Challenges of parenting in migrant families

Abstract

his article derives from the results of two qualitative scientific initiation research projects (PIBIC), which investigated the challenges of parenting for migrants, based on a Venezuelan family through interviews with parents and, using the Family Drawings with Stories (DF-E) procedure, we sought to understand the migratory experience for their children. We analyzed the suffering resulting from cultural conflicts and the strategies adopted to rebuild life in a new country. The results highlight that migration causes suffering due to the loss of cultural references related to identity formation. Families, as a form of group protection, try to resist these changes, which requires a process of identity negotiation in relation to the establishment of the narcissistic contract and psychic transmission. However, children are inserted into the new cultural context through school and depend on this family negotiation to establish the possibility of building a process of interculturality. It is concluded that public reception policies are fundamental to facilitating these processes, considering that they can facilitate the transition of these families, especially the second generation.