Languaging Diversity in EU Institutional Discourse on Immigrant Integration

This chapter begins by identifying dominant concepts for the study of integration highlighting differences and/or similarities among them with special attention to integration of immigrants from a European perspective. The research develops to highlight interrelationships between notions identified in dimensions of integration and analysis of roles through words, especially nouns, deployed in EU institutional discourse in dealingwith immigrant integration. The investigation is based on a quantitative-qualitative analysis of the texts in a Corpus ad hoc collected and searched by AntConc 3.1.2 software. The Corpus includes different text types in a time-span that extends from 2008 to 2013, notably specialised legal texts and texts addressed to a broad and mixed audience: EU Directives, “Strengthening the Global Approach to Migration: Increasing Coordination, Coherence and Synergies” (8.10.2008), European Agenda for the Integration of Third- Country Nationals” (20-7-2011), “EU Initiatives Supporting the Integration of Third-Country Nationals” (20-7-2011). In particular, the analysis has shown a move in the 2011 texts towards the gender perspective and a more careful look at the figure of the “ethnic entrepreneur” with a socio-economic role in the host society in the EU Initiatives text, which seems to mark a step forward in the EU stance to migration and im/migrant integration. The migrant’s identity moves from a generic “person” or “applicant” in the Directives to figures of migrants as beneficiary (man, woman, child, migrant) to whom rights (education, public health, residence and so on) must be granted, and who at times are granted a role as social actors. Overall, a depersonalised discourse on immigrant integration appears to be slowly replaced by a new type of discourse stressing the EU involvement in operationalising processes and activities in favour of immigrant integration.