Children and Migration

This chapter will explore how children experienced a sense of community and family within the context of migration, focusing on case studies from the nineteenth century and the Viking Age. In particular, the chapter will look at two main migratory contexts: transnational and internal migration. There has been extensive research on migration in diverse contexts and time periods by archaeologists, but the experiences of children of migration have largely been unexplored. Analysis of recent migrations, principally by social scientists, has highlighted the distinctive experiences that children may have of migration, and revealed that children are often important mediators of the ensuing cultural interaction and assimilation, being particularly socially adept at extending adult social networks in new settings. Children can, indeed, be shown to shape the migratory experience in fundamental ways.