Experience of Health and Illness among Migrants from Turkey in Switzerland

This dissertation examines the experience of health and illness among people from Turkey, many of whom came to Switzerland between 1960s-2013, as a result of many different reasons, using variety of ways and methods, equipped with distinguish resources and motivations. Experiencing diverse social practices of the orientation and finding place in the new society, most of them has been still living in the German and French speaking parts of Switzerland as well as in the transnational fields.

Scrutinizing social processes of the health and illness experiences, I discuss within related social practices, which include the use of diverse routes to arrive in Switzerland; acquisition and striving of distinctive legal and social status; settling-down practices; as well as viewing the migration project within a totally different socio-cultural and political framework; be called and identified as a migrant; both losing and gaining one`s social status; engaging in unregulated role conflicts; as well as diverse practicing structural discipline; regulation and control. To focus on the selected aspects of these (migration specific) social practices, which I conceptualized as practices of being, becoming and doing migrant, and I show their relevance for health and illness. In addition, I discuss the role and function of social capital in terms of health and illness.