Paper/Proposal Title
Building a Bridge Across the Sea
Start Date
11-8-2017 3:30 PM
Keywords
migration, mobility, enclosure, displacement, human rights
Abstract
On October 3, 2013, the island of Lampedusa, Italy, was transformed into an international stage for the crisis of migration when a boat carrying hundreds of migrants traveling from Libya sank off its coast. Reports indicate that 368 people drowned, while 89 people were rescued, most of them by locals. Though the mass drowning of Africans seeking refuge in Europe was not a new phenomenon, the event brought international attention to Lampedusa and underscored the fragile line between local and global processes and the intertwined yet opposing forces of mobility and enclosure.
Using Lampedusa as a case study, this paper examines the reality of human displacement and mass migration through three distinct yet interrelated approaches. These include:
1) A humanitarian corridor to resettle one thousand vulnerable migrants from Syria, Lebanon, and Morocco co-created by the Italian government and the Federation of Protestant Churches in Italy;
2) Local responses that range from receiving and welcoming migrants and refugees as they disembark in Lampedusa to documenting the militarization of the island over an extended period of time;
3) Autonomous migration examined through the intimate stories of migrants and refugees arriving on the island after months of travel across the Western Sahara and Mediterranean Sea.
Based on ethnographic research conducted over two summers in Lampedusa, Italy, I argue that the human rights challenges posed by the militarization of the EU-Africa corridor are not insurmountable and are continuously challenged through autonomous migration and local efforts to circumvent failed immigration policies.
Included in
Building a Bridge Across the Sea
On October 3, 2013, the island of Lampedusa, Italy, was transformed into an international stage for the crisis of migration when a boat carrying hundreds of migrants traveling from Libya sank off its coast. Reports indicate that 368 people drowned, while 89 people were rescued, most of them by locals. Though the mass drowning of Africans seeking refuge in Europe was not a new phenomenon, the event brought international attention to Lampedusa and underscored the fragile line between local and global processes and the intertwined yet opposing forces of mobility and enclosure.
Using Lampedusa as a case study, this paper examines the reality of human displacement and mass migration through three distinct yet interrelated approaches. These include:
1) A humanitarian corridor to resettle one thousand vulnerable migrants from Syria, Lebanon, and Morocco co-created by the Italian government and the Federation of Protestant Churches in Italy;
2) Local responses that range from receiving and welcoming migrants and refugees as they disembark in Lampedusa to documenting the militarization of the island over an extended period of time;
3) Autonomous migration examined through the intimate stories of migrants and refugees arriving on the island after months of travel across the Western Sahara and Mediterranean Sea.
Based on ethnographic research conducted over two summers in Lampedusa, Italy, I argue that the human rights challenges posed by the militarization of the EU-Africa corridor are not insurmountable and are continuously challenged through autonomous migration and local efforts to circumvent failed immigration policies.
