Go Home? - The Politics of Immigration Controversies
A new book focusing on the Home Office's 'Go Home' immigration campaign has been released, co-written by Birmingham School of Media professor Kirsten Forkert.
Kirsten was part of an 18-month project of the same name, which was created in response to the London campaign, which called on migrants with an insecure legal status to 'go home or face arrest', which attracted widespread controversy and activism. Kirsten's role as co-investigator of the project involved carrying out an ethnography of activism, online ethnography of the public debate around the van campaign, including Twitter as a site of struggle, and she also worked with community organisations in Birmingham to conduct focus groups and interviews.
Following the report, the new book, Go Home? - The Politics of Immigration Controversies, sets out to explore the effects of the campaign, particularly in terms of policy, public debate, pro-migrant and anti-racist activism, as well as the everyday lives of people in Britain. This book presents the authors' findings, and provides insights into the practice of conducting research on such a charged and sensitive topic.