Migration and Assimilation in a Nordic Setting: A Generational Analysis of the Thai Diaspora in Denmark

บทคัดย่อ

 The Thai diaspora is one of the biggest Asian immigrant groups in Europe, and especially in Nordic countries. Most research about Thai immigration has focused on topics related to female immigrants, such as human trafficking and transnational marriage migration, while the children of these Thai women who immigrated with their mothers from Thailand (the 1.5 generation) have been neglected, and very little attention has been paid to their assimilation into Nordic society. This article aims to shed light on Thai migration in Denmark and reexamine the key theories of assimilation that originated in the US. Furthermore, it attempts to theorize the assimilation process in a Nordic setting through an ethnographic study of Thai immigrants in Copenhagen. The research findings show that there are significant generational differences in the assimilation process between Thai women and the 1.5 generation in Denmark. However, due to the unique social structures of Nordic countries, this “dissonant acculturation” does not lead to the negative effects that the segmented assimilation theory assumes.