RGS Conference: Pt II

The second day of the conference has been every bit as enjoyable as the first, with three sessions focusing to various degrees on migration. On paper, today’s first session - ‘Camps, Control & Crime’ - was the most pertinent to my own research and, with five excellent presentations, it did not disappoint. The speakers led us through a full spectrum of containment: Hanno Brankamp’s paper on the policing of Kenya’s Kakuma camp raised questions of the ‘humanitarian-violence complex’ and the role of aid agencies; Maria Hagan presented a fascinating reading of the disassembling of the Calais Jungle and the ‘invisiblising’ of its scattered former residents; and Alexandra Rijke’s presentation framed checkpoints on the Israeli-Palestinian border as ‘spaces of exception’ within an intricate theoretical context.

The two papers which interested me most both happened to be concerned with Germany’s asylum system: Marielle Zill’s ‘Open Doors, Mental Borders’ and Toby Parsloe’s 'The Architecture of Securitisation’. Having chatted previously to Toby - who is part of Cambridge’s Centre for Urban Conflicts Research - it was great to get a more in-depth insight to his research. His presentation illustrated his analysis of the spatial securitisation within the Berlin-Tempelhof refugee centre, from the general masterplan to details such as the banning of graffiti. He discussed Elena Fontanari’s proposal that ‘Fortress Europe’ actually occurs within the centre of our cities in the form of mundane security practices, which correlates with my thoughts on the plurality of Ceuta’s borders. A question raised about the open-top cubicles gave way to a conversation about the many sensorial experiences within Tempelhof which are so often overlooked.

Marielle’s paper, on the Ottostraße asylum centre in Augsburg, focused predominantly on the notions of (un)familiarity, belonging, and the ‘everyday borders’ created by mass accommodation. She questioned the idea that a non-militarised centre necessarily integrates migrants, instead suggesting that ‘being in the middle of nowhere, having nowhere to go, is just another kind of closedness’. The topic of material and perceived barriers is something I have recently started to think about in greater depth, so I was pleased to hear her opinions on depersonalisation and institutionalisation as methods of restricting mobility. Her theoretical framework was fascinating and I plan to follow up on all of her sources for my own research.

The second session - ‘Interrogating Relationships between Spatial & Social Mobility in the Global South’ - covered a wider range of topics, although a few key themes emerged. Class systems were discussed in a couple of papers: Daniel Robins’ 'Imagining London’ explored the changing experiences of class in London’s Brazilian migrant community, while Madleina Daehnhardt’s ‘Links between Caste & Mobility Patterns’ mapped out the upward mobility of an Indian hill village. A focus on remittances and economic security threaded through most of the presentations and the closing discussant. Although I have not yet looked at this, it might prove interesting when considering the wider economic impacts of my proposal.

The final session was titled ‘Critical Geographies of Care, Mobilities & Migration’ and I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect from it. In the end, the three papers were investigating vastly different topics yet all fit under the same umbrella. Maddy Thompson’s ‘Everything Changes to Stay the Same’ looked into the mobility of Filipino nurses, especially the recent shift from ‘exporting’ nurses to the UK and US, to the growing system of ‘call-centre nursing’. Although on the whole unrelated to my research, I had no prior knowledge on the subject so her talk was a thought-provoking learning curve.

Brenda Yeoh’s paper on Singapore’s migrant domestic workers was, again, an insight into a topic which I would otherwise know little of. She framed migration in the Singaporean context as a conservational strategy, rather than an aspirational ideal, and was one of several speakers to mention ‘permanent temporariness’ as a key issue. Although talked about before, I hadn’t realised it was a common term, so that has opened up another avenue of relevant reading.

Two thirds of the way through, I’m already hoping I can make it to next year’s conference. Apart from the wonderful array of stimulating academic discussions, I’ve very much enjoyed Cardiff’s many shades of ugly pink in their decorating choices!