Introduction: Becoming cosmopolitan? -- A cosmopolitan gaze towards migration studies -- Chinese migration to New Zealand: Desiring place and desirable migrants -- Cosmopolitanism and everyday life -- Rooted cosmopolitanism and everyday encounters -- Feeling cosmopolitan: Emotion, migration, and cosmopolitan sociability -- Conclusion: Interrupted pathways to becoming cosmopolitan -- References -- Index
Emotions matter in home-making, and this is particularly true in migration. Drawing upon qualitative research with 35 first generation new Chinese migrants in New Zealand, this article explores how emotions intersect with home-making and its role in generating "cosmopolitan sociability." Migrants invest in "emotional labor" to engage in cosmopolitan sociability in order to form new relationship networks, rebuild comfort points and generate a sense of home. For the Chinese migrants in this research, emotional dissonance generated from the early settlement period and everyday encounters have disrupted their opportunities for performing cosmopolitan sociability and feeling at home in a transnational setting.
This article contributes to the literature on migration aspirations by examining their temporal dimensions and capacity to shape and be reshaped through migration. Drawing on qualitative research with Chinese migrants in New Zealand, we unpack the shifting character of aspirations to migrate in relation to three dimensions: everyday times; individual lifetimes; and institutional times. Utilising this temporally sensitive theoretical approach, the article shows that migration aspirations do not occur at one time – before migration – or across one duration – but rather articulate with multiple temporalities ranging from the intensity or slowness of everyday life, through appropriate progression through life courses, to the broader vistas of institutional and geo-historical time. Migration aspirations are hence necessarily temporally distributed rather than located in a singular chronological instance, or only in relation to a linear arrangement of past–present–future, and as a result, we argue for greater attention on the generation and reconfiguration of aspirations across time.
Inland river basins in arid to semi-arid regions are widely distributed in Northwest China, Central Asia, Central Australia, and North Africa, and are often subject to significant human activities. The most distinctive natural feature of such basins is the shortage of water resources, and the pivotal reasons involve less precipitation and heavy evapotranspiration (ET). In recent years, intensive human activities also damage the natural environment of the basins. They result in many problems especially the deterioration of ecological environment which will lead to severe consequences such as desertification, sandstorm, the disappearance of wetlands, reduction of forest and grassland degradation. They prevent us from achieving the goal of sustainable development. How to balance economic development and ecosystem conservation and to realize the sense of sustainability in inland river basins will be vitally important. The Heihe River is the second largest inland river in the Northwest of China with a long history development by human (Figure 1). Water resources from the river are crucial not only for the ecosystem but also for local human societies. The Heihe River Basin (HRB) is divided into three zones with different landscapes and natural environments. The upstream of HRB is the headstream which generates water resources mainly from glaciers and snow in Qilian Mountain. A large population of nomadic national minorities inhabits here and keeps animal husbandry as the primary production activity. In the early times, the Chinese government encouraged production activities to stimulate economic growth, and significant over-grazing and resultant severe grassland degradation occurred. Grassland is crucial for maintaining water resources especially in arid regions, without grasses most water will quickly evaporate into the air. Therefore, land resource management about grassland and the impact of human activities on the natural environment are of high research value in the HRB. This research aims to investigate the impact of over-grazing on grassland degradation in the inland ecosystem of the HRB. The changes of grassland distribution were simulated under different over-grazing scenarios to provide a reference for resource management and the related decision-making process and to contribute to the sustainable development of the region.
Inland river basins in arid to semi-arid regions are widely distributed in Northwest China, Central Asia, Central Australia, and North Africa, and are often subject to significant human activities. The most distinctive natural feature of such basins is the shortage of water resources, and the pivotal reasons involve less precipitation and heavy evapotranspiration (ET). In recent years, intensive human activities also damage the natural environment of the basins. They result in many problems especially the deterioration of ecological environment which will lead to severe consequences such as desertification, sandstorm, the disappearance of wetlands, reduction of forest and grassland degradation. They prevent us from achieving the goal of sustainable development. How to balance economic development and ecosystem conservation and to realize the sense of sustainability in inland river basins will be vitally important. The Heihe River is the second largest inland river in the Northwest of China with a long history development by human (Figure 1). Water resources from the river are crucial not only for the ecosystem but also for local human societies. The Heihe River Basin (HRB) is divided into three zones with different landscapes and natural environments. The upstream of HRB is the headstream which generates water resources mainly from glaciers and snow in Qilian Mountain. A large population of nomadic national minorities inhabits here and keeps animal husbandry as the primary production activity. In the early times, the Chinese government encouraged production activities to stimulate economic growth, and significant over-grazing and resultant severe grassland degradation occurred. Grassland is crucial for maintaining water resources especially in arid regions, without grasses most water will quickly evaporate into the air. Therefore, land resource management about grassland and the impact of human activities on the natural environment are of high research value in the HRB. This research aims to investigate the impact of over-grazing on grassland degradation in the inland ecosystem of the HRB. The changes of grassland distribution were simulated under different over-grazing scenarios to provide a reference for resource management and the related decision-making process and to contribute to the sustainable development of the region.
