Territorialisation: Migrant-state relationships as everyday political and religious processes

At this one day PhD-workshop we will discuss ‘encounters between migrants and states’ with an emphasis on processes of territorialisation.

The aim is to move beyond analytical approaches to migration policy that are mainly skeptical of state practices, and rather discuss ways of investigating migrant-state relationships as processes of territorialisation which encompass the everyday inscription of symbolic boundaries (both political, religious and social) taking place between migrants and states. Our hope is that the concept of territorialisation can be helpful in theorizing a variety of migrant positions and experiences in light of differing state practices and we want to engender a critical debate on the usefulness, limits and meanings of this concept.

In the workshop we especially wish to focus on territorialisation in relation to issues of legal status and religion as we see these as sites for specifically poignant negotiations over the symbolic conquest of territory.

The workshop therefore intends to test the concept of territorialisation in relation to empirical investigations of migrant-state relationships in different regions of the world. Some of the questions we wish to engage through these examples are: How are citizenship and illegality conceptualized as symbolic boundaries and inscribed on territory in different ways by different states and what impact does this have on migrant experiences and their room for maneuvering? How do migrants inhabit social and religious territories vis a vis different states and what new configurations of society does this variety entail? Our aim is to unravel some of the differing ways the meeting between migrants and states takes place and investigate how space is conquered as territory in this process.

We warmly welcome PhD students working on issues related to migrant-state relationships to participate in this oneday workshop.

 

Invited speakers:

Madeleine Reeves, Senior Lecturer of Social Anthropology at University of Manchester, UK.

Tuomas Martikainen, Director of the Institute of Migration in Turku, Finland.

 

ECTS:

0,8 for participation and active engagement in discussions.

2,3 for participation with ten minute presentation.

 

Programme:

The workshop and seminar will take place over one day on the 9^th of May. We begin the day with public lectures by the two invited speakers and end the day with a closed PhD workshop and discussion in the afternoon. For the workshop all participating PhD students are asked to contribute with a ten minute presentation of how their own work relates to the topic. Each workshop will be chaired by one of the invited speakers.

 

Registration:

To register for this course please send a short motivation (maximum one page) in which you also describe  your academic background  and outline the ways in which your research relates to the topic to one of the organisers:

Astrid Krabbe Trolle: a.trolle@hum.ku.dk

Birgitte Stampe Holst: stampe@hum.ku.dk

Deadline for registration is 15th of April 2016.

 

Target group:

PhD students interested in the concept of territorialisation.

 

Readings:

Gupta, Akhil og James Ferguson 1997: “Beyond Culture: space, identity and the politics of difference” i Akhil Gupta and James Ferguson (eds.) Culture, Power, Place. Duke University Press. Pp. 33-51.

Brun, Cathrine 2001: “Reterritorializing the Relationship between People and Place in Refugee Studies” i Geografiske Annaler, vol. 83, no. 1. Pp. 15-25.

Blom Hansen, Thomas og Finn Stepputat 2001: “Introduction, States of Imagination” i Thomas Blom Hansen and Finn Stepputat (eds.) States of Imagination. Duke University Press. Pp. 1-38.

Reeves, Madeleine 2009: “Materialising State Space: ‘Creeping Migration’ and Territorial Integrity in Southern Kyrgyzstan” i Europe-Asia Studies, vol. 61, no. 7. Pp. 1277-1313.

Garbin, David 2014: “Regrounding the sacred: transnational religion, place making and the politics of diaspora among the Congolese in London and Atlanta” i Global Networks, vol. 14, no. 3. Pp. 363-382.

Landau, Loren B. 2014: "Religion and the foundation of urban difference: belief, transcendence and transgression in South Africa and Johannesburg", Global Networks 14 (3): 291-305.

Vásquez, Manuel A. og Kim Knott 2014: ”Three Dimensions of Religious Place Making in Diaspora”, Global Networks 14 (3): 326-347.