Thesis: The European Borderscape in the Face of Covid-19

The Canary Islands as setting of the new border play

Andrea Gallinal Arias
Master’s thesis, Political dynamics and changes in societies,
Institute of Political Studies, Aix-en-Provence, 2021

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In this thesis I aim to explore the convergence of the Covid-19 pandemic and the migratory event that has taken place in the Canary Islands archipelago, Spain, during the year 2020, focusing more specifically on the island of Gran Canaria. In this sense, I question the development of this event into a crisis and the effects of the consequent urgency management on the reconfiguration of the actors and the materiality of the European border of the Canary Islands. I also address the transformations of the insular political landscape since this event and the rise of the extreme right. The objective of this thesis is to think, through the example of the Canary Islands, the effect that the Coronavirus pandemic will have on other European borders.

The Atlantic migratory route of the Canary Islands, considered virtually obsolete for the past ten years, returned to the forefront of the international scene during 2020. Indeed, the Spanish authorities reported an 881% increase in the number of migrants arriving on its shores compared to 2019 (EP, 2021). Some 22,000 people reached the islands from various enclaves in Morocco, Western Sahara and West Africa, a trend that has continued during this year 2021 (Bautista, 18 May 2021). While this figure may seem relatively low compared to other border areas of Europe, the archipelago has been completely overwhelmed by this situation, mainly due to the already complex context generated by the Covid-19 epidemic.

Photo Andrea Gallinal, 2021

I approach this sudden arrival of migrants as an event in the sense that Alain Badiou defines it, that is, as a process through which the arising of a situation disables the operative modes by which we compose with our environment (Badiou, 2007). Here, the sudden and radical emergence of excluded populations on the social scene, in this case irregular migrants, came to disrupt the appearance of normality and opened up a process of reconfiguration of reality. Although the arrival of irregular migrants to the Canary archipelago is a recurrent phenomenon and, in this sense, predictable, its articulation with the Covid-19 pandemic created an unprecedented event on the island that left this part of the European border without the tools to cope with the situation. Border management in the islands in the current epidemic context has had to be adapted through new mechanisms and actors to ensure that migrants are managed in accordance with health restrictions. The lack of logistical and strategic preparation of the archipelago to respond to this event generated an institutional bricolage that has been, as I have been able to observe on the field, a source of contradictions and vulnerabilities at every level: a migrant reception system completely surpassed in terms of numbers; poor reception structures which have had to be assisted with new ones like hotels or macro camps; exhausted politicians and social workers; desperate and confused immigrants; and a polarized local population succumbing to conspirative theories and xenophobic demonstrations.

In this sense, the objective of this thesis is to analyze how the emergence of Covid-19 led to the collapse of the fragile reception system on the Canary Islands and forced a deep reconfiguration of the border infrastructure and policy and, as a consequence, of the collectives involved in its formal and informal functioning. The question of the impact of the pandemic on the ways in which Europe’s borders are managed seems significant for two reasons. Firstly, the spread of Covid-19 vaccines does not necessarily seem to guarantee the end of the pandemic, as the tendency already shows in some countries (Genoux, 11 April 2021). Second, the fact that vaccination policies are only implemented in the most privileged countries may confer to international mobility a key role in the evolution of the health situation (Héran, 2020), as shown by the creation of the WHO Global Program for Health and Migration (WHO, 2020). In this sense, the analysis of the reconfiguration of the European border scenario in the Canary Islands could, through a magnifying effect, provide an illustration of the questions that the pandemic will raise in the years to come in terms of border and mobility management in Europe.
My questioning revolves around three main axes: the transformation of a migratory event into a crisis; the responses of the different actors involved and the impact of these actions on the borderscape of the island; and the articulation of the migratory event with the transformation of the archipelago’s political composition.

First, I address how the migratory event in the island of Gran Canaria has been progressively enacted as a crisis. As Cuttitta explains for the island of Lampedusa, crises are usually created and “performed” through political measures and practices as a means of governing migration (2014), which allows for the implementation of further control procedures. Moreover, islands are particular places that, in relation to migration, attract extraordinary media attention (Bernardie-Tahir & Schmoll, 2014; Cuttitta, 2014) and where the reality and implications of irregular migration take exacerbated forms (Bernardie-Tahir and Schmoll, 2014), making it easier to enact migratory crises. In this sense, I suggest that the emergency measures deployed for the management of the Coronavirus pandemic in the Spanish territory have facilitated the reconfiguration of this migratory event into a crisis. It seems appropriate then to question the articulation between the pandemic and the migratory event, and the further becoming of a perceived crisis, as well as what actors are involved in this process.
Secondly, I discuss how the reactions of the authorities and the local actors deployed in order to master the crisis have contributed to the transformation of the Canarian borderscape. I privilege the notion of borderscape over that of border because, on the one hand, it allows me to highlight the fluid and changing nature of borders (Bernardie-Tahir & Schmoll, 2014; Brambilla, 2014) and to focus on the relations between the different collectives that compose it: the confrontations, contradictions, alliances and concessions at different levels that emerged in this changing context. On the other hand, it allows me to delocalize the border both in space and in time (Brambilla, 2015; Perera, 2007), apprehending all the actors -human or not- who intervene before in time and far in space: this is the case of the European directives and laws that have a central role in this matter in the territory of the Canary Islands.

In this sense, I focus on how the response to the migratory “crisis” has reconfigured the relationships between the different actors present in this space, as well as on the emergence of new actors. Several authors have studied the emergence of citizen organizations and NGOs as a response to migratory urgencies (Cuttitta, 2018; Danese, 2001), however, during my fieldwork I was able to observe the emergence of private actors acquiring a central role in the reception system. In the gap generated by the lack of means of the Spanish State, owners of different hotels have managed to organize themselves in the aim of offering a dignified response to the reception urgency on the island. Other actors, already existing, have had to adjust their operating modes to adapt to the sanitary situation. I assess the changes provoked by these reactions at the level of the local collectives: the redistribution of roles, their compositions, their limits.

Finally, I address the transformations of the political and social fabric of the island through the management of the migratory event. During my stay in Gran Canaria, I could clearly see the emergence and upsurge of a hitherto unknown xenophobic discourse as well as new practices and forms of solidarity. This allows me to posit that the migratory event goes beyond the logistical and strategic management of the phenomenon, but also impacts the political composition and the collective imaginary of a society. In this sense, I address the reactions of the local population to the management of the migratory situation, as well as the political instrumentalization of this event by extreme right-wing political parties.

Methodology, sources and fields

This research study is the result of a two-month fieldwork conducted during January and February 2021 in the island of Gran Canaria. My study is based on three types of materials for analysis: ethnographic work in different environments during my stay on the island, interviews with different representatives of collectives involved in the field of migration management and press articles through which I have been able to build a chronology of events, both during my stay on the island and from a distance before and after my fieldwork.

In relation to my ethnographic work, I was able to obtain first-hand information through participant observation during my work as a volunteer in two large associations that managed two different immigrant reception centers. After a little less than two weeks on the island of Gran Canaria, I was able to start working as a volunteer Spanish teacher in one of the centers for migrant women of the White Cross Foundation . This first contact with the organization allowed me, later during my stay, to visit one of the macro-camps built to respond to the migratory situation on the island, as it was managed by the same association. Some time later, I was also able to join the team of the Integral Reception Center (CAI) of Tafira, on the outskirts of the capital city of Las Palmas, managed by the Red Cross. This center, where I also worked as a Spanish teacher, welcomed families only from Morocco and Western Sahara. Both experiences were particularly enriching on a personal level, especially in relation to the interpersonal relationships I was able to establish with several of the residents. In addition, it gave me access to first-hand accounts of the different phases of the migration project of the migrants and the attention received upon arrival on the islands. It was also a very good opportunity to see from the inside how this type of temporary reception resources works at an institutional and human level.

In addition to this type of participant observation, I also employed diffuse observation, very common in anthropology, for describing on my fieldwork diary both the places and the practices that I observed within these different environments. This technique was especially useful to me during explorations in the different neighborhoods where the macro-camps had been established, and also during my various trips to the south of the island, where I focused mainly on observing the tourist structures, empty due to Covid-19, and the new shape the landscape took with the presence of the hundreds of migrants. Apart from the ethnographic work, I was also able to conduct a total of six interviews with different representatives of organizations and actors involved in one way or another in the management of migrant reception on the island of Gran Canaria.

During my encounters with the migrants themselves, I decided to favor an informal conversation format over that of an arranged interview as it seemed more appropriate to the context. Given the situation in which many of them found themselves upon their arrival on the islands – confused, having lived through moments of great tension, sometimes traumatic, and very wary about the type of relationship they established – informal conversations seemed to me the best option to favor the building of a relationship of trust and also to preserve and respect the situation of vulnerability in which many of them found themselves.

The relationships I was able to establish with migrants, both inside and outside the reception structures, have been the most enriching part of my fieldwork. However, they were also the most complex: since most of the migrants I was able to talk to outside the reception centers were in difficult situations, where they felt desperate and frustrated, I quickly understood that my efforts to reach out to them could quickly turn into a relationship of dependency. If I provided my phone number for future contact, I received messages and calls at all hours. In this sense, I had to take some time to understand where and how to set the boundaries in this type of relationship. I decided, upon reflection, that I was indeed interested in establishing human relationships beyond my object of study. I did not want to simply obtain information from these people and ignore their personal situation. But to do so, I had to be quite selective in who I facilitated my personal contact to and who I did not. Thus, although my exchanges were multiple and with many different immigrants, I privileged to establish a relationship of trust with a total of four people whom I saw regularly and with whom I was also personally involved . This selectivity allowed me to have privileged access to first-hand information about the situation in the different hotels and the material and psychological experiences inside them, without having to neglect the personal relationships established since I had time to answer any messages or calls.

Finally, since the beginning of October 2020 I started working on a press review with different articles published by different digital media. This allowed me to have an exhaustive chronology of all the important events that were happening as the situation evolved. It also allowed me to track the reproduction of the facts in the media, which also facilitated the identification of discourses positioned against and in favor of the migrants’ stay on the island. Working with written press in various languages (Spanish, English, French) has also allowed me to analyze how the events have been perceived in the international sphere.

Through these three sources of information, I have been able to construct my analysis of the situation in the Canary Islands before, during and after my fieldwork on the island of Gran Canaria.

Photo Andrea Gallinal, 2021

Challenges during my fieldwork: reflections on gender

There is an important element that has stood out during my fieldwork that I would like to address separately because of the scarce information I have found on this topic: being a female researcher in contact with mainly men interlocutors. I will be discussing here only the part of my fieldwork related to my contact with migrants themselves outside of the reception centers in which I gave Spanish lessons.
All the migrants I was able to see and talk to, with the exception of the two centers where I worked as a volunteer, were young men. In this sense, sexist or sexualized behavior and comments were quite recurrent. Gurney describes sexual hustling to which female researchers are often exposed, as a “range from flirtatious behavior and sexually suggestive remarks to overt sexual propositioning” (1985). One of the biggest difficulties during my approach to young male migrants was the constant attempts at flirting that completely discredited the position of researcher in which I wanted to maintain myself. Usually, three reactions were possible when I approached to talk to the young men: a shy, respectful response; an attempt to approach me with compliments and questions about my personal life and asking for my phone number; or, very often, they just wanted to take pictures of or with me. The latter two reactions were quite uncomfortable and, although sexual hustling behavior is not something specific to this particular context, since I face it on my daily life, in this situation there was an added difficulty: how should I react?
Gurney points out that a “modicum of tolerance is necessary with respect to any behavior respondents may exhibit, otherwise very little field research would ever be accomplished”, but “the question of where to draw the line” and how is a rather difficult one (1985). Obviously, I could not react in that context as I would react in my day-to-day life because it was in my interest to get close to these people. The ability to speak French greatly facilitated my approach to the migrants I met on the island. As they told me, being ignored by most of the local population, if not relatively mistreated, made my approach an unusual event. This was very commonly interpreted on their part as an interest of a romantic or sexual nature. Several of the people with whom I established more solid contact explained to me that they did not understand why I was so nice to them compared to the rest of the people they met. At first, I was forced to constantly justify my kindness to them, not as a romantic interest, but simply out of respect. Questions about my marital status, if I had a boyfriend, if I was married, were a regular occurrence.
In the face of compliments and comments regarding my physical appearance, I tried to ignore them or simply smile. Little by little, I began to develop mechanisms with which I could avoid the uncomfortable questions regarding my personal life. I noticed that, as Gurney points out, “sexual hustling is more likely to occur when the female is perceived as single or unattached to a male” (1985). So, I began to reply on every occasion that I was married, which seemed to be pretext enough to combat the harassment, at least to some extent. Even so, I still had to face situations in which I found myself certainly uncomfortable. Of particular note was a moment when one of my interlocutors repeatedly tried to kiss me on the mouth, even when I made it clear that I was not at all interested. On another occasion, another person with whom I tried to establish contact insisted that he wanted to marry me, even when I told him I had a partner. Again, on these occasions, finding the right reaction was not easy and, thinking about it in perspective, I think I should have reacted more strongly. However, the situation of vulnerability in which these people found themselves also made me not want to generate further conflict with them.
Being a woman, in this context, has also been beneficial because it has made it easier for me to approach my interlocutors, even if it has generated undesired situations. It is clear that if I had been a man, I would not have had to endure many of the comments, looks or behaviors that I have had to face as a woman, but it is also likely that a male presence and an eventual approach as a man would have generated more distrust in my interlocutors. Being a young woman has been, in this sense, both an advantage and a disadvantage.

Photo Andrea Gallinal, 2021

Contents

This thesis consists of three parts and eight chapters. The division of the different parts corresponds to the explanatory logic that guides the analysis.
In the first part, I contextualize the convergence of the pandemic and the migratory event in the islands and question its supposed unpredictable character. I also examine the construction of this double event as a crisis and how this categorization has impacted the evolution of the different institutional emergency mechanisms developed during the last months. Finally, I establish a comparison between the migratory situation of the Canary Islands during 2020 and that of the island of Lampedusa during the same period, with the aim of contextualizing the situation of the Spanish archipelago in a broader European panorama.
In the second part of this thesis, I focus on the different phases of development and implementation of migration management and reception systems. I intend to present here the reconfiguration of the Canarian borderscape through the recomposition of the different collectives that constitute it. After a first moment in which the lack of means and resources on the part of the central government became evident, the latter launched the Plan Canarias, a road map that aimed to put an end to the emergency situation experienced up to that moment. In this sense, I focus here on the use of hotels as temporary reception centers and all their implications, and the implementation and management of the different macro-camps established on the island of Gran Canaria through this new plan.
Finally, in the third part, I focus on the implications of the new migratory infrastructure that emerges through the recomposition of the borderscape of the islands. Thus, I analyze the new practices of this system, based on constrained mobilities and expanding temporalities for the migrants. I also address the social and political consequences resulting from the emergency management of this double event. In this sense, I refer mainly to the increase and expansion of xenophobic discourse on the island, and the instrumentalization of this unrest by various political formations, especially of the extreme right, in order to gain political leverage.

Photo Andrea Gallinal 2019

Bibiography

Badiou, A. (2007). Being and event. A&C Black.
Bautista, L. (18 May 2021). La immigración en Canarias ha aumentado un 133% en los primeros
4 meses de 2021
. ABC, págs. https://www.abc.es/espana/canarias/abci-inmigracion-
canarias-aumentado-133-por-ciento-primeros-4-meses-2021-
202105061202_noticia.html.
Bernardie-Tahir, N., and Schmoll, C. (2014). “The uses of islands in the production of the southern
European migration border”. Island Studies Journal, 3-6.
Brambilla, C. (2015). “Exploring the Critical Potential of the Borderscapes Concept”. Geopolitics, 20:1, 14-34.
Cuttitta, P. (2014). “Borderizing the island setting and narratives of the Lampedusa border play”.
ACME: An international journal for critical geographies, 13(2), 196-219.
Cuttitta, P. (2018). “Repoliticization through search and rescue? Humanitarian NGOs and
migration management in the Central Mediterranean.” Geopolitics, 23(3), 632-660.
Danese, G. (2001). “Participation beyond citizenship: migrants associations in Italy and
Spain”. Patterns of prejudice, 35(1), 69-89.
EP. (2021, January 02). La llegada de inmigrantes a las costas canarias creció en 2020 un 881%
respecto a 2019
. ABC, pp. https://www.abc.es/espana/abci-llegada-inmigrantes-
costas-canarias-crecio-2020-881-por-ciento-respecto-2019-
202101021157_noticia.html?ref=https://www.google.com/.
Genoux, F. (11 April 2021). “Covid-19 : malgré une vaccination massive, l’épidémie est hors de
contrôle au Chili”. Le Monde, https://www.lemonde.fr/planete/article/2021/04/11/au-chili-l-epidemie-est-hors-de-controle-malgre-une-vaccination-massive_6076368_3244.html.
Gurney, J. N. (1985). “Not One of the Guys: The Female Researcher in a Male-Dominated
Setting”. Qualitative Sociology, 42-62.
Héran, F. (2020). “Voyageurs internationaux ou immigrants, le virus ne fait pas la différence”. De
facto
, vol. 18, 38-41.
Perera, S. (2007). “A pacific zone? (In)Security, Sovereignty, and stories of the Pacific
borderscape”. In P. K. Rajaram, & C. Grundy-Warr, Borderscapes: hidden geographies
and politics at territory’s edge
(p. 201-227). University of Minessota Press.
WHO. (2020). ApartTogether survey: preliminary overview of refugees and migrants self-
reported impact of COVID-19
. World Health Organization.

Main photo: Andrea Gallinal, 2021

Out.of.the.blue.map

An itinerant curatorial research program

Out.of.the.blue.map is a context-sensitive, itinerant curatorial research program exploring the notion of permanent liminality within Mediterranean [fluid+solid] territories. Anchored between Morocco, France, and the Netherlands, the program operates a collective and critical rethinking of governance systems shaping the Mediterranean [fluid+solid] borderscapes. From 2019 to 2020, this collaborative effort brings together French, Moroccan and Dutch artists, researchers, designers, architects and activists whose works contest, question or summon Mediterranean [fluid+solid] geographies. The program is structured around a series of stopovers in Morocco, France and in the Netherlands, during which a cycle of exhibitions and workshops will be organised, from March to December 2020 [International Community of Arts Rotterdam + Mahal Art Space Tanger + Les Parallèles du Sud Manifesta 13 Marseille + Jan Van Eyck Academie Maastricht].

Lexicon

Resulting from a 2-years research, a lexicon will be developed, edited, and exhibited throughout the program. Co-produced with designers, artists, journalists and activists, it is an evolving, hybrid editorial object composed of fragments from juridical literature and reports, activists testimonies, artists, media and political discourses, informal narratives and imaginaries as well as visual elements. The lexicon constitutes in itself an alternative map to Mediterranean [fluid+solid] liminal spaces. It will grow at every step of the program, and will be exhibited throughout the year.

Out.of.the.blue.map constitutes an attempt to compose alternative narratives and maps, going beyond inherited narratives and colonial fictions ; to experiment new ways for borders to be sensed, and made sense of. Both a space of passage and of rupture, the Mediterranean Sea constitutes a liminal territory for some of those who cross it. The participatory work of the lexicon allows one to deconstruct this territory, and to free oneself from imposed narratives by exploring their dead angles.

For more information : https://calypso3621.com/

antiAtlas Journal #02, Fictions at the Border, 2017

Directed by Jean Cristofol, Cédric Parizot and Anne-Laure Amilhat Szary

The second issue apprehends fiction as a strategy that tends, through it effect of realty, to introduce stimulating gaps, disturbances and incoherences in what appears as naturally given. Through this, it assess the role that fiction can play in the renewal of our questionings around 21st century’s borders.

Table of contents

– Jean Cristofol, Introduction: fiction and border
– Elena Biserna, Soundborderscapes: Lending a Critical Ear to the Border
– Thomas Cantens, The Political Artithmetic of Borders: Towards an Enlightened Form of Criticism
– Charles Heller et Lorenzo Pezzani, Drifting Images, Liquid Traces: Disrupting the Aesthetic Regime of the EU’s Maritime Frontier
– Raafat Mazjoub, Writing as Architecture: Performing Reality until Reality Complies
– Stéphane Rosière, International Borders, Between Materialisation and Dematerialisation
– Johan Schimanski, Glass Borders

On line: a manifestation of the human border

June 6 and 9, 2018

On June 9th 2018, the artist Clio Van Aerde will start her expedition during which she seeks to explore the physical border of the Grand Duchy of Luxemburg. The departure and arrival point is Schengen and to arrive back to the starting point, it will take around four weeks. The artist will walk as precisely as possible along the border-line. Thanks to the collaboration with MUDAM, the public will be able to observe the development of this endeavour in real time in the museum and on online.cliovanaerde.com
on line follows the Walking Art practice and questions the meaning of the border by exploring its physicality on a human scale. This project seeks to enlighten absurdities as for instance privileges and barriers encountered in relation to the possession of a certain passport or another. In the larger sense, nowadays, while some people lead progressively nomadic lives as if the borders had vanished, others perceive the exact same borders as impassable barriers. The body finds itself physically limited while the use of technology, more essential than ever and inexhaustible, surpasses every physical limits. The naive procedure of on line seeks to question what society is taking for granted.
On June 6th at MUDAM, right before the performance and on July 11th (location t.b.c.), after the performance Clio Van Aerde and two members of the Institute of Geography and Spatial Planning of the University of Luxembourg, Estelle Evrard and Cyril Blondel will hold a public debate about on line.

Born in Luxembourg, Clio Van Aerde is an artist and a scenographer, living in Luxembourg and Vienna. She studied in Madrid, Paris and Vienna before graduating in scenography at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste Wien. Her artistic practice questions the trivial relations between body, time and space through performances that explore repetition and endurance. Next to her own practice, Van Aerde also works as a stage and set designer and engages in the organisation and development of the research based residency Antropical as part of Kolla Festival.

Cyril Blondel is post-doc researcher in geography and spatial planning at the University of Luxemburg (Research Unit IPSE). He holds a PhD in planning from the University of Tours, France, since 2016. He was in 2015-2016 Marie Skłodowska-Curie fellow at the University of Tartu, Estonia, as part of the FP7 European project RegPol2. He has also been guest researcher in Graz and Leipzig. He is now involved in the H2020 European project RELOCAL that aims at “resituating the local in European Cohesion”. His research interests are mainly connected to the production of spatial justice and territorial development public policy in Europe, in particular in and towards peripheral and border spaces. He is also interested in interactions between art and research. He has conducted his fieldwork mainly in Portugal, Serbia, Croatia, Estonia and France. He is in the first semester of 2018 sharing a residence one week a month with the theatre writer Magali Mougel in the mining basin of Pas-de-Calais in France.

Estelle Evrard is a senior researcher in political geography at the University of Luxembourg. She holds a Master Degree in European Law (2006) from the Institute of European Studies (Brussels) and a PhD in Geography (2013) from the University of Luxembourg. Her interest for the European construction is the common thread through her professional career. Her research deals with the significance of the European integration for localities in terms of governance, autonomy and territoriality. In this endeavour, she understands border areas as exemplary terrain for investigation. She is also interested in the research/practice/policy interface (e.g. ESPON, INTERREG) as well as in the interaction between art and research. She is currently involved in the H2020 European project RELOCAL that aims at “resituating the local in European Cohesion” (2016-2020) and in the INTERREG VA Greater Region “UniGR-Center for Border Studies” project (2018-2020).

Supported by : L’Œuvre Nationale de Secours Grande-Duchesse Charlotte
In collaboration with : Mudam Luxembourg – Musée d’Art Moderne Grand-Duc Jean et de l’Université du Luxembourg
technological equipment : Motion-S
technical equipment : Saturn
Provision of cartographic data: Administration du Cadastre et de la Topographie, Luxembourg
Documentary : Catherine Dauphin
Artistic consultant : Camille Chanel

Thierry Fournier – En Vigie

Series of generative videos, 16/9e, 20’, with sound, on loop
LCD screen, usb key, sound, 2018

En Vigie (The Lookout) is a series of generative videos, which establishes a paradoxical relationship between looking and waiting. A landscape chosen by the sea or a large river is filmed in a fixed shot. The image is then interpreted by a program: each movement is highlighted, like a firefly. All these movements control the movement of a reading head in an orchestral crescendo, which never ceases to vary and whose climax never occurs.

Through this situation of artificial cinematographic suspense, the landscape and the horizon become the object of a shared gaze between human and machine, which questions our physical limits but also the contemporary forms of augmented surveillance – of which the Mediterranean territory is particularly invested.

The series includes three autonomous videos: En Vigie / Strasbourg (2017), En Vigie / Nice and En Vigie / Venise (2018), each lasting approximately 20′, on loop. En Vigie / Nice is presented as part of the solo exhibition Machinal, Villa Henry, Nice, from 25 March to 28 April 2018, accompanied by a catalogue with a text by Céline Flécheux and an interview with Isabelle Pellegrini.

Hervé Braik – New needs and solutions for land border surveillance

Hervé Braik – Thalès, France

Given the overall increase in illegal and criminal activities at state borders, which in some cases include terrorist attacks, many countries have an obligation to strengthen border controls in order not to jeopardise their development and/or to ensure their security. Urgently needing to improve the efficiency of surveilling devices and not being able to recruit thousands of people to monitor borders, governments increasingly choose to equip themselves with integrated surveillance systems.

Gaza Unreleased

Scientific and cultural international days – 21 March 2016 – Paris/Marseille

Download the program

Despite the blockade and more than eight years of repeated assaults, the Gaza Strip continues to survive, live and create. A small piece of land in the middle of a tormented region, Gaza is an essential part of Palestine’s future, with social-cultural dynamics, as well as resistance strategies, which are its own. Central to the Palestinian national question and the evolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Gaza is also crucial to understanding a number of issues which Arab and Muslim societies are confronted with.

This conference will present recent works on the Gaza Strip and the scientific issues they raise, such as methodological concerns related to the production of knowledge in a war zone, restrictions of access to the field and the closing of borders. The increasing marginalization of the Gaza Strip and its inhabitants, whose relationships to the outside have been cut off, have impeded knowledge of a particularly rich social, political and cultural history. The closure of Gaza has made fieldwork studies almost impossible, hence impeding the production of knowledge on the contemporary period, as well as policy planning.

The event, a debate gathering actors from Gazan civil society, round tables and conferences dedicated to art and culture, will bear witness to the great artistic and civil vitality found in the Gaza Strip. It will therefore highlight Gaza’s emergent cultural scenes and the role increasingly played by the media and social networks, contrarily to simplistic images often conveyed. Through their images and words, these artists’ messages resonate beyond borders. They reveal their native land under another light, despite the constrained conditions of creation and circulation.

Gaza Unreleased will bring together for 4 days in Paris and Marseille contributors from different backgrounds: researchers (archaeologists, historians, political scientists, sociologists, anthropologists, economists) but also journalists, diplomats, artists, humanitarian workers, committed citizens from Gaza, the West Bank, France, Europe, United States…

Scientific coordinators: Stéphanie Latte Abdallah and Marion Slitine

Nouvelle étape de « Moving Beyond Borders » à Arcueil (94) [FR]

Moving Beyond Borders
Photo (c) Pauline Duclos

Une exposition itinérante de Migreurop et mise en scène par la compagnie Étrange Miroir. A Anis Gras – le Lieu de l’Autre, Arcueil, du 21 janvier au 6 février 2016

Interactive, multimédia et accessible à tou.te.s, l’exposition vise à lutter contre les préjugés et les idées reçues sur les migrant.e.s ainsi qu’à dénoncer les politiques de mise à l’écart des exilé.e.s jugé.e.s indésirables sur le territoire européen.

Cette exposition, mise en scène par la compagnie Etrange Miroir, s’intéresse aux parcours des migrant.e.s et pointe les dispositifs responsables de leur périlleuse traversée, dans le Sahara, en mer Méditerranée et/ou aux frontières orientales de l’Union européenne.
Dans la continuité des campagnes Open Access Now/Close the Camps et Frontexit de Migreurop, « Moving Beyond Borders » (MBB) est un outil de sensibilisation « tout public » inscrit dans une perspective à la fois militante et artistique. Elle vise à partager dix ans d’observations et de recherches sur les entraves, les injustices et les violations des droits des personnes migrantes. Elle entend aussi promouvoir une autre vision du monde, où la liberté de circulation serait garantie pour toutes et tous, et à ce titre constituer un vecteur de changement social au profit d’une société plus juste et plus équitable.

L’exposition itinérante MBB propose une approche multimédia des réalités migratoires. Des cartes, pour saisir les parcours des personnes et la façon dont les contrôles aux frontières se déplacent et s’externalisent. Des photographies, pour illustrer les conséquences d’une gestion sécuritaire de la question migratoire, telle qu’elle s’observe en Europe et au-delà. Des paysages sonores, pour accompagner et mettre en relief les supports visuels. L’exposition est constituée de cinq modules interactifs, les trois premiers touchant des réalités contemporaines, les derniers imaginant deux scenarios opposés quant aux possibles évolutions futures des politiques migratoires européennes.

Etrange Miroir, le réseau Migreurop et Anis Gras vous invitent à découvrir l’exposition « Moving Beyond Borders » (MBB) et à participer à la rencontre « La cartographie à l’épreuve de la représentation des flux migratoires » qui aura lieu le 21 janvier.

La représentation cartographique des mouvements migratoires concentre des enjeux de formes (flux, stocks) et de fonds (cohérence et disponibilité des données). La position d’un cartographe n’étant jamais neutre, les messages proposés par les cartes relatives aux migrations de populations sont aussi le reflet d’un positionnement faisant écho à l’actualité.

La rencontre sera animée par Olivier Clochard (géographe, Migrinter, Migreurop) et Philippe Rekacewicz (cartographe, Visions Carto) – auteurs d’une partie des cartes animées qui composent MBB – ainsi que par Françoise Bahoken (cartographe, Inrets) et Elsa Tyszler (sociologue, Migreurop). Elle se tiendra de 16 h 00 à 18 h 00.

ANIS GRAS – le lieu de l’autre du jeudi 21 janvier au samedi 6 février 2016
55, avenue Laplace – 94110 Arcueil
Accès RER B station Laplace-Maison des Examens
Entrée libre

Horaires d’ouverture :
L’équipe d’Anis Gras vous accueille 1h avant les soirs de représentation (voir programmation) et tous les vendredis de 12h à 18h.

Sites web :
Migreurop | Etrange Miroir | Anis Gras

Pages FB :
Moving Beyond Borders – Paris / Arcueil 2016 | Migreurop | Etrange Miroir | Anis Gras

Regarder le teaser en ligne :
https://vimeo.com/146229544

Pour plus d’informations :
Pour Migreurop : contact@migreurop.org
Pour Anis Gras : communication@lelieudelautre.fr

source : Migreurop

Margins and Digital Technologies

Journal des anthropologues, n° 142-143

Issue edited by Tristan Mattelart, Cédric Parizot, Julie Peghini and Nadine Wanono
Read the introduction in English

Abstract

The social, political, cultural and economic issues raised by digital tools are usually seen from the perspective of highly-educated and wealthy young urban adults in North America and Western Europe. The call for papers for this issue of Journal des Anthropologues sought to encourage authors to take a different approach. We wanted them to problematize the challenges raised by digital technologies and their utilization ‘at the margin’. Thus, contributors were first asked to seize the significance of the digital technologies outside American and European societies or, at least, at the margins of these societies. What forms does the digital economy take in these spaces? How do individuals adopt products in this economy? Our objective was also to understand how, whether at the ‘margin’ or in the ‘centre’ of the global system, minority actors mobilize digital technologies to achieve their social, cultural and political goals, while being conscious of the limits of these mobilizations.

The End of Maps?

The Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University will hold an international conference and, in partnership with Kareron, an exhibition walk curated by Isabelle Arvers. These two highlights of the Némo Biennal conclude the art and research program The End of Maps? Dream Territories, Normalized Territories, begun in 2013.

The End of Maps? Dream Territories, Normalized Territories (La Fin des cartes ? Territoires rêvés, territoires normalisés) merges scientific research and artistic practice to question the representation of territories from a technological, scientific, political and urbanistic point of view. Producing imagery that is both captivating and disturbing, the map and its virtual variations (3D representations, digital mock-ups, etc.) are an object of research but also a method for anyone who wants to address the city in terms of design, anthropology, urban planning, history or geography. But this “method” is problematic. Beginning with its title The End of Maps? Dream Territories, Standardized Territories, the project aims to create tension between the subjective and appropriative visions that people have of their territories, and the increasingly powerful and inquisitive tools that tend to absorb these representations.

The project will be take place over two years (2013–2015) through the organization of mobile working groups involving the main project partners, a research workshop (October 2013), two exhibitions (Spring 2014 and Fall 2015), and an international symposium (November 2015). A publication –an exhibition catalog together with the conference proceedings- is also planned (2016). The work done during this period will contribute to a database, Art / Mapping Knowledge Base, which aims to identify a wide range of art-related mapping projects and to provide a critical look at the work done by their authors.

1 – International conference

Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Paris-Belleville, November 19-20, 2015
9h – 18h, 60 Boulevard de la Villette, 75019 Paris

The international conference will take place over two days and will bring together anthropologists, architects, geographers, artists, curators, and graduate students, for a serie of presentations, round table discussions and conversations. The project aims to create a tension between the subjective and appropriative visions that people have of their territories, and the increasingly powerful and inquisitive tools that tend to absorb these representations.

2 – Exhibition walk

The exhibition walk consists of two exhibitons curated by Isabelle Arvers and three others exhibitons presented in association with The End of Maps? program.

Le Shakirail, November 12 – 22
Espace des Arts sans Frontières, November 18 – 23

Curator: Isabelle Arvers. An exhibition conceived as a walk between different spaces to invite the audience to wander and to shape a collective reappropriation of a territory through cartography. A walk between maps, models, installations, workshops and drifts, imagined in answer to the questions raised by the research projet The End of Maps?

Associated spaces:

Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Paris-Belleville, November 16 – December 14
Espace Khiasma, Octobre 22 – December 19
Immanence, November 18 – December 19

> Detailed program: www.lafindescartes.net

Israelis and Palestinians in the Shadows of the Wall: Spaces of Separation and Occupation

Edited by Stéphanie Latte Abdallah, French Institute of the Near East, CNRS, Palestinian Territories and Cédric Parizot, IREMAM, CNRS, Aix Marseille Université, Aix en Provence, France

Ashgate, 2015
294 pages
14 illustrations and 9 maps

Shedding light on the recent mutations of the Israeli separation policy, whose institutional and spatial configurations are increasingly complex, this book argues that this policy has actually reinforced the interconnectedness of Israelis and Palestinian lives and their spaces. Instead of focusing on the over-mediatized separation wall, this book deals with what it hides: its shadows. Based on fieldwork studies carried out by French, Italians, Israelis, Palestinian and Swiss researchers on the many sides of the Israeli-Palestinian divide, it highlights a new geography of occupation, specific forms of interconnectedness and power relations between Israeli and Palestinian spaces. It offers a better understanding of the transformation of people’s interactions, their experiences and the ongoing economy of exchanges created by the separation regime. This heterogeneous regime increasingly involves the participation of Palestinian and international actors. Grounded in refined decryptions of territorial realities and of experiences of social actors’ daily lives this book goes beyond usual political, media and security representations and discourses on conflict to understand its contemporary stakes on the ground.

More information on the book 

Read the introduction of the book

Border Cultures: Part Three (security, surveillance)

Curated by Srimoyee Mitra
Art Gallery of Windsor, Canada
January 31 – May 10, 2015

Participating artists

Bambitchell (Canada), Yto Barrada (Morocco / France), Patrick Beaulieu (Canada), RebeccaBelmore (Canada), Mahwish Chishty (Pakistan / USA), Harun Farocki (Germany), Chitra Ganesh and MariamGhani (Afghanistan / India / USA), Tory James and Alex McKay (Canada), ShelaghKeeley (Canada), OsmanKhan (USA), Evan Lee (Canada), Victoria Lomasko (Russia), Dylan Miner (Métis), Trevor Paglen (USA), Camal Pirbhai and Camille Turner (Canada), Tazeen Qayyum (Canada / Pakistan), José Seoane (Canada / Cuba), Charles Stankievech (Canada), Hito Steyerl (Germany), Syrus Marcus Ware (Canada / USA), Tintin Wulia (Australia / Bali)

Three years ago, the AGW launched Border Cultures, a series of exhibitions which deepen our understanding of what is means to be a border city in the 21st century. Located in the southernmost part of Canada across the river from the USA, Windsor is an important site for the arrival and departure for Indigenous, settler and migrant communities. Crisscrossing the geographic and national boundaries for generations in search of freedom, land, work and security, the collective memory, (oral) histories and cultures on these lands are at once deeply interwoven and splintered along colonial, racial and economic lines. This three-part exhibition Border Cultures: Part One (homes, land) (2013), Border Cultures: Part Two (work, labour) (2014) and Border Cultures: Part Three (security, surveillance) (2015) was conceptualized as a research platform, bringing together regional, national and international artists to examine the complex and shifting notions of national boundaries.

The final iteration of this series, Border Cultures: Part Three (security, surveillance) examines the impact of heightened militarization along national boundaries that has intensified deportations, detentions and mechanisms of surveillance of migrants and foreigners. The culture of fear has accelerated the latent colonial hierarchies across the world. In North America missing Aboriginal women in Canada and incarceration of black men in America urges us to reconsider questions of security and citizenship. Moving back and forth between these internal and external boundaries, Part Three proposes the border as a site of struggle between personal subjectivities and systems of power. The series has brought together 45 artists from diverse local, national and international backgrounds to re-imag(in)e national boundaries as bridges and meeting places to build solidarity and mutual respect.

The AGW thanks TD Bank Group, multi-year sponsor for the Border Cultures 2013-15 exhibition series.

Public Programs

Friday, January 30, 7–10 pm
Fridays Live! Opening Reception for Winter Exhibitions
Celebrate the winter exhibitions, participate in the Make Your Own Passport workshop, meet the artists, enjoy delicious treats, music by DJ Double A and a cash bar!
Location: AGW 2nd floor
Cost: $7.00 (FREE to AGW Members)

Saturday, January 31, 2–4 pm
Join us for a panel discussion, Border Talk # 3 : On agency, security and violence with artists Sharlene Bamboat and Alexis Mitchell, Patrick Beaulieu, Shelagh Keeley, Osman Khan, Camille Turner, Tazeen Qayyum, Syrus Marcus Ware and moderator Andrew Herscher. Pay-what-you-can admission

Saturday, February 28 12–1 pm: Curator-led tour of Border Cultures with Srimoyee Mitra
2–4 pm: Images of War: What is Forgotten, How Do We Remember? A panel discussion including John Greyson, Elle Flanders, José Seoane and Mahwish Chishty; moderated by Dr. Lee Rodney.
Pay-what-you-can admission

Wednesday, March 25
5:30–6:30 pm: Curator-led tour of Border Cultures with Srimoyee Mitra
6:30–8 pm: Two Drone an audio-visual performance by Osman Khan and Bekay Mobtu

March 26, 2:30–4 pm
talk by CONFLICT KITCHEN followed by a reception.
Location: Room 115, Lebel Building, University of Windsor, southwest corner of Huron Church Road and College Avenue, Windsor. Admission is FREE and open to the public. Presented in Partnership with the School of Creative Arts, University of Windsor.

March 27, 9 am – 5 pm
Sustainable Economies: Regional Public Art Galleries and Art-Vibrant Scenes, a professional development exchange presented by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries with the AGW.

March 28, April 11, 18, 25, 12-2 pm
transcription events by Alex McKay and Tory James

Wednesday, April 1, 4-6 pm McPhearson Lounge, University of Windsor
Ah Raza! The Making of an American Artist, a multi-media performance created by the Tug Collective in the
USA-Mexico borderlands. Organized by Dr. Lee Rodney.

For more information, contact Nicole McCabe at nmccabe@agw.ca or 519-977-0013 ext. 134.

Art Gallery of Windsor, 401 Riverside Drive West, Windsor, ON N9A 7J1 www.agw.ca

Please subscribe to: get connected to receive AGW program updates!

The AGW would like to acknowledge funding support from the Ontario Arts Council, an agency of the Government of Ontario and the Canada Council for the Arts.

Photos : Rebecca Belmore; The Named and the Unnamed,; video installation (still); Collection of the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, purchased with the support of the Canada Council for the Arts Acquisition Assistance Program and the Morris and Helen Belkin Foundation, 2005.

Yto Barrada;Le Detroit – Detroit – Trou dans le Grillage, Tanger 2003, From A Life Full of Holes: The Strait Project, (1998–2004). Courtesy Galerie Polaris, Paris.

What is a Border Today? by Anne Laure Amilhat Szary

Qu’est-ce qu’une frontière aujourd’hui? Paris, PUF, 2015 (Anne Laure Amilhat -Szary)

Today, the importance of borders in people’s lives is more than theoretical. Borders unite and divide; they have become mobile and individualized, letting some move around freely and restricting access to others. Hence, whether they are opening or closing, borders have become an object of public policy as well as an essential resource for private interests; they are both a governing tool and an advantageous one for the market economy. They represent a point of political, social, economic exacerbation, a laboratory of our times.

For the moment, international borders remain the basis of citizenship, on which democracy is built… But the manner in which they oscillate reveals the uncertain future of our political systems. To understand what a border constitutes today means raising fundamental questions in order to visualize our future societies, as well as redefining our relation to the world.

164 pages, 14 euros

International Conference of Critical Geography

Precarious radicalism on shifting grounds : towards a politics of possibility

26-30 July 2015 | Ramallah, Palestine

Despite the social, political and economic significance of the Middle East, past and present, this region remains poorly understood and often ignored within the geography discipline. By hosting the 7th edition of the International Conference of Critical Geography (ICCG) in Palestine, the organizing collective and the International Critical Geography Group (ICGG) hope to contribute to redressing this neglect and to shed light on the convoluted realities of this context. In other words, we aim to place Palestine and the Middle East more broadly on the map of critical geography, academically and politically.

More informations on ICCG website

Bordering Europe Abroad: Schengen Visa Policy Implementation in Morocco and Transnational Policy-Making from Below

PhD Viva of Federica Infantino

Institut de Sociologie, Avenue Jeanne 44, 1050 Bruxelles
Université Libre de Bruxelles, Salle Henri Janne, Building S, 15th floor
November, 2014 at 10 am

The constitution of the European visa regime has deservingly received much scholarly attention. It has been analyzed as part of the policy toolkit that displaces migration control away from the edges of the territory of Europe. Nevertheless, the street-level implementation of this European policy in national consulates remains understudied. This dissertation sheds ethnographic light on Schengen visa policy implementation that is conceptualized as bordering policy. By delivering Schengen visas, state and nonstate organizations achieve the filtering work of borders; this dissertation therefore investigates the day-to-day bordering of Europe abroad and using a comparative approach and focusing on from the theoretical perspective of street-level policy implementation. The analysis builds on a comparative case study: it focuses on the visa sections of the consulates of two old immigration countries, Belgium and France, and one new immigration country, Italy, which implement visa policy in a same third country, i.e. Morocco. This study highlights cross-national differences of visa policy day-to-day implementation that are due to shifting historical backgrounds, national sense-making of visa policy, and distinct organizational conditions. However, the comparative research design and the inductive epistemological approach deployed have revealed processes of transfer at the implementation level, which result in transnational policy-making from below. Informal interactions between actors constitute a ‘community of practice’ based on the desire to share local and practical knowledge rather than expert knowledge in order to address problems linked to day-to-day implementation. The street-level view of visa policy implementation in a comparative perspective reveals that bureaucratic action is aimed at stemming undesired regular migration rather than irregular migration.

Colloque Les villes arabes : compte-rendu [FR]

Compte-rendu par Daniel Meier (CNRS-Grenoble)

Les révolutions de 2011 ont porté au-devant de la scène la centralité des villes arabes dans les évolutions en cours. En révolte, détruite ou recomposée, la ville est un observatoire original et pertinent des grandes mutations sociales, économiques et culturelles que traverse une société.

Où se situe aujourd’hui la ville arabe sur la toile des villes du monde ? Issue d’une riche construction historique, comment fait-elle face aux nouveaux défis et à l’émergence dans l’aire arabe d’une citoyenneté ?
Voir le programme (pdf)

Le colloque Villes du Monde Arabe qui s’est tenu le 23 octobre dernier à l’hôtel de ville à Paris à l’initiative du Cercle des Chercheurs sur le Moyen-Orient (CCMO) (http://cerclechercheursmoyenorient.wordpress.com) a retenu notre attention tant sa thématique ne cesse de soulever des enjeux de frontières, en marge des divisions, zonages, répartitions socio-spatiales et autres conflits communautaires affectant les zones urbaines au Moyen-Orient. Dans son introduction, Sébastien Boussois, le Président du CCMO, fournissait une explication à ce phénomène en relevant à quel point les villes sont les moteurs du changement dans cette région, des espaces privilégiés du politique et de ce fait des enjeux de pouvoir.

Quatre panels totalisant une vingtaine de communications ont rythmé la journée. J’ai sélectionné ci-dessous quelques unes d’entre elles qui articulaient de façon saillante différents aspects (politiques, sociaux, militants, géographiques ou culturels) de ces jeux sur l’espace.

Dans sa présentation sur Jérusalem, Elias Sanbar, ambassadeur de la Palestine auprès de l’UNESCO, soulignait la confluence des lignes de clivages qui traversent et divisent la ville en divisant les visions sur celle-ci. Son propos visait a montrer que le caractère sacré de la ville a rajouté une ligne de division entre parties en conflit autour de la « souveraineté divine » du lieu. Militant pour la laïcisation du débat sur la ville et son partage, il notait qu’au-delà des politiques discriminatoires à l’égard de ses résidents Palestiniens, à Jérusalem, « on n’a pas besoin d’un mur pour savoir où sont les souverainetés », en référence à la résolution onusienne 242. Fort pertinemment, il soulignait en conclusion que les récentes reconnaissances de la Palestine par certains Etats (Grande-Bretagne, Suède, etc) sont importantes puisque les Etats ont besoin de connaître les frontières et la capitale d’un Etat qu’ils viennent de reconnaître.

Julien Salingue, doctorant en science politique, a pour sa part montré avec son étude sur la ville d’Hébron en quoi sa division et la dégradation de la situation des Palestiniens dans la zone H2 est un condensé de la situation des Palestiniens en Israël-Palestine. Dominé militairement par l’armée israélienne qui y protège quelques colons fanatiques en raison de la présence d’un lieu sacré, cette zone voit se dérouler un processus de grignotage de la souveraineté palestinienne par technique du fait accompli avec la complicité des forces occupantes. Cela a conduit à la fermeture de 70 commerces et au départ de 40% des familles vivant dans la vieille ville. Ce faisant il a montré tout ce que cette occupation doit à des techniques de ségrégations spatiales sur base ethno-nationale.

L’intérêt de la présentation de Clément Steuer, politologue et chercheur associé au CEDEJ, sur les clivages territoriaux dans la révolution égyptienne est bien sûr d’avoir mis en lumière la spatialisation des soutiens au mouvement révolutionnaire dans les marges désertique et au Sud du pays. Mais plus encore, il montré à partir de l’étude des villes de Tanta et Suez que le retournement politique qui a renversé les Frères Musulmans et le président Morsi a été accompagné (et sanctionné par les urnes) d’un redéploiement des frontières politiques avec l’alliance des anciens révolutionnaires et du Nord du pays avec le régime militaire du général Sissi.

Matthieu Rey, maitre de conférence en histoire, a effectué une comparaison des villes syriennes entre les années 1950-60 et la période actuelle en soulignant le rôle de la ville comme espace d’éveil au politique. Il a ainsi mis en avant la transformation des bourgs ruraux en villes de taille moyenne qui ont dès lors joué un rôle clé dans le soulèvement syrien depuis 2011. Ce faisant il a mis aussi l’accent sur la transformation du mode de contestation politique dans le cadre de la ville, du coup militaire – 41 coups en Syrie depuis l’Indépendance – qui consistait à tenir les lieux clés du pouvoir aux soulèvements des quartiers des villes actuelles signalant à la fois la fragmentation de l’espace urbain mais aussi l’émergence de nouveaux espaces de référence pour l’action que sont les quartiers.

Au plan de la géographie urbaine, la réflexion de Jack Keilo, doctorant en géographie, sur l’organisation de la mémoire à partir des toponymies est particulièrement cruciale lorsqu’il s’agit de façonner l’espace des villes (rue, place, quartier) par les symboles qui font sens pour une population et/ou un pouvoir. A partir d’exemples variés, il a montré les nouvelles « mental maps » que l’organisation de l’Etat islamique a mis en place en renommant les zones (villes et rues) qu’il domine en Syrie. Ce faisant il a également mis en perspective la toponymie du régime baassiste et sa contestation également par les insurgés syriens qui n’hésitent pas à rebaptiser des rues de leur ville avec des noms de martyrs afin de témoigner de la réalité sociale et historique qui s’y déroule.

Au niveau des représentations et de leurs mise en question, le propos de Jean Zaganiaris, enseignant-chercheur, sur « le sexe des villes et les villes du sexe » au Maroc était fort utile pour ouvrir une fenêtre significative sur l’espace culturel dans la production sociale des limites. En effet, il a montré comment la littérature érotique marocaine peut se penser en hétérotopies (Foucault) par rapport au domaine du licite en Islam et s’autoriser des publications au ton libre et libéré pour parler de sexe. Ce faisant, ces pratiques culturelles déconstruisent la polarité classique entre un monde occidental ou la sexualité serait libérée par opposition à un monde musulman ou elle serait taboue.

Vincent Bisson, géographe et politologue, a lui abordé la ville à partir de la question tribale au Maghreb, avec deux cas d’études en Tunisie et en Mauritanie, en cherchant à savoir ce qui se passe lorsqu’un groupe de solidarité (clan, tribu), une asabiyyat, investit une ville. Sa recherche montre l’impact socio-spatial des tribus sur la géographie de la ville mais aussi sur son pouvoir en fonction de critères à la fois historiques mais aussi régionaux, lorsque la asabiyyat tend à devenir un lobby et la ville un butin à se partager. Dans le cas de la Tunisie a-t-il noté en conclusion, il y a eu depuis le début du soulèvement arabe de 2011 un effacement de ces solidarité tribales au profit d’autres lignes de partages entre générations, idéologies ou régions.

Dans son étude sur la banlieue Est de Beyrouth, Jennifer Casagrande, doctorante en géographie et histoire urbaine, met en lumière un système d’apartheid urbain très problématique dans les régions à forte implantation informelle. En effet, c’est en raison de la loi électorale libanaise qui ordonne aux résidents de voter sur leur lieu d’origine et non pas sur leur lieu de résidence que des pourcentages très élevés d’habitants des régions de Roueissat, Zaatrieh, Fanar ou Sad el-Bauchrieh ne peuvent pas voter pour les

services qui les touchent dans les régions ou ils vivent, fractionnant et déconnectant certaines régions d’avec leur habitants. Une autre marginalisation, celle touchant les chiffonniers du Caire (zabbalin) a été présentée par Gaëtan Du Roy, assistant en histoire et chercheur associé au CEDEJ. Ces acteurs bien connu du recyclage des déchets semblent être les éternels figures repoussoir de la marge quand bien même ils occupent aujourd’hui une place centrale dans la représentation de la ville et sont même parfois présentés comme des icônes originales pour le tourisme.

Le colloque, qui a connu une forte affluence, a ainsi mis en lumière les nombreux enjeux de frontières que recèlent les villes au Moyen-Orient, tant l’intrication des problématiques politiques et identitaires s’incarnent dans des dimensions spatiales dont les villes sont les réceptacles.

Festival International de Géographie à St Dié des Vosges [FR]

L’antiAtlas est au festival de géographie de St Dié des Vosges, du 3 au 5 octobre
Vernissage le vendredi 3 octobre à 11 h

Musée Pierre-Noël (place Georges-Trimouille) : Conférences guidées le vendredi 3 octobre de 16 h 30 à 17 h 30 et le samedi 4 octobre de 15 h à 16 h.

Expériences cartographiques : « L’anti-Atlas des frontières : Cartographies traverses » par Sarah Mekdjian et Anne-Laure Amilhat-Szary, Marie Moreau du Collectif l’excès, et un groupe de migrants.

Ce dispositif, à la croisée des sciences humaines et de l’art, est issu d’un atelier de cartographie expérimental et participatif. L’atelier a réuni à Grenoble, entre mai et juin 2013, douze voyageurs, alors demandeurs d’asile ou réfugiés, trois artistes, deux chercheuses en géographie…

plus d’informations sur le site du FIG


Photo : Alberto Campi

The Unmanned Systems Expo

4 – 6 février 2015
World Forum
The Hague – The Netherlands

The Unmanned Systems Expo (TUSExpo) is a dedicated and focused business platform, unique in bringing together European and global companies from the entire Unmanned Systems supply chain with customers and end-users. This event provided opportunities for new international cooperation in the Unmanned Systems industry.

TUSExpo consists of the following ‘zones’:

Trade Show
Conference
Country Pavilions
Start-up/New business
Media
Innovation
Live demonstrations
Technical seminar
University
Meeting
Recruiting
Makers Lab
Hospitality

All informations on TUSExpo.com

“Frontières et migrations” in Genève

From 16 to 24 September 2014
Conferences, exhibitions, movie and theater

More informations on the website of Geneve University

Read the review of the events by Daniel Meier (CNRS-Pacte/Euroborderscapes – Grenoble)

Exhibition:

Photography and maps, with among others Cartographies transverses, shown at the first exhibition of the antiAtlas at the Musée des Tapisseries.

Cartographies traverses est un dispositif à la croisée des sciences humaines et de l’art, issu d’un atelier de cartographie expérimental et participatif. Cet atelier a réuni à Grenoble, entre mai et juin 2013, douze voyageurs, alors demandeurs d’asile ou réfugiés, trois artistes, Fabien Fischer, Lauriane Houbey et Marie Moreau, association ex.C.es, deux chercheuses en géographie, Sarah Mekdjian et Anne-Laure Amilhat-Szary (Laboratoire PACTE-Projet EUborderscapes), Coralie Guillemin à l’organisation et Mabeye Deme à la photographie.

Voyageurs, artistes et chercheurs abordent la cartographie comme une technique créative de relevés d’expériences. Les cartes produites avec et par les voyageurs évoquent des souvenirs de parcours et d’épopées migratoires. Cartographies traverses est à la fois un atelier, un terrain de recherche, une installation.

Théâtre :

con t(r)atto, cie Autonyme | installation photographique vivante

con t(r)atto est un projet artistique multidisciplinaire né des recherches de la géographe Cristina Del Biaggio et du reportage photographique « Beyond Evros Wall » réalisé en parallèle par Alberto Campi. Tous deux ont parcouru la route suivie par les migrants de Istanbul à Patras, en passant par Athènes, et en s’arrêtant dans la région de l’Evros, là où les autorités helléniques ont construit un mur, espérant arrêter le flux de migrants. À partir des images, des notes et des sons récoltés sur le terrain, les comédiens et metteurs en scène Stefano Beghi et Maika Bruni ont créé une performance, con t(r)atto. Le public est convié à un voyage à travers l’exposition photographique. Le jeu masqué et la performance des acteurs interrogent le public sur les différentes facettes de la notion de frontière. Ainsi, con t(r)atto rappelle que le vécu des migrants est un sujet universel, quelles que soient les latitudes.

Plus d’information sur galpon.ch

« Zones d’incertitude », first exhibition in the new art center Frontière

The new art center Frontière$ in Hellemmes (north of the France) just opened for its first exhibition.
« Zones d’incertitude », until July 12.

Bernard Lallemand organised this first exhibition ans selected the works amongst the names of the Contemporary Art Fund to propose a reflexion and open questions about the nature of borders.

Until Jul 12, from Wednesday to Saturday
14 h – 19 h or with appointment.
Centre d’art Frontière$, 211, rue Roger-Salengro (métro Hellemmes), Hellemmes.
Tel. 03 20 41 52 50.

More information about the exhibition