Immigrants’ Citizenship Perceptions

My sincere gratitude also goes to Senior Professor Nayani Melegoda from University of Colombo (UOC), Sri Lanka, who is my long-term mentor. Thank you for always being my rock, through thick and thin. From writing several academic recommendation letters for me, to listening to my reflections about life, I appreciate each and everything you have done for me. I also thank Dr. Maneesha Wanasignhe-Pasqual for all the academic, administrative, and personal support offered to me. I am also very grateful for all my colleagues at the Department of International Relations, University of Colombo, Sri Lanka: Dr. Chaminda, Dr. Hasith, Krishanthi, Kulani, Dr. Ajith, and Dr. Menik for stimulating my intellectual curiosity constantly. Waradas, Krishan, and Samal deserve special mentions. Your critical insights and constructive feedback have enriched this book in multiple ways, and thank you so much for that.

Some sections of this book were presented at conferences and talks at the Faculty of Arts and Faculty of Graduate Studies at UOC, New Zealand Political Studies Association (NZPSA), VUW, Aotearoa Migration Research Network, University of Bari – Italy, Colombo Think Tank, International Studies Association (ISA) – USA, and Osmania University – Hyderabad, India. I thank the audiences in all these conferences and talks for their comments and questions. I would also like to sincerely acknowledge the NCAS (National Centre for Advanced Studies in Humanities and Social Sciences, Sri Lanka) scholarship that made this research possible and to the University of Colombo for granting me paid leave throughout my Ph.D. period.

A special thanks is deserved by all my fieldwork participants in Melbourne, Sydney, Auckland, and Wellington who let me explore their migrant lives with open arms. Thank you for sharing your life stories, your thoughts, and experiences with me. I appreciate the trust you all placed in me. Thank you Pavithra, Isuri, Wasana, Chamani, Maduhari, Danushka, Srihan, and Maheesa for being lifetime friends. You might not know that you were a part of this book, but you were. Thank you for encouraging me to get over my lows. I also thank Pathum Fernando for helping me to be stable during the course of my research.

Last but not least, my family deserves huge appreciation. My husband provided me with much practical support, enabling me to focus on my research. Supun, I am forever grateful to you for your never-ending support, tolerance, flexibility, and openness. I thank my darling daughter Sukhi, who was two years old when I started my research and had to adapt to a variety of changes because of my studies. I hope you will read this book one day and ask millions of questions from me. I thank Thercie Hettiarachchi, my mother-in-law, as well as all the other family members of my husband’s family, for rendering support whenever we needed them. Without this practical help, writing this book would be far away.

My intellectual curiosity to study Sri Lankan immigrants emanated from my father, Sarath Jayawardena (Thaththa). Being a Sri Lankan immigrant himself for nearly 30 years (living in Italy), he constantly stimulates my inquisitiveness about the way Sri Lankan immigrants negotiate their sense of belonging as citizens between host and home countries. Thaththa, you never failed to impress and surprise me about immigrants’ lives. Thank you for being the silent motivator for this entire project. I also thank my only brother Ishanka Jayawardena (Malli), for everything he did and said to keep me stable throughout the last six years. A very special thanks are to my wonder woman, the strongest and the kindest woman I have ever known, my mother, Ramani Wickramasinghe (Amma). If I am to name only one individual who has given me energy during the course of this project, undoubtedly it is you. Thank you for always standing with me, Amma. The most fortunate thing that has ever happened to me is being born as your daughter.

However, the Prime Minister of Aotearoa New Zealand noted that the responsibility of the incident should only be carried by the individual attacker and not by any faith, culture, or ethnicity (Hurley & Savage, 2021). This statement led the people to be specifically worried about the existence of extremism in Aotearoa New Zealand rather than worrying about the immigrants’ nationality in this particular incident. It was also reported that there was no sign that the attacker was radicalised by the time he arrived in Aotearoa New Zealand, but likely to have become so during his stay in Aotearoa New Zealand. Even though Aotearoa New Zealand could identify this event as an act of one individual without letting it to reflect on the whole Sri Lankan immigrant group in the country, this is not the case in every host country and in the aftermath of a similar tragedy. Many other Western democratic host countries tend to have stronger anti-immigrant sentiments than Aotearoa New Zealand where such individual incidents easily trigger broader anti-immigrant sentiments from natives.

An example is the Cronulla beach incident which took place in 2005 in Australia. On 11 December 2005, nearly five thousand white Australians gathered, calling for a reclamation of their right to manage Cronulla beach, an iconic beach suburb in Southern Sydney (Collins, 2007; Economou, 2007). This riot was triggered by an incident that took place a week earlier between a group of youths of Middle-Eastern appearance and Anglo-Australian lifeguards. This group of Lebanese youth, usually called Lebos by their opponents, had attacked two lifeguards, “the quintessential masculinised figure of white Australian culture,” when they asked the Lebanese youth group to stop playing football, an unpopular sport in Australia with “wogs” – a racist term to describe migrants from Southern Europe (Farid, 2009, p.61).