The Influence of Migration on Sense of Belonging and Self-Identification of the Biduns Living in Sweden

Abstract: This research presents the daily life experience of the Kuwaiti Bidun people after migration to Sweden and tries to understand how they view their sense of belonging and how they deal with the emergence of new identity formations in their everyday life practices. By taking a closer look at the different modes of belonging and new identity formations in the process of migration for the Biduns, I will analyze how new interactions, new engagements, irregularity and postcolonial roots shape sense of belonging and new identity formations. By using a postcolonial perspective, I will answer the question of how the Bidun’s Bidunness identity experience the sense of belonging and the emergence of new identity formations after migration to Sweden. By conducting semi-structured in-depth interviews with a selected group of the Biduns living in Malmö this thesis aims to understand Bidun’s feelings of sense of belonging and emergence of new identity formations through their eyes. The thesis shed light on the way Bidunness identity represents itself in connections with its previous interactions and the way it experiences a sense of belonging when confronting with its other.