School of Planning, Architecture and Civil Engineering
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Murphy, Aisling
| Migrant integration in new destination areas: a study of Northern Ireland |
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Address: |
School of Planning, Architecture and Civil Engineering |
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Telephone: |
+44 (0)2890 974254
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Current Research:
Since 2004, a result of European Union enlargement, Northern Ireland has experienced an unprecedented rise in new migrants from Central and Eastern European countries. Considering Northern Ireland as a ‘new destination’ for immigration, this has presented new challenges for both migrants adapting to life in a new society and for local government and civil society in responding to this change. Integration, despite being the most popular way of conceptualising the relationship between migrants and society, has become a highly debated and loaded term with strong theoretical and empirical connotations. Using the analytical concepts of structure and agency the research aims to investigate integration as ‘a two-way process’. This will be achieved using the perspectives of migrants combined with an evaluation of the efforts of the statutory, community and voluntary sector who are involved in facilitating this process. Contextually, Northern Ireland provides a unique case in which to study this phenomenon. With little history of large scale immigration and a society still coming to terms with a historical legacy of conflict and division, research into the integration agenda for migrant communities remains largely unexamined in both policy and practice. It is expected that the research will provide unique insights into both the personal lives of migrants and how these are situated within larger scale contexts of achieving integration.
Supervisors: Dr Ruth McAreavey, Dr Jenny Muir and Dr Brendan Murtagh
Qualifications:
MSc with distinction in Environmental Planning, Queen’s University Belfast, 2008
BSc Hons (2:1) in Geography, Queen’s University Belfast, 2007
Publications:
Murphy, A. and Murtagh, B. (2012) Children, the Environment and Participatory Planning, SPANDREL: Journal of the School of Planning and Architecture: New Dimensions in Research of Environments for Living, Issue 4, Spring 2012: 2-9.
Murtagh, B. and Murphy, A. (2011) Environmental Affordances and Children in Post-conflict Belfast, Space and Polity, Volume 15(1): 65-79.
Murphy, A. and Murtagh, B. (2010) Children, Policy and the Built Environment, Working Paper No. 1, July 2010, Institute of Spatial and Environmental Planning, School of Planning, Architecture and Civil Engineering, Queen’s University Belfast. Available here
Conferences / Presentations:
‘Migrant integration in new destination areas: a study of Northern Ireland’, Popfest 2012, Loughborough University, June 2012
Awards:
Turley Associates Prize for the best MSc Thesis in Environmental Planning, 2008
Turley Associates Prize for the best MSc Thesis in Environmental Planning, 2008
Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI) Prize for Best Overall Student, MSc Environmental Planning, 2008
Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) Prize for International Spatial Planning, 2008
Funding:
William and Betty MacQuitty Travel Scholarship, 2012
PhD Research Studentship, Queen’s University Belfast and the Northern Ireland Rural Development Council, 2010
ESRC-CLG Scholarship to undertake RTPI accredited master’s course, 2007