This open access book offers new insights into the ageing-migration nexus and the nature of
home. Documenting the hidden world of France's migrant worker hostels it explores why older
North and West African men continue to live past retirement age in this sub-standard housing.
Conventional wisdom holds that at retirement labour migrants ought to instead return to their
families in home countries where their French pensions would have far greater purchasing
power.This paradox is the point of departure for a book which transports readers from the
banlieues of Paris to the banks of the Senegal River and the villages of the Anti-Atlas. In
intimate ethnographic detail the author brings to life the experiences of these older labour
migrants by sharing in the life of the hostels as a resident by observing at close quarters
the men's family life on the other side of the Mediterranean as a guest in their homes and
even by accompanying them in their travels by bus sea and air. The monograph evaluates
several theories of migration against rich qualitative data gathered from multiple methods:
biographical narrative and semi-structured interviews participant observation and archival
research. In the process it offers a thoughtful contribution to broader debates on what it
means for migrants to belong and achieve inclusion in society. This book has been awarded an
'honourable mention' in the Khayrallah Prize in Migration Studies courtesy of the Moise A.
Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies at North Carolina State University. For more
information please see: https: lebanesestudies.ncsu.edu awards scholarly 2018.php.This book
has been nominated for the 2019 BSA Philip Abrams Memorial Prize
