Wandering at a Crossroad: An Exploration of Gendered Mobility Aspirations in the Study-to-work Transition of Chinese Graduates at Dutch Universities

Abstract

The value of a gender lens in immigration study is increasingly highlighted nowadays, but gender analysis is infrequently applied to research on international student mobility. This study aims to unpack how gender impacts on mobility aspirations of Chinese international graduates in the Netherlands. Drawing on an online survey (n=96) and semi-structured in-depth interviews followed by the method ‘story completion' with 25 international graduates and 3 Chinese parents of international students, this paper analyses gender intertwining with post-graduation mobility at individual, inter-relational and international level. The findings underline how gender identities shape the personal goals of mobility, how gender roles in a relationship and international settings confine or facilitate mobility desires and how these gender effects are intersected. This research also stresses how gender-role ideologies are diverse and dynamic in one's life course. Therefore, the study-to-work transition means not only a career start for Chinese international graduates. They attach more gendered meanings and responsibilities to post-education mobility, considering social roles they are engaging or will engage in. This research conduces to depicting unequal gender patterns in international students' after-study mobility trajectories.