Jeffrey Patterson

Utrecht University, Media and Culture Studies, Faculty Member

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Jeffrey Patterson graduated from the master program Youth, Education, and Society in the Department of Social and Behavioural Sciences at Utrecht University, The Netherlands. He completed a post-graduate programme in Gender Studies also at Utrecht University. He has his undergraduate degree in Sociology and holds a minor in Psychology from Ryerson University, Toronto, Canada. His growing interest in digital diaspora research and the critical perspective of intersectionality led him to this particular area of focus.

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Journal articles by Jeffrey Patterson

Transnational Digital Intimacy Practices

Global Perspectives, 2020

Personal and intimate consequences of cultural globalization have received little critical attent... more Personal and intimate consequences of cultural globalization have received little critical attention in comparison to scholarship on politics, finance, or the environment. Taking digital technology practices of young adult expatriates as an entry point to understand the emotional and affective consequences of transnational mobility, in this article we research the interrelated cultural politics of emotion, migration, and digitization of middle-class mobilities. Presenting a case study of digital experiences of young adult expatriates (aged fifteen to twenty-five years) living in the Netherlands, we seek to better understand how emotions and affects of middle-class transnational mobility are mediated through digital technologies. Our empirical argument draws from thirty-one semistructured, face-to-face in-depth interviews with young adult expatriates and smartphone photo-elicitation exercises. We develop the notion of transnational digital intimacy practices to address how transnational mobile subjects negotiate emotional precarity through selective smartphone and social media practices. Finally, we call into question the notion of "expatriates" as supposed elite mobiles with global privilege. This article is part of the Global Perspectives, Media and Communication special issue on "Media, Migration, and Nationalism," guest-edited by Koen Leurs and Tomohisa Hirata.

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‘We Live Here, and We Are Queer!’ Young Adult Gay Connected Migrants’ Transnational Ties and Integration in the Netherlands

by Koen Leurs and Jeffrey Patterson

Media and Communication, 2019

Upon arrival to Europe, young adult gay migrants are found grappling with sexual norms, language ... more Upon arrival to Europe, young adult gay migrants are found grappling with sexual norms, language demands, cultural ex- pectations, values and beliefs that may differ from their country of origin. Parallel processes of coming-out, coming-of-age and migration are increasingly digitally mediated. Young adult gay migrants are “connected migrants”, using smartphones and social media to maintain bonding ties with contacts in their home country while establishing new bridging relation- ships with peers in their country of arrival (Diminescu, 2008). Drawing on the feminist perspective of intersectionality, socio-cultural categories like age, race, nationality, migration status, and gender and sexuality have an impact upon iden- tification and subordination, thus we contend it is problematic to homogenize these experiences to all young adult gay migrants. The realities of settlement and integration starkly differ between those living on the margins of Europe—forced migrants including non-normative racialized young gay men—and voluntary migrants—such as elite expatriates including wealthy, white and Western young gay men. Drawing on 11 in-depth interviews conducted in Amsterdam, the Netherlands with young adult gay forced and voluntary migrants, this article aims to understand how sexual identification in tandem with bonding and bridging social capital diverge and converge between the two groups all while considering the interplay between the online and offline entanglements of their worlds.

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