Narrating Migrant Enterprise and Experience in the Australian Cultural and Creative Industries

This chapter explores the presence of migrants in the Australian ‘cultural and creative industries,’ framing accounts of their experiences in terms of a search for creative community and kinship. The chapter asks: What are the stories that creative migrants tell about themselves? Which notions of migration and mobility as well as integration and inclusivity do they narrate? How do they reflect upon their role as migrant creatives in the cultural sector? Exploring the concept of the ‘cultural migrapreneur,’ the chapter surveys online communities of practice, narrating experiences and issues encountered by creative migrants in ‘making it,’ drawing also on semi-structured interviews with individuals at work in supportive intermediary organizations. The chapter documents how migrants seek to affirm and maintain their creative status by seeking professional opportunities while weighted with expectations, obligations, and continuing challenges of arrival, acculturation, and settlement.