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Abstract

In this article, we explore and seek to understand transnational teacher migration from the narrative expressions of two women who migrated from their home countries to another southern African country. The data are complemented by a self-constructed narrative of a woman who left her home country. Framed through Appreciative Inquiry, the study observes that all individuals, organizations, and institutions are powered by positive thought and have some good or something that works well for them at some point. The data generated from two narrative expressions were analyzed through narrative analysis with emerging themes presented. In addition, data were complemented by a coconstructed narrative of a woman who gave up her career aspirations to migrate with the family. With the latter, the situation got more complicated when the husband untimely passed away. Issues such as gender discrimination and socialization as well as imaginations of positive futures do play a role in women teachers’ transnational migration decisions. We conclude that transnational women teacher migration should be understood within its own socially constructed, relativist ontology and subjectivist epistemology, which may be influenced by the power of appreciative, positive thought.

Keywords

Appreciative Inquiry women teachers interpretivism narratives migration

Introduction

This article provides an exploration and subsequent understanding of the decision-making practices of transnational women teacher migration in the southern African region collated through narrative expressions. Transnational teacher migration is a trend that is seen to predominantly emanate from emerging to developed economies. Transnational migration of professionals including teachers has become an important feature of globalization (Manik, Maharaj, & Sookrajh, 2006). While emigration is seen in a negative light in that it robs fledgling economies of their valuable assets and purchasing power, developed economies usually reap the rewards of a skilled workforce and in a way this eases the receiving country’s teacher shortage. Migration has been perpetuated by the push and pull factors between sending and destination countries: economic disparities are widening between labor shortage in high income countries and labor surplus in low income countries (Kawar, 2004).

Although mobility is a direct consequence of the forces of globalization, it is also seen as the system of interaction among the countries of the world to develop the global economy (Kayode, 2012). Brain drain or brain gain is not unique to any country. While emerging countries lose teachers to the developed countries, the latter, such as the big five (the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand), have experienced a shortage of teachers, and this has led to innovative strategies to attract and retain teachers from abroad (Manik, 2010). South African teachers migrate to countries such as the United Kingdom, China, Australia, and the Middle East, mostly to teach English. In contrast, during the 19th century, South Africa was the popular destination for mine and farm workers. In southern Africa, South Africa is a popular choice for migrant workers from the region. According to statistics, Zimbabwean teachers constitute the largest group of migrant teachers in South Africa (Department of Higher Education and Training, 2013). Post-apartheid South Africa attracted a diversity of skilled workers. In the context of Africa, international patterns are evident wherein an increasing number of teachers from other African countries, such as Lesotho, Zambia, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, are immigrating into South Africa due to the country’s economic prosperity, political stability, better working conditions, and attractive income (South African Council for Educators, 2011) compared with their countries of origin.

Teacher mobility led to a transnational community, which is regarded as a system of institutions, networks, and relations that connect people (migrants and nonmigrants) in both the source and host countries (de Villiers & Weda, 2017). There is a concerted effort to learn from southern African countries. Mobility affects all individuals regardless of gender. However, gender plays a pivotal role in decision-making among couples who plan to look for job satisfaction. Therefore, long-distance migration continues to be undertaken for the advancement of men’s careers. This happens despite the increase in women’s education, earnings, participation in labor-force, and work attachment (Costa & Kahn, 2000). Women teachers may be presumed to be less mobile than their male counterparts in many parts of the African continent. Female partners suffer considerable losses in terms of economic achievement and career prospects (Shauman, 2010). In contrast, single women like single men are more mobile as they can take better job offers and employment opportunities in distant regions (Melzer, 2013). Therefore, for highly qualified single workers, spatial mobility fosters career progress regardless of gender (Nisic & Melzer, 2016). There is a tendency to consider women migrants within narrow domestic and familial contexts (playing supporting roles as wives and homemakers).

Normally, men are primary economic migrants, and women are either left behind or simply follow through family reunification. There are positive effects for women who choose to remain behind when their husbands migrate. Migration has a potential to influence and change gender norms, and the women who choose to remain gain power and authority in the household (Fleury, 2016). Female migration is conceptualized in terms of dependency rather than employment or autonomy. On the contrary, Fleury asserts that women are migrating on their own, more often for personal advancements through job satisfaction and/or education. Data indicate that the rate of female migration is growing faster than male in many countries that receive high levels of migrants. At the time of migration, some adaptations in the household routine become inevitable. For example, householding strategies have to be reformulated when migrant women-as-mothers rewrite their roles (but often not their identities) through labor migration as productive workers who contribute to the well-being of their children via financial remittances and long-distance mothering (Lam & Yeoh, 2018).

This article seeks to understand transnational teacher migration–decision-making and the factors that influence the decisions in the context of southern African migrants. We present background information on the nature of transnational women teacher migration to southern Africa, the factors that influence decisions of women teachers to migrate to developing countries, the processes of inquiry involved in generating data, as well as the findings in the form of narratives and discussions.

Theoretical Underpinnings

The study is framed around Appreciative Inquiry theoretically and Interpretivism methodologically.

Appreciative Inquiry as a Theoretical Framework Underpinning the Study

To frame this study, we draw from Appreciative Inquiry. Appreciative Inquiry is based on the assumption that change can be achieved through focusing on strengths and successes, moving away from an emphasis on weaknesses and failures (Watkins, Mohr, & Kelly, 2011; Myende & Hlalele, 2018). Appreciative Inquiry assumes that every person has some unique talents and as such does something right some of the time. Second, it believes that images of the future are created by social interactions among group members, and once these images are articulated and understood, they can guide the individual and group action. In addition, Appreciative Inquiry is presumed to thrive on the assumption that by focusing on something that works and by focusing on the things that work and by using positive thinking, imagery, and language, we can create a positive future (Fynn, 2013; Howieson, 2011). In this article, we draw from the core principles of Appreciative Inquiry stated as follows:

The constructivist principle accepts that there are multiple realities and people’s realities are constructed through social interaction whilst simultaneity sees change and inquiry are simultaneous and inquiry can of itself create change. Thirdly, the poetic principle maintains that the individual story is a product of the continual narrative by the individuals and those who interact with them. Furthermore, imagining or anticipating a positive future can guide people towards that future in accordance with the anticipatory principle. A focus on the positive can create energy and hope for the future as espoused by the positive principle. The enactment principle complements the previous by asserting that positive change occurs when people create the future through their words, images and relationships. In addition, wholeness brings out the best in people, so sharing the whole story with the whole group and the whole of oneself can build a collective capacity for change as cherished by the wholeness principle. (Howieson, 2011; Mohr & Watson, 2002; Watkins et al., 2011)

In tandem with the principles above, Appreciative Inquiry guided by affirmation for the power of positive thinking (Fritz & Smit, 2009; Author¹). Narratives are socially constructed phenomena, which have no tangible reality, and the ways of organizing are limited only by human imagination and the agreements people make with each other (Kessler, 2013).

Interpretivism as a Paradigm Informing the Study

A paradigm constitutes an expression of the core beliefs and assumptions that inform social research and comprises four elements, namely, epistemology, ontology, methodology, and axiology (Guba & Lincoln, 1989). Ontology is the study of the nature of existence (Gray, 2009). Therefore, the ontological dimension of research focuses on expressions of fundamental beliefs and assumptions about a certain reality. In this paradigm, it is accepted that the social world cannot be understood from the standpoint of an individual, and the belief that realities are multiple and socially constructed holds (Guba & Lincoln, 1989).

Epistemology as a philosophical aspect of social research concerns attempts to comprehend “what it means to know” (Guba & Lincoln, 1989), “how we come to know something; how we know the truth or reality” (Kivunja & Kuyini, 2017), or what counts as knowledge within the world (McDonald, 2011). Thus, in social research, the epistemology provides a rationalization for the kinds of knowledge that are deemed reasonable and acceptable (Gray, 2009; Guba & Lincoln, 1989). Summed up, epistemology traverses beliefs on the way to generate, understand, and use the knowledge that is deemed to be acceptable and valid (Wahyuni, 2012). In social research, values refer to ideas and statements about “what does happen” as opposed to “what should happen” (May, 2011). Thus, in research, values differ and play different roles depending on the theoretical framework, aims, and objectives of the research. Consequently, they have an impact on the research design and methodology employed to satisfy the objectives of the study and realize its aim. Using a qualitative approach within an interpretivist paradigm, the article draws from the premise that cherishes understanding as a fluid, pluralistic, and reciprocal exercise. The interpretivist paradigm emphasizes the understanding and interpretation of the subjective world of human experience (Lincoln & Guba, 1985). Furthermore, the interpretivist paradigm usually exhibits the following characteristics (Lincoln & Guba, 1985; Morgan, 2007).

The acceptance that there is inevitable interaction between the researcher and his or her research participants,

The acceptance that context is vital for knowledge and knowing,

The need to understand the individual rather than universal laws,

The belief that causes and effects are mutually interdependent,

The belief that contextual factors need to be taken into consideration in any systematic pursuit of understanding.

Method of Inquiry

Considering the ontological, epistemological, and axiological prescripts of the interpretivist paradigm, the study adopted Narrative Inquiry as an approach. The narrative approach acknowledges human experiences as dynamic entities that are in a constant state of flux (Lemley & Mitchell, 2011; Wang, Andre, & Greenwood, 2015; Wang & Geale, 2015).

Narrative Inquiry is a ubiquitous practice in that human beings have lived out and told stories about that living for as long as we could talk. And then we have talked about the stories we tell for almost as long. These lived and told stories and the talk about the stories are one of the ways that we fill our world with meaning and enlist one another’s assistance in building lives and communities (Connelly & Clandinin, 2006, p. 375).

In addition, stories add value by making “the implicit explicit, the hidden seen, the unformed formed, and the confusing clear” (Chou, Tu, & Huang, 2013; Morgan, 2007; Wang, 2017). Data were generated through a Narrative Inquiry, which is a ubiquitous practice in that human beings have lived out and told stories about that living for as long as we could talk. Narrative Inquiry is a way of understanding and inquiring into experience through collaboration between the researcher and the participants (Clandinin & Connelly, 2000; Calndinin, 2006). These lived and told stories and the talk about the stories comprise one of the ways that we fill our world with meaning and enlist one another’s assistance in building lives and communities. The narrative approach acknowledges human experiences as dynamic entities that are in a constant state of flux (Lemley & Mitchell, 2011). Hence, this article taps into the narrative expressions of three women teachers in higher education to understand the nature and factors at play in their migration. Furthermore, a coconstructed anecdote, which presents a brief, revealing account of a higher education teacher who migrated to South Africa, is presented. In general, an anecdote is a recounting of a real incident, involving actual persons and usually in an identifiable place (Fineman, 2013). The coconstructed anecdote in this article is of a successful former medical professional who migrated from her country in support of the husband’s career advancement aspirations. The situation turned on its head when the latter, who was the only one employed in the family in a new country, passed away. Without employment, the family is caught between staying in the new country and returning to the country of origin.

Emerging Themes

Findings are presented in themes. The following themes have been developed: participant’s personal, family, and educational background; decision-making; women at work; and transnational migration.

Personal, Family, and Educational Backgrounds Are Diverse

As Narrative Inquiry follows a recursive, reflexive process of moving from field (with starting points in telling or living of stories) to field texts (data) to research interim and final research texts (Clandinin & Huber, 2010), our meeting point with the participants was about sharing personal backgrounds (not necessarily biographical information). The participants’ diverse personal background was presented as follows:

P1:

I was born into a family of seven and in a second position. There was this existence of gender inequality in my community, male children are preferred above the girl’s children, hence my education career was retarded. However, things turned around when I encountered Chris, got an enlightened about education and went back to school after ten years of leaving high school. I started with National Certificate in Education (NCE), with the certificate I got teaching appointment. Thereafter I proceeded to university on part time and finished with a very good grade. It was at this time that my husband came to South Africa for his studies and insisted I join him here. I used the opportunity to upgrade my academic, I have finished my masters and now working on my PhD.

P2:

I come from a family of nine and I am the youngest in the family. We are five girls and four boys in the family. I attended both Primary and secondary schools close to home because I had to take care of my mother at the time. All my sisters got married at a young age and my brother were working in the mines in South Africa. I studied up to PhD level in education.

Data on personal background show that participants came from large families, which are diverse in their own ways. P1 notes the existence of gender inequality in favor of boys, resulting in girls’ education not being supported and encouraged. In addition to the suppression of girl children’s education, P2’s sisters were married off at an early age. This is consistent with some communities where marriage is seen as a status to be achieved as soon as one possibly can, relegating the value of education to being a lesser priority for girls. It may also be noted that the two participants were able to study the situation they found themselves in and attempted to prioritize educational attainment. P1 turned the situation around through motivation by an accomplice who indicated that despite a decade of nonactivity in education, one can still achieve educationally. The situation did not allow P1 to study on a full-time basis, and hence the use of part-time study opportunities. In addition, P2 studied at educational institutions closer home to take care of her ailing mother. Therefore, it may be noted that the participants did not “avoid known problems” (Lincoln & Guba, 1985), but worked their way around/with them. We are of the view that opportunities may always be there, but it depends on whether the person is able to discern and make the most of them. In the next section, we navigate the participants’ narrative expressions on their decision-making through their journey.

Decision-Making

This theme is further divided into subthemes. Each participant’s narrative is viewed through the lens of the factors that resulted in them leaving home, whether it was the desire of advancing their careers as women or a response to the call by their husbands to advance their own careers.

Leaving home country may be accounted for by some of the Appreciative Inquiry principles

P1’s interests seem to have been ignored when the decision to migrate was made. In this case, the husband’s career advancement, opportunities, and prospects appear to have overridden every other factor. In fact, it appears as if what prevailed was the husband’s voice and no other. However, the situation described does not necessarily mean that no form of dialogue existed. While it is clear that spousal dialogue never ensued, some form of internal dialogue may be assumed to have taken place. Consistent with internal dialogue, the husband may be construed to have had positive and hopeful future images through internal conversations.

My leaving was not pre-determined or planned, I was a federal high school teacher and a business woman before I left. The reason for my leaving was due to my spouse demand and request (P1).

Family members of transnational migrants may, for various reasons, choose to relocate with the spouse or remain in their home country. In P1’s case, the decision was to follow the spouse and it appears her voice may not have counted, as she sees the move as a spousal “demand.”

P2 indicated that she had a successful early career stint as follows:

After my first degree, I taught for two years in a high school which was regarded as one of the best in the country. I also served as the head of commercial subject department. Then I left to further my studies in the postgraduate level.

P2’s motivation to study further was spawned by her interactions with her mother who had already experienced the education system in South Africa. Her decision to leave her home country of Lesotho was further fuelled by, among others, the lack of postgraduate study opportunities, which were available in South Africa. She states,

I was motivated by my mother and the exposure she had in South Africa. She used to share her learning experiences and validated by the certificates she accumulated. She encouraged me to further my studies and there weren’t many universities offering honours degree and hence I applied in universities in South Africa. I was also motivated by my undergraduate performance which was outstanding and I believed there is a room to achieve more than what my mother achieved (she had Diploma in Education). I was also motivated by the financial opportunities. Teachers in South Africa were earning far much better than the Lesotho teachers and I knew with my kind of academic performance I could stand a better chance to find a job in South Africa.

As it is the case with Appreciative Inquiry, the participants observed the heliotropic principle that says people move toward those things that give them energy and life (Rogers & Fraser, 2003). In addition to better study opportunities, the participant was lured by economic incentives and career prospects. Contrary to P1’s situation wherein the husband might have had an internal dialogue with himself, it may be construed that P2 had internal conversations with herself and created positive, hopeful images about a positive future in South Africa.

Rather than accepting her situation as “collateral damage,” P1 may be construed to have been, after accepting her fate and acceding to the husband’s demand, in dialogue with herself in the new country to contrive “positive future images” (Mohr & Watson, 2002), and, therefore, decided to embark on a future journey for the advancement of her own career. P1 says,

My decision to pursue education to the fullest was the fact that women are relegated, hence I made up my mind to be a strong woman and also helped as many females as I can help.

P1’s ability to turn her situation around shows the power of positive thinking, and this opens our eyes to the enormous potential of the positive question (Mohr & Watson, 2002). Consistent with Appreciative Inquiry, P1 believed that there has to be “something that works,” “something possible” (Browne, n.d.) for her in the situation she found herself in. This is also consistent with the simultaneity principle of Appreciative Inquiry, which sees change and inquiry as simultaneous and proposes that inquiry can of itself create change. It is complemented by the anticipatory principle, which embraces imagining or anticipating a positive future. Almost similar tendencies and sentiments were shed by P2 in respect of her own career advancement. P2 says,

My decision making to further my studies and seek to improve my financial position was purely based on my academic achievement and was not so much influenced by gender. However, being surrounded by female role models (my grandmother and my mother) made me believe that I can shape my life and my brothers was very excited about my performance throughout my entire academic career. So my brother’s support for the decision that I took could be influencing the way that I respond to the work environment. I have never come across a confrontation that makes my job difficult or easy because I am a woman. I see myself as a co-worker with my male and female counter parts. What I experienced at work was that coming from another country could be challenging. When I joined the university both as a student and an employee I came across situations where I asked myself: “When are you returning home?” I am still faced with this question yet nobody ever asked me: “where exactly is your home?”

P2’s case had a link with South Africa where she eventually migrated to. Her mother had had exposure to South Africa earlier. One other issue to note is the participant’s comment on gender. Even though she later lamented regarding cultural gender socialization, her career advancement interest was not influenced by it but by associating with female role models.

Views on transnational migration

Transnational migration occurs from emerging to developed economies. The view is supported by P2 who says,

The assumption that transnational teacher migration emanates mainly from emerging to the developed economies could be true. Many people from the emerging economies were did not have access to education as compared to those in the developed economies. There are many factors (intentional and unintentional) that contributed to this, such as, apartheid regimes (in South Africa) and colonisation in Lesotho to mention but a few. All these factors contributed to the way curriculum was constructed and delivered, for example, in Lesotho the curriculum was (still is) influenced by Britain, examination (Form C [grade10]) and E(matric) were set and examined by the Britain education governing bodies.

The assumption of a relativist ontology means that you believe that the situation studied has multiple realities, and that those realities can be explored and meaning made of them or reconstructed through human interactions between the researcher and the subjects of the research, and among the research participants (Chalmers & Wasserman, 2009). In case of P2, British colonial dominance in respect of educational programs and curricula in her home country contrasted with the end of apartheid rule in South Africa appears to have spawned a desire to leave and choose the latter for settlement. It may be concluded that P2 suggested that South Africa may be seen to be free of oppression:

So, women teacher transnational migration is very complex and apartheid, colonisation, culture and girls’ upbringing and socialisation need to be understood and their intersections towards. It is also useful to understand women teacher transnational migration as a choice, and as a result lost/gained opportunities, dreams, her freedom and love.

The excerpt above is indicative of subjective epistemology. The assumption of a subjectivist epistemology means that the researchers and participants make meaning of their situation and/or data through their own thinking and cognitive processing of data informed by their interactions with their communities. There is the understanding that the individuals construct knowledge socially as a result of their personal experiences of the real life within the natural settings investigated. P2 considers the intersectionality of colonization, culture, and gender socialization as complex but interrelated factors at play for women teachers’ handling of transnational migration. Therefore, permutations regarding the women teachers’ consideration and outplay of migration apply uniquely differently to each of them.

Discussion

For various reasons attributable to the ease with which certain jobs in the teaching fraternity may be accessed, most women teachers chose countries closest to their homes, while few seemed to opt for the available opportunities further afield. Globally, male migrant workers outnumbered female migrant workers in a context where males comprised a higher number of international migrants of working age (United Nations Educational, Scientific, Cultural Organization, 2018). In tandem with economic and career advancement for the other (spouse) and self, family power dynamics are at play. We note the power husbands hold in some African families where the woman’s voice may not necessarily matter when decisions to relocate are made. Remarkably, women migrating on the basis of following the spouse and contrary to the expectation that the former’s career may be in jeopardy may, in an Appreciative Inquiry milieu, benefit their careers. Therefore, perpetual dependency on the other (spouse) may be circumvented. We, therefore, note intersectionality (dependence vs. independence) at play as P1 mutates her own future within the context of enduring prominence in respect of her husband’s career advancement.

Furthermore, the absence of marital ties seems to augur well for P2. Coupled with deserving female role models and positive stories told nurtured the ground for anticipatory decision-making. P2 evinced a sense of political awareness to question where “home” is. In addition to the principles of Appreciative Inquiry, we concede that in addition to the issues raised in this paragraph, P2 also considers herself belonging to the country to which she migrated due to family roots as well as exposure. So, P2 appears to be alert to the particularities of the colonial/postcolonial history (Pasura & Christou, 2018). It is also worth mentioning that we noted some silences and blind spots in P2’s narrative. Other than a brother and a father, no further mention of a male next of kin is made. We note the nonexistence (perhaps manifesting as silence) of “demand” or “pressure” or “expectation” from a male partner. Single unmarried women appear to be more mobile (Thomas & Logan, 2012). Contrary to the generally accepted norm that says women migrants remain in destinations for a shorter duration compared with men migrants, P1 and P2 seem to be in South Africa for a permanent stay. In respect of the coconstructed anecdote, it should be noted that even though the woman’s world may seem to have crashed, the power of positive thought (as espoused in Appreciative Inquiry) suggests that she may embark on career adaptation and succeed in it.

In shaping their stories, it can be noted that the participants’ historical experiences, epistemologies, and ways of thinking about and living their worlds have shaped their histories and their lives, and the meanings they make of women transnational migration. Furthermore, interwoven “within the fiber of these epistemologies is the way they tell their stories, what elements frame their stories, what is important to them; telling their stories is one of their ways of being in the world” (Ambrosio, 2015, p. 28).

Conclusion

We conclude that storied lives of women teacher transnational migrants are diverse and offer diverse intersectionalities. Guided by hope and the power of positive thought, women teacher migrants have the opportunity to maximize gains in their careers even in instances where the original decision to migrate was not necessarily theirs. Invoking career construction and adaptation in the new country remains a possibility until it is tapped into. We found the use of narratives in this study very enriching.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

The authors expressed gratitude to the women teachers who generously shared their storied lives.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Dipane Hlalele

Author Biographies

Dipane Hlalele is an associate professor in educational psychology at the University of Kwazulu-Natal (UKZN). Prior to joining UKZN, he was an assistant dean, lecturer, and high school teacher. His research and teaching interests include inclusive education, rural education, and sustainable learning.

Nontokozo Mashiya is an associate professor in early childhood education at UKZN. Her research interests include children’s mobility and early childhood development, education, and care.

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Understanding Women Teacher Transnational Migration: A Narrative Inquiry From Southern Africa

Abstract

Keywords

Introduction

Theoretical Underpinnings

Appreciative Inquiry as a Theoretical Framework Underpinning the Study

Interpretivism as a Paradigm Informing the Study

Method of Inquiry

Emerging Themes

Personal, Family, and Educational Backgrounds Are Diverse

Decision-Making

Leaving home country may be accounted for by some of the Appreciative Inquiry principles

Views on transnational migration

Discussion

Conclusion

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

Funding

ORCID iD

Author Biographies

References