This book is a study of nostalgia, belonging and community which provides a new theoretical framework for understanding retirement migration. It is the first account of retirement migration that focuses on the voices of retired working-class British women, who are considering either return migration to the UK or permanent/temporary settlement in Spain. Through a narrative approach, we follow their journeys as they seek, recreate and construct community in a new context and their experiences of belonging and non-belonging are unravelled. The book offers a critical perspective, challenging positivistic, essentialist definitions of community.
Retiring to the Costas: British women's narratives of nostalgia, belonging and community
Part One: Lives in context;
Conceptualising, theorising and narrating retirement migration;
Locating the women: macro, meso and micro contexts;
Boundary spanning and reconstitution: retirement migration and the search for community;
Part Two: Lived experiences;
Leaving the UK: motives, agency and decision-making processes;
Living in Spain: 'idyllisation' and realisation;
Belonging to networks: reconciling agency and positionalities;
Renegotiating family relationships: managing intimacy from a distance;
Locating 'home' and community: the end point of plot movement;
Conclusion: nostalgia, community and belonging: linking time and space;
Afterword.
