Statelessness and the Lives of the Children of Migrants in Sabah, East Malaysia

This article explores issues involved with researching statelessness ‘on the ground’ during ethnographic fieldwork in Malaysia with the children of migrants and refugees. It argues that many of these children, whose parents or grandparents originate from Indonesia or the Philippines, lack an ‘effect...

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Main Author:	Catherine Allerton
Format:	Article
Language:	English
Published:	Ubiquity Press 2014-01-01
Series:	Tilburg Law Review
Subjects:	statelessness migration citizenship children Malaysia Sabah
Online Access:	https://tilburglawreview.com/articles/52

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spelling	doaj-e22b1bf358ad4b0dbab13d18d2c713ab2020-11-25T01:27:48ZengUbiquity PressTilburg Law Review2211-25452014-01-01191-2263410.1163/22112596-0190200446Statelessness and the Lives of the Children of Migrants in Sabah, East MalaysiaCatherine Allerton0Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology, London School of EconomicsThis article explores issues involved with researching statelessness ‘on the ground’ during ethnographic fieldwork in Malaysia with the children of migrants and refugees. It argues that many of these children, whose parents or grandparents originate from Indonesia or the Philippines, lack an ‘effective nationality’. However, rather than statelessness or illegality per se, what dominates these children’s lives is their perpetual ‘foreignness’. Even when children might be able to have their citizenship recognised by a parental country of origin, families often prefer to remain undocumented, and to wait (perhaps indefinitely) for the Malaysian citizenship they perceive as rightfully theirs.https://tilburglawreview.com/articles/52statelessnessmigrationcitizenshipchildrenMalaysiaSabah
collection	DOAJ
language	English
format	Article
sources	DOAJ
author	Catherine Allerton
spellingShingle	Catherine Allerton Statelessness and the Lives of the Children of Migrants in Sabah, East Malaysia Tilburg Law Review statelessness migration citizenship children Malaysia Sabah
author_facet	Catherine Allerton
author_sort	Catherine Allerton
title	Statelessness and the Lives of the Children of Migrants in Sabah, East Malaysia
title_short	Statelessness and the Lives of the Children of Migrants in Sabah, East Malaysia
title_full	Statelessness and the Lives of the Children of Migrants in Sabah, East Malaysia
title_fullStr	Statelessness and the Lives of the Children of Migrants in Sabah, East Malaysia
title_full_unstemmed	Statelessness and the Lives of the Children of Migrants in Sabah, East Malaysia
title_sort	statelessness and the lives of the children of migrants in sabah, east malaysia
publisher	Ubiquity Press
series	Tilburg Law Review
issn	2211-2545
publishDate	2014-01-01
description	This article explores issues involved with researching statelessness ‘on the ground’ during ethnographic fieldwork in Malaysia with the children of migrants and refugees. It argues that many of these children, whose parents or grandparents originate from Indonesia or the Philippines, lack an ‘effective nationality’. However, rather than statelessness or illegality per se, what dominates these children’s lives is their perpetual ‘foreignness’. Even when children might be able to have their citizenship recognised by a parental country of origin, families often prefer to remain undocumented, and to wait (perhaps indefinitely) for the Malaysian citizenship they perceive as rightfully theirs.
topic	statelessness migration citizenship children Malaysia Sabah
url	https://tilburglawreview.com/articles/52
work_keys_str_mv	AT catherineallerton statelessnessandthelivesofthechildrenofmigrantsinsabaheastmalaysia
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Statelessness and the Lives of the Children of Migrants in Sabah, East Malaysia

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