Content area
Abstract
In this study, I investigate the integration policy, identity, and integration practice of Turkish immigrants in Berlin. Utilizing Soja's concepts of Second- and Thirdspace, I compare the policy discourse on integration with lived integration practice of Turkish immigrants in Berlin's immigrant neighborhoods of Kreuzberg and Neukölln.
In investigating these related but different processes, I attempt to capture the difference between the way integration is framed in the political discourse, and the way it is lived by the immigrants. I show that it may not necessarily be the case—as has been argued by policy-makers in Germany—that Turkish immigrants are unwilling or unable to integrate, but rather that—based on the dominant ways of framing of integration in the policy discourse—we overlook their lived integration strategies.
Space plays an important conceptual and empirical role in this process. Conceptually, Soja's Second- and Thirdspace concepts provide a lens for understanding the difference between what is imagined and conceived in the policy discourse, and what is lived in the neighborhoods. Empirically, space is central to the formation and assertion of identity: The relationship between space and identity is mutually contingent. Thus, urban space—and the different meanings it can acquire through different practices and visibilities—represents the centerpiece of my analysis. It is specifically within the microcosm of the urban setting that different identities clash and compete in the search for a home in the city.
