforms contribute to the reproduction of national identity and invite renewed consideration of the role of the state. Schneider (2018) emphasises that digital media operate within a tightly controlled information environment shaped by the state, focusing on how state-provided national narratives are disseminated online. Specifically, Schneider suggests that as users share and discuss state-led information on digital platforms, emotional resonance may lead individuals to internalise top-down nationalism as part of their identities. Furthermore, Mihelj and Jiménez-Martínez (2021) note that platforms such as Netflix customise content for different national audiences, transmitting national images in explicit promotional and everyday consumer contexts. However, digital platforms also provide spaces for migrants to exercise their agency. Kim (2011) argues that Japanese, Korean, and Chinese women living abroad in the United Kingdom for approximately 3 to 7 years have experienced social exclusion in their transnational everyday lives. They maintain connections with their home countries through digital media, reinforcing ‘diasporic nationalism’. In a study of Serbian migrants in London, Vico (2020) shows how platforms such as Facebook and Viber support identity politics as a spontaneous, everyday practice. Migrants articulate their sense of self by expressing how they are distinct from and connected to the broader world. One strategy is ‘juxtaposing’ national identity with other identifiers, such as profession or region. Other common tactics include practising forms of ‘self-exoticisation’ (Vico, 2020). These studies argue that although the digital space serves as a channel for reproducing nationalism, it also functions as a dynamic arena in which migrants actively renegotiate their nationalist sentiments and national identities.
Along with these debates on reproducing national frameworks, growing attention has been paid to forming transnational and diasporic identities. ‘Digital diasporas’ refers to electronically networked migrant communities enabled by modern communication technologies (Brinkerhoff, 2009; Ponzanesi, 2020). Digital diasporas differ from virtual communities in that they often maintain strong pre-existing ties with their home countries before forming or redefining themselves online (Alonso and Oiarzabal, 2010). Widely used platforms among migrants include Facebook and WhatsApp (launched in the United States in 2004 and 2009, respectively), Viber (2010, Israel), and WeChat (2011, China) (Baldassar and Wilding, 2020; Marino, 2015; Stevens et al., 2024; Vico, 2020; Wilding et al., 2020). Marino (2015: 3) shows that Facebook and online communities reinforce a sense of ‘diasporic identity’ and belonging among Italian migrants in London. Collectively, these studies suggest that television and online platforms facilitate identity negotiation through interactions between media texts and users. In connection with their backgrounds – such as origin, generation, and language proficiency – and other social and contextual factors, migrants actively negotiate nationalist sentiments or foster transnational identities through media.
Digital kinning and affect
While digital media research has often highlighted how migrants negotiate national and transnational affiliations, scholars have increasingly expanded their focus to include the more intimate spheres of care, leading to the development of theories on emotions, affect, and feelings. This development is often called ‘the affective turn’ and is the subject of considerable discussion in media studies (Alinejad and Ponzanesi, 2020: 623). Such studies focus on exploring care for distant family members and the role of digital media in these relationships (Cabalquinto, 2018; Madianou and Miller, 2012). In this context, Baldassar and Wilding (2020: 315) introduced the concept of ‘digital kinning’. Defined as ‘the processes of engagement with new technologies for the purpose of maintaining support networks’ (Wilding et al., 2020: 640), digital kinning refers to the practices whereby families living physically apart use smartphones, social networking services, video calls, and other tools to maintain and reinforce their familial relationships. According to Baldassar and Wilding (2020), this concept is necessary, especially for older migrants, to retain their cultural and social identities while preventing social isolation by maintaining connections with distant family members or friends. Digital kinning is not merely about employing communication technology, but also about the critical role of ‘affect’, or the emotional dimension involved. In other words, through messages sent and received via digital tools, video calls that convey facial expressions and voices, and sharing daily life on social media, people can sense each other's presence across physical distances and exchange care and support (Baldassar and Wilding, 2020; Wilding et al., 2020). Similarly, Alinejad and Ponzanesi (2020: 623) emphasise that ‘emotions, affect, and feelings are not only essential to transnational migratory relationships but also constitutive and defining for their emergence’. In addition to the emotional aspect, successful digital kinning requires certain practical conditions, such as digital literacy, access to affordable technology, and support from the family or community (Baldassar and Wilding, 2020). Thus, digital kinning is important for migrants to maintain their social identities, cultivate family relationships across physical distances, and deepen emotional bonds. The specific platforms used to support these interactions often vary according to the migrants’ country of origin; for example, WeChat is commonly used by Chinese migrants (Stevens et al., 2024). These insights highlight the need for further research on how digital kinning practices interact with broader national and transnational belonging within diverse cultural and social contexts.
Tracing identity among Japanese cultural migrants
Building on the preceding literature review, this study addresses key gaps in the research on media, migration, and identity. First, theories of migrant nationalism and media, such as ‘long-distance nationalism’ (Anderson, 1992) and ‘diasporic nationalism’ (Kim, 2011), have found that migrant nationalism is not just nostalgia for a past homeland, but a dynamic, ongoing phenomenon sustained and strengthened through global information flows; migrants’ nationalist feelings do not fade with distance or time but are continually activated through transnational practices and media. However, existing discussions often rely on short-term, single-timepoint studies, leaving the long-term dynamics of migrant nationalism insufficiently explored. Moreover, theories such as Appadurai’s (1996) diasporic public spheres and the concept of digital diaspora (Brinkerhoff, 2009; Marino, 2015) suggest that migrants also have the potential to construct transnational identities. If identity is understood as a dynamic process negotiated through everyday practices, it is essential to investigate whether nationalist sentiments are sustained over time or are gradually transformed into a transnational sense of self. Addressing this issue requires employing a longitudinal study. Therefore, this study poses the following research question:
Second, to examine the long-term identity negotiation discussed in the first question, it is crucial to consider both the changes in media use and the broader sociocultural context in which these practices are embedded. As previously discussed, identity negotiation emerges not simply from technological changes, but from integrating media practices and everyday experiences (Aksoy and Robins, 2003; Georgiou, 2013; Madianou, 2005; Skey, 2009; Vico, 2020). Over the past 20 years, the media environment has undergone significant shifts – from satellite television to social media and streaming platforms – reshaping how migrants interact with their homes and host societies. During this period, migrants’ relationships with their work, family, and local communities were also likely to undergo substantial transformation. Furthermore, although previous studies established that affect mediated through digital media facilitates social connections with the family (Baldassar and Wilding, 2020; Wilding et al., 2020), the role of digital kinning in shaping a sense of national belonging remains underexplored. This study examines how evolving media practices intersect with migrants’ everyday experiences to reconfigure their sense of belonging over time.
The Japanese migrant case provides a meaningful lens for exploring these research questions. In the 2000s, many young Japanese moved to New York City and London to pursue careers in the arts – actors, artists, dancers, photographers, and musicians aspiring to enter cultural and creative industries (CCI) (Fujita, 2009). Even before this period, Saskia Sassen's theory on ‘global cities’ (first published in 1991, with a revised edition in 2001) positioned New York and London as quintessential global cities, functioning as key nodes in the network of the world economy. The present study uses the term ‘cultural migrant’ to describe those who relocate for cultural rather than economic or political reasons. As Kato (2023) notes, the umbrella term ‘lifestyle migrants’ can include such culturally motivated individuals, along with ‘self-searching migrants’. However, while ‘lifestyle migrants’ are often defined as affluent individuals seeking a better quality of life (O’Reilly and Benson, 2009: 2), these young Japanese were drawn to ‘passionate work’ (McRobbie, 2016) in Western arts and culture. This aspiration was shaped by the broader context of the historically high youth unemployment in Japan during the early 2000s. In Japan's recruitment system, those who fail to secure a regular job immediately after graduation often find non-regular employment. Faced with such a rigid structure, many young people looked abroad for crucial breakthroughs, with many moving to the United States. Particularly, the appeal of the American Dream drew those who had migrated to New York City. Others, typically art school graduates, moved to London to gain cultural capital. The strong yen allowed Japan's middle-class youth to live abroad with parental financial support. In my reflexive analysis, these cultural migrants can be understood as a migration-context version of the global creative youth that McRobbie (2016: 36) described as sharing an ‘expectation of happiness at work’ in creative industries. Before migration, most had little opportunity to consider their national identity in socially homogeneous Japan and struggled to articulate it (Fujita, 2009). Meanwhile, they were exposed to positive images of cities such as New York City and London, constructing an idealised ‘imagined West’ through TV, film, magazines, and websites. Nevertheless, after their arrival, they encountered racial discrimination and daily challenges. Within the first 5 years, many developed nationalistic sentiments (Fujita, 2009: 149–161). Therefore, this and other studies have revealed that young people moving from East Asia to Western countries developed heightened nationalism in the early migration period (Fujita, 2009; Kim, 2011). However, it remains unclear whether these nationalist sentiments endure in the long term and how other factors contribute to this process. To answer these research questions, this study adopted a research design that examined the long-term identity negotiations among respondents.
Methods
Data were gathered using an ‘ethnographic returning’ method (O’Reilly, 2012), which allows researchers to gain more detailed insights into changes and long-term trends at the field site. New York City and London were initially selected because they were among the most popular destinations for young Japanese people in the early 2000s. I primarily recruited participants in front of the British Council and the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo. I spent many days outside these buildings, approaching young people who visited them. Whenever I saw someone walking up to these institutions, I would immediately go up to them, introduce myself, ask whether they met the criteria for my sample, 1 and request their cooperation. This process was repeated more than a hundred times. I also posted recruitment messages on popular websites for Japanese residents of New York City and London. It took approximately six months to recruit a sufficient number of participants. The age of participants ranged from 19 to 30 years at the time of departure, with an average age of 25. Of these, 10 participants planned to move to New York City, and 12 planned to move to London. Highest education was college for 14 participants and high school for 8. None of the participants were enrolled in an elite university. Women comprised 15 of the 22 participants. Compared to labour migrants or refugees, these participants were privileged in having the opportunity to attend school abroad with parental support. However, within the Japanese society undergoing prolonged economic stagnation, they belong to a precarious middle class of young people facing an uncertain future. The initial interviews were conducted predominantly in Tokyo in 2003. After the participants migrated to New York City and London, I adopted multi-sited ethnography, as proposed by Marcus (1995). This approach suggests that researchers ‘follow and stay with the movements of a particular group’. I ‘traced’ the participants via email in the host countries and conducted interviews and participant observations over a 5-year period until 2008 (Fujita, 2009).
In the present study, I contacted and traced four participants who remained at their destination for approximately 20 years after their departure. In contrast, the others either gave up their dreams, left the city, or returned to Japan to pursue different careers. Among the four participants, three were men and one was a woman. The interviews and fieldwork were conducted in New York City and London in 2022 and 2023, respectively. Informed consent was obtained from all participants before conducting the interviews, and permission was granted for audio-recorded conversations. Each interview lasted approximately two to four hours, during which participants were asked open-ended questions about their careers in the cultural industry, their daily lives, how they communicated with family and friends in Japan, and how they accessed Japanese news and entertainment through digital media. All interviews were transcribed and subjected to thematic and narrative analyses. Furthermore, I visited places with participants I had accompanied 20 years ago, including locations where Japanese youth gathered frequently, such as shops, restaurants, and streets. I also visited their workplaces and other newly popular places for Japanese residents in New York City and London. These visits were documented in fieldnotes. Thus, this study combines interviews with participant observations. To compare the previous research with the new data, I recoded and analysed data from interviews conducted between 2003 and 2008 based on insights derived from the latest codes. All participant names are pseudonymised in the text. Despite the small sample size, this research design enabled the exploration of richer contexts and meanings developed by migrants.
Results
Local inclusion through work and family
This section focuses on four participants – Atsushi, Daisuke, Jun, and Ryo – who remained in their host cities for 20 years after leaving Japan. In the 2000s, they lived in precarious circumstances as freelance artists attending language schools in New York City or as students at art colleges in London, staying on student visas. By the 2020s, however, all had secured permanent residency through work or family, and each described this milestone as a major turning point in their lives, easing anxieties about settlement. Among them, Ryo alone achieved professional recognition in the cultural industries as a photographer, by building a portfolio that included portraits of celebrated musicians and models. Nevertheless, his lifestyle in East London has remained unchanged since his younger days; he continues wearing casual clothes and eating at nearby cafés. Daisuke forged a different path in New York City, establishing himself as a commercial painter who created works designed for display as interior décor in the homes of wealthy clients. He rented a spacious studio in Brooklyn, where his modern paintings, marked by the heavy use of gold, were displayed on white walls. Every day, Daisuke commutes to his studio on a bicycle equipped with a child seat. Although Ryo succeeded in high-end cultural production, Daisuke found a place in commercial production. The other two participants struggled to sustain themselves through cultural work alone, which reflects the precarious nature of freelance labour. Jun appears on British television and in films and works as a narrator, but still depends on her husband for financial support. The fact that only one woman, Jun, remained may be related to the greater barriers that women face, such as wage disparities and unequal domestic responsibilities (McRobbie, 2016: 89). Atsushi sustains his livelihood through dual-income household arrangements, supplementing his artistic work with non-art-related employment. The male participants often said they would return to Japan only if they had better career opportunities. This finding indicates that return decisions are shaped by social norms deeply embedded in their country of origin, and their narratives reflect the gendered expectations that men should achieve success abroad before returning (Girma, 2017).
Despite differing levels of success in cultural industries, all participants expressed satisfaction with having families built up in their host cities. In the 2000s, they were single and lived in ‘cool’ neighbourhoods such as Brooklyn and East London. In the 2020s, they remained in the same areas but now lived with partners they had met locally. In New York City, Atsushi and Daisuke had children with Japanese partners. They built ties with other Japanese families they met in school or parks in Brooklyn through bilingual parenting and sharing Japanese cultural practices. In London, Jun and Ryo were married or engaged to local partners, and these relationships facilitated their integration into London society.
During the first 5 years of migration (2003–2008), most of the 22 participants experienced a heightened sense of Japaneseness and expressed nationalistic sentiments. This emotion emerged as the ‘reality’ of racial discrimination and daily obstacles in New York City or London, contrasted with their ‘imagined worlds’ constructed by media before migration (Fujita, 2009). For example, Daisuke said, ‘I like Japan more. Japan is superior to America’ (interviewed in 2004). Similarly, Jun emphasised, ‘I am very Japanese’ (interviewed in 2007), employing strategies similar to ‘long-distance nationalism’ (Anderson, 1992), ‘diasporic nationalism’ (Kim, 2011), and ‘self-exoticisation’ (Vico, 2020).
However, 20 years later, their sense of inclusion derived from job opportunities and family life gave them a new sense of belonging to their host cities. By the 2020s, these participants described themselves as New Yorkers or Londoners, rather than American or British. Two participants in New York City identified themselves as Japanese and New Yorkers. Atsushi says, ‘My identity is Japanese. That has not changed.’ Nonetheless, he no longer expressed nationalistic sentiments. Daisuke describes the change in his sense of identity as follows: Do you feel you’ve become American? No, not really. A New Yorker – well, maybe a New Yorker in parentheses… like a New Yorker (Japanese), if that makes sense?
Similarly, in London, Ryo stated that he now thinks less about his Japanese identity than he used to: I don’t really think about my identity much anymore. If I had to say when I did think about it, it was probably during the Black Lives Matter movement. At that time, I started wondering, like, ‘Is there something I can do as a Japanese artist?’ But I didn’t really do anything special. I can’t call myself
Video platforms and everyday Japaneseness
This section examines how the sense of belonging to Japan, demonstrated in the previous section, relates to changes in the media environment, especially the advent of video platforms over the past 20 years. In the 2000s, many young Japanese living in London and New York City relied on cable television, rented videos, and file-sharing software. Despite earning some income from part-time jobs in Japanese restaurants, they often found the cost of subscribing to Japanese satellite TV – approximately 30 dollars or pounds per month – too expensive (Fujita, 2009: 148, 155). As Daisuke noted in his 2004 interview, he watched the same videos five to six times. Many participants repeatedly viewed the same tape and used sharing tools like Winny to access Japanese dramas and variety shows. These labour-intensive methods are vital cultural resources for affirming their ongoing connection to Japan. At the time, rental videos and cable TV served as the main media for virtual returns to Japan, offering emotional reassurance that their homes still existed (Fujita, 2009). Few participants had begun using digital platforms such as YouTube, which launched its Japanese version in 2007.
By the 2020s, the participants used streaming services such as Netflix, TVer, and YouTube daily, enjoying near-instant and unlimited access to Japanese content. They could easily watch Japanese comedies, dramas, and anime without the constraints of broadcast schedules or physical rentals. As discussed previously, during the early years of migration, participants developed nationalist sentiments and emphasised their Japaneseness. Twenty years later, they no longer expressed those sentiments but engaged with Japanese content through digital media more regularly. Platforms such as Netflix and TVer, both launched in Japan in 2015, and YouTube now play a central role in conveying images of Japan. Despite living in the host country for many years, Daisuke and Ryo continue to watch Japanese variety shows, dramas, and anime daily. Daisuke checks what is happening in Japan every morning as part of his daily routine, saying, ‘I like Japanese anime. I watch it often. I also check Yahoo Japan News every morning’. Ryo provided a similar explanation: Even now, I can watch Japanese TV anytime on TVer. And it's easy to get Japanese food or ingredients too. Even living in London, are you regularly exposed to Japanese culture? Exactly. When I’m alone at home, it feels just like being in Japan. How about British TV programmes? I don’t own a TV. I end up watching Japanese stuff on my computer. I need to concentrate on understanding English programmes, but I can play Japanese ones in the background, like on the radio. It's just right for me. I would say I’m Japanese. Because that's what the person asking expects. If someone asks, ‘what's your nationality?’ – especially in the UK, it's probably because they don’t think I’m British, right? That's why they’re asking.
With the rise of video platforms, participants have gained increased access to Japanese culture and resources to negotiate their sense of Japanese identity. This limits their engagement with American or British media; instead, they use it for comparison or boundary reinforcement. Moreover, using these platforms does not necessarily foster participation in diasporic online communities (Appadurai, 1996; Marino, 2015). For instance, Daisuke and Ryo primarily use Instagram to showcase their artwork, whereas Atsushi and Jun use Facebook to update others on exhibitions or creative projects. For these individuals, social media is viewed as a career tool rather than a leisure tool. They use it for personal branding as artists, photographers, or actors, engaging in strategic self-presentation and often concealing parts of themselves to appear authentic (Marwick and boyd, 2011). Overall, this section thus demonstrated that video platforms facilitate migrants’ engagement with everyday Japaneseness. Although the strong nationalist sentiments they held in the early stages of migration were gradually weakened, partly by their growing sense of inclusion in the host city, their connection to and sense of belonging to their home nation were renegotiated through video platforms.
Digital kinning, returning home
The influence of video calls on participants’ identity negotiations has transformed since the 2000s. Until that decade, the participants could confirm that their family and ‘home’ still existed by performing a more laborious act – opening their computers to Skype or purchasing a phone card to make expensive international calls to talk to their parents. However, in the 2020s, they can see each other virtually, talk to their parents, and engage in digital kinning anytime and anywhere. In doing so, they mostly use LINE, a digital media platform popular among Japanese people that was developed in response to the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake by the Japanese branch of a South Korean company. It was designed as a digital messaging platform when traditional communication systems were disrupted. According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (2023), LINE usage increased from 20% in 2012 to over 90% by 2020, whereas Twitter and Facebook remained below 50%. LINE's rapid growth has promoted digital media adoption in Japan by offering free video calls, messaging, media sharing, and news (Hjorth and Lupton, 2021). LINE connects Atsushi, Daisuke, and Ryo to family members living in Japan. Atsushi and Daisuke, who are married to Japanese women and have become parents themselves, re-established connections with their parents in Japan because their parents manifested a desire to engage with their grandchildren. Typically, these transnational intergenerational interactions were facilitated weekly via video calls. For example, in a 2007 interview, when Daisuke was in his late 20s, he described being single with an unstable job. This situation frequently strained his relationship with his parents because of unmet expectations: I contact my family and friends in Japan roughly once a month, though this has become even less frequent. They’re moving forward with their lives, getting married and so on. We don’t talk as much these days, so I don’t keep in touch with them very often.
However, in an interview in 2022, Daisuke, who is now in his 40s, said that he had re-established a relationship with his parents in Japan: After getting married, I don’t think I feel a sense of obligation towards my parents. Before, I could sense some kind of unspoken pressure, but now they just say, ‘Do as you please over there’. These days, it is easy to just call on LINE, isn’t it? How often do you call your parents in Japan on LINE? About once a week, I guess. They want to see my kid. But if we hadn’t had video calling, things might have been different. Maybe I would have returned to Japan. […] Now, it almost feels no different from being in Japan.
In London, Jun and Ryo have no children and rarely make video calls with their parents. Ryo created a family group on LINE, although he did not make video calls daily. He regularly saw interactions between his brother's family and his parents through text messages and video calls, occasionally joining them. Thus, as other studies have argued (Baldassar and Wilding, 2020; Wilding et al., 2020), with the diffusion of video calls and text message functions of LINE, the participants of this study also began to practise digital kinning. Three of the four participants practised digital kinning, whereas Jun did not. The two participants with children showed a stronger desire to connect and a tendency to practise digital kinning. Thus, the availability of video calls does not automatically result in digital kinning. As scholars (Alinejad and Ponzanesi, 2020: 623; Wilding et al., 2020: 652) have noted, digital kinning depends on the desire to connect with people in their homeland.
Moreover, they return home not only virtually but also physically, which is made possible by a stable income from their career or partner. In the 2000s, participants returned to Japan once a year or less as they were young, had little money, and had recently migrated. By the 2020s, however, the four participants frequently travelled between the two countries. Atsushi and Daisuke return with their wives and children and stay in their parents’ homes for several weeks to months at a time each year. Jun's husband, who appreciated Japanese culture, bought an old rural house near Tokyo, where they regularly spend time. Only Ryo, who built a successful cultural career, travels frequently to Japan for work, serving European and Japanese clients and visiting Japan every two months. Therefore, with improved transportation, their increased income enables them to move between their home and host countries. Consequently, unlike earlier generations, these migrants rarely expressed nostalgia for Japan.
Conclusion
This study investigated how migrant identities evolved by comparing the 2000s and the 2020s. It conducted a critical review of existing scholarly literature (e.g., Anderson, 1992) and examined arguments that migrants sustain or reinforce nationalist sentiments through transnational media. Regarding the first research question, this study found that the nationalist sentiments that migrants initially experienced upon migration in the 2000s were not necessarily sustained but rather dynamically negotiated through migrants’ accumulated life experiences. By the 2020s, they had developed identities that juxtaposed a more moderate sense of national belonging to their homeland, Japan, with a growing attachment to the host city, New York City or London, without fully assimilating into the host nation, the United States or the United Kingdom. This weakening of nationalist sentiments was influenced by a growing sense of inclusion in the host city through work and family life.
Regarding the second research question, this study revealed the factors involved in the identity negotiation process from a temporal perspective. In the 2000s, migrants, reacting to experiences of discrimination and exclusion in the early stages of migration, sought to reaffirm the continued existence of their homeland by relying on resources such as cable television and rental videos. That is, ‘home’ was nostalgically reaffirmed as a distant and discontinuous space. However, by the 2020s, the expansion of digital media had enabled migrants to access Japanese content more easily and in real time. It has become a site of continuous engagement, sustained through the mass consumption of popular culture from the homeland. Although their nationalist sentiments have gradually faded through local integration, video platforms now fulfil their cultural and linguistic needs, allowing them to reaffirm their connection to their homeland, often unconsciously, in daily life. Furthermore, digital kinning (e.g., Wilding et al., 2020), supported by digital technologies, enables migrants to fulfil familial responsibilities from a distance. Such affective care and emotional connections alleviate feelings of nostalgia and provide daily opportunities for migrants to reaffirm their sense of national belonging. Through frequent interactions like speaking their mother tongue and confirming where their ‘home’ is, migrants reaffirm emotional ties to their homeland within the intimate sphere across borders. Thus, migrants often unconsciously engage in everyday nationhood through digital content and digital kinning. Overall, this engagement and a growing sense of belonging help reconfigure nationalist sentiments into a more moderate sense of national belonging.
The primary theoretical contribution of this study is that it critically updates the contemporary understanding of the long-term process of identity negotiation among migrants. This study advances existing theories such as long-distance nationalism (Anderson, 1992) and diasporic nationalism (Kim, 2011), by demonstrating that nationalist sentiments are not necessarily sustained but may fade over time through migrants’ long-term settlement. This study also contributes theoretically by showing that local belonging can coexist with and reshape national identification, offering a more nuanced understanding of migrant identity negotiation. Furthermore, as migrants do not engage in diasporic or transnational communities, this study questions the optimistic expectation that migrants actively engage in diasporic public spheres (Appadurai, 1996). Finally, this study argues that digital kinning is a powerful mechanism of everyday nationhood. The increasing frequency and speed of affective circuits, in connection with ‘home’, weaken the motivation for assimilation to the host nation.
As Skey (2009) notes, these identities remain contingent and subject to negotiation by different groups, reinforcing the need to understand nationhood as a dynamic and context-sensitive process. The identities described here, formed over a 20-year span, will likely continue evolving. These points also highlight the limitations of this study, as it focuses on a specific group of Japanese migrants motivated by cultural aspirations. Under political tensions, migrants may sustain nationalist sentiments differently. Similarly, second-generation migrants with hybrid backgrounds may follow different identity trajectories. Another limitation is that it captures only two specific points in time in the lives of the participants (i.e., the first 5 years after migration and 20 years later) rather than continuously tracing changes in their engagement over the entire 20-year period. Addressing this issue would require researchers to overcome time, cost, and mobility constraints. Future research should address these limitations by including more diverse groups of migrants and exploring their identity negotiations through continuous long-term engagement.
