In the context of transnational higher education,this study examines Chinese and British academic migrants everyday work�瞝ife practices in a Sino�睻K university joint venture.The study breaks new ground by teasing out the difficulties,problems,misunderstandings,contradictions,and tensions that occur in an unfamiliar transnational academic field for academic migrants.Correspondingly,it also looks at the career opportunities and international social and academic connections that gradually cultivated in the transnational working environment.The study offers a deeper understanding of transnational academic space by providing empirical insights into transnational academics moving strategies,their pedagogic creativeness,and how their sense of belonging is intertwined with different places on the‘host’university campus.

　　The study adopted a variety of qualitative methodological tools(semi�瞫tructured interviews,photo interviews and participant observation)to explore the everyday texture of academic migrants working practices in transnational workplace.The findings suggest the‘unexpected’barriers in the‘new’transitional academic workplace have significance for academic migrants further professional improvement and transnational mobility.It also reveals how academic migrants are not just passively adapting or integrating into the‘new’transnational professional structure,but also positively challenging and changing its boundaries.

　　The research sheds light on scholarly debates on transnational academic mobility and the internationalisation of higher education in the Sino�睟ritish context.It goes beyond the national boundaries of higher education and places the investigation in a broader frame of social,cultural and spatial analysis in order to generate a deeper understanding of academic migrants everyday practices.It argues for a transnational and enduring understanding of academic migrants experience and points out that those experiences are nationally unbounded,yet locally specific.It also takes a step forward in academic mobility studies,by using grounded evidence gathered in transnational academic space to challenge the mono�瞐cademic cultural stereotypes bounded within national borders.

　　Here，I wish to acknowledge the encouragement,help and support from my faculty,supervisor,colleagues,friends and family during the completion of this dissertation and my doctoral studies in this four memorable years in London.Firstly,I would like to give my sincere thanks to Professor Katie Willis and Dr.Katherine Brickell for their expertise,guidance and support for my research through out the challenging Ph�盌 process.I would like to also give my thanks to the Department of Geography at the Royal Holloway University of London.This is very good Geography Department,not only because it is ranked 2nd in the UK and 1st in England for worldclass research,but also because there are many wonderful people I have met during my time here.I would also like to say a special thanks to Rupert Griffiths and Weiqiang Lin,who are my closest friends and colleagues,for their warmth,friendship and academic support in the past few years.Finally,a special thank goes to my parents,they are the best in the world.I am dedicating this work to both of them.