RETHINKING GENDER, RETHINKING MIGRATION: Strange Heaven – The Social Implications of Nikola’s Case

During the research in Norway, our Polish-Norwegian team encountered a social factwhich inspired us to create a separate research field in the project. Many intervieweesmentioned the name of The Child Welfare Service of Norway: Barnevernet. The majorityof opinions about this service were negative – both in the respondents’ narratives and onthe internet forums for the Polish migrants (‘mojanorwegia’) or social network fan pages(Polacy w Stavanger, Polacy w Norwegii). There are vividly negative emotions present inthe Poles’ statements about raising children in Norway, and the fear of Barnevernet is particularlyapparent. It was this ‘fear’ that triggered the research presented in this article. Westarted to look for its presence in both the Polish public reality and in the private sphere.We decided to use a critical discourse analysis to discover communication mechanismswhich have influenced the shape of the Polish attitude towards Barnevernet.