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Immobility and crisis: rethinking migrants’ journeys through Libya to Europe

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 August 2021

Marthe Achtnich
Marthe Achtnich*
Affiliation:
Fellow by Examination in Anthropology, Magdalen College, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

Much work on recent unauthorized migration via Libya to Europe – often framed as a migration ‘crisis’ – is focused on linear movement, isolated snapshots and points of arrival on European shores. Migrants’ experiences along their journeys and prior to arriving in Europe, important for their future mobilities, are neglected. By highlighting multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork in Libya and Malta, this paper calls for an analytical focus on immobilities along the journey, so as to develop a more nuanced account of the lived experiences of mobile life. Immobility retrieves situations and relations erased by linear accounts of migration. When looked at in comparative terms through the journey, immobility reveals the variegated forces that shape mobile life.

توقف الحركة والأزمة: إعادة التفكير في رحلات المهاجرين عبر ليبيا إلى أوروبا

مارثا آختني

يركز الكثير من العمل على الهجرة الأخيرة الغير موثقة عبر ليبيا إلى أوروبا – والذي غالباً ما يتم وصفه في سياق ”أزمة“ الهجرة – على أنها حركة خطية، وعلى لقطات معزولة ونقاط وصول المهاجرين إلى الشواطئ الأوروبية. ونتيجة لذلك، فإن الأراضي التي يجتازها المهاجرون قبل وصولهم إلى أوروبا، وهو الأمر الحاسم من حيث التزوير اللازم للتنقلات الطويلة المدى، أمر يتم إسقاطه وإدراجه تحت مجهول. بالاعتماد على العمل الميداني الإثنوغرافي متعدد المواقع في ليبيا ومالطا، تحاول هذه الورقة نقل بؤرة التحليل إلى الرحلات و التجارب المعيشية للمهاجرين. حيث تتفحص الأشكال المختلفة من توقف الحركة في ليبيا ومالطا، وذلك لإظهار بأن البحث في الوسائل التي يتعامل بها المهاجرون - الذين لا يحملون وثائق - مع حالات توقف الحركة هو أمر حاسم لفهم كيفية تأكيد الأدوات التي يستعملها المهاجرين و تشكيل تحركاتهم. يمكّن التركيز على الرحلة من استرداد السياقات التي تُمحى بالسرد الخطي للهجرة. إنها تعيد صياغة دراسة الأماكن المعزولة، مع مراعاة منطقة أوسع تتشكل على طول طرق الهجرة وعبرها.

Type
Part 1: Research Papers
Information
Libyan Studies , Volume 52 , November 2021 , pp. 154 - 158
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for Libyan Studies 2021

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