РУАЭСТ (RUAEST)
Socialization of Tajik Students in Tomsk University Space: Looking for Models and Meaning
In the last ten years, the number of students from Tajikistan studying at Tomsk universities has been steadily increasing. Statistics of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation shows that this process is typical for a number of other Russian regions. Migrant students face the challenge of adaptation and enculturation in the host community. An important part of this process is getting a good command of the Russian language. Some of the graduates will stay in Tomsk or will move to other major cities of Siberia that attract migration processes and are the multimodal migration hosts. They will become Russian citizens, start their own families here. Treating these “new Russian Asians” not as migrants, but as a part of the civil society will strengthen the solidarity of the nation and will facilitate the solution of administrative problems. Successful social experience of university graduates will help to switch the Youth Bulge phenomenon – the pressure of a large number of young people in Tajikistan on the socio-economic situation in the country of origin and in the host community – to a positive track. Those who will be unable to successfully ёt into the host community may experience at ёrst symbolic, and then physical ghettoization. Disappointment and frustration may encourage them to seek “social justice” through participation in criminal groups and radical religious organizations. Individual in-depth interviews, which are the primary method of gathering information in the framework of this research project, are considered in terms of the status and other attributes of the interaction between a respondent and an interviewer.