title: Songs of migration: The role of music in realising benefits and barriers of regional migrant resettlement and development in Queensland and New South Wales, Australia
Creators: name: Blok, Aleksandra
Publisher: name: Griffith University
Year: 2023
Subjects: subject: migration
subject: music
subject: regional Australia
subject: identity
subject: inclusion

description: The changing global shift of migrant settlement from metropolitan to regional areas over the last few decades makes it necessary to rethink the role that immigrants can play in regional development, as well as strategies for regional immigrant settlement. The subject of immigrant resettlement is particularly pertinent for Australia as the federal government recognises migration as a form of population and economic policy (Golebiowska, 2015, Productivity Commission Report, 2016). Researchers of regional migration in Australia consider the agenda of regional resettlement as a challenge of attracting and retaining migrants in regional areas (Krivokapic-Skoko &amp; Collins, 2016). The COVID-19 pandemic revealed the importance of migration for regional economic development and addressing skills shortages, demonstrating a need for further discussion of successful frameworks and methodologies of resettlement. This research examines current Australian migration policies defined as ‘post-multicultural’ (Levey, 2019) in a regional context. The specificity of the regional multicultural context makes music practices particularly important as a grass-roots agent of regional resettlement. Multiple studies suggest that music is involved in migrants’ negotiations of cultural belonging and wellbeing, utilised as a vehicle of cultural acceptance and social inclusion (Bafekr &amp; Leman, 1999; Baily, 1999; Lundberg, 2009; Marsh, 2012). Moreover, migrant music’s contributions to creating cultural and social change has been examined (Eyerman, 1998; Martinello, 2015; Scheding, 2018). The purpose of this study, therefore, is to answer a question about various roles of music in regional migrant resettlement: Why does music matter, and what difference does it make in the process of migrant resettlement and potentially regional development? The research took place in regional locations in the neighbouring states of New South Wales and Queensland. The specific sites of data collection were Wagga Wagga and Coffs Harbour in New South Wales, and Toowoomba and Cairns in Queensland. These places were chosen as each has a significant number of skilled and humanitarian migrants from non-Western backgrounds. Various formats and spaces of migrant music-making were analysed to answer the research question. This research illustrates how music is utilised by non-Western migrants to address issues of belonging and wellbeing through music practices. In negotiations of cultural identities, music represents a cultural ‘currency’ that can be ‘exchanged’ for relations of trust and cooperation in regional settings. Therefore, music becomes a vehicle of social inclusion, through which migrant musicians reconstruct local and translocal community identities and participate in wider local and transnational networks. This research investigates the place of music in addressing the issues of regional migrant youth and their process of ‘juggling’ cultural contradictions of belonging. Their musical endeavours prompt us to rethink regional areas as interconnected and impacting global music scenes. The thesis also stresses the role of migrant music as an integral element of negotiations of migrant cultural capital and its participation in regional cultural production. Migrant music practices reflect the existing gaps caused by cultural and social inequalities in regional music scenes and the institutional issues of regional accommodation of non-Western cultural capital. The research findings can be seen as an examination of regional multiculturalism through migrant music practices. This research contributes to discussion of the role of music as a proxy for the arts in regional migration, arts and regional development policies.