White African migrants in regional Queensland

While most White African migrants in Australia settle in urban areas, some have chosen to settle in regional Australia. Reasons include the attractions offered in regional and provincial cities where migrants from countries such as South Africa and Zimbabwe can access comfortable lifestyle among spacious gardens and acreage areas. In doing so they can replicate aspects of their past life left behind in Africa. Such notions relate to constructs of lifestyle migration, and the embedded memories of past idealised lifestyles linked to cultural practices in the country of origin. Associations with a rural lifestyle are also attractive to those with experience of farming and rural industries. This migration emphasises the reality that areas of regional Australia are not moribund and isolated from external influences, but are a changing space and an environment attractive to outsiders. This paper focuses on Toowoomba and the Darling Downs region, a part of Queensland that has attracted white African migrants