Media and immobility: The affective and symbolic immobility of forced migrants

Abstract

Can we think about the role of media and information and communication technologies in the lives of forced migrants through the lens of immobility? The dominant focus in the communication studies literature is on mobility, movement and connectivity. Migration studies and anthropology however offer productive ways to conceptualize the mobility–immobility spectrum as well as the imaginative dimensions of (im)mobility. Building on two studies that were situated at the temporal and geographical edges of the ‘European refugee crisis’ – a 2015 study in a Syrian refugee camp in Turkey and a 2017–2018 study with Syrian, Afghan and Iraqi refugees in Belgium – this article develops a conceptual framework of media and immobility in the context of forced migration. It coins the pair concepts affective immobility and symbolic immobility to highlight and understand practices of disengagement with media and information and communication technologies, agentic disconnectivity and feelings of symbolic fixedness.

Mobile communication and refugees: An analytical review of academic literature

“…Conceptualizations of smartphone affordances in protracted displacement contexts are complexified by scholars through specific forms of affect that point to a spectrum of temporal mobility and immobility (Greene, 2019; Smets, 2019). Based on the findings of two studies with Syrians in different contexts of forced migration, Smets (2019) proposes the notion of affective immobility to explain the deliberate choices refugees make to be disconnected from the flow of new textual and visual information, while performing nostalgic and imaginary engagements with technologies (p. 5). According to the author, the fact that refugees may attach themselves to photos, messages, or songs from the past and archived in their smartphones can be interpreted as an attempt to foster a sense of immobility and timelessness that help them deal with the harsh reality of camp life.…”

“…Specifically focusing on the paradoxical roles of mobile technologies in the context of transnational family relationships, different studies highlighted that mediated practices of doing family require time and emotional labor from resettled refugees (Awad & Tossell, 2019; Leurs, 2019; Smets, 2019). Similar to findings from studies in prolonged displacement settings (Witteborn, 2015), Syrian refugees also felt obliged to be constantly available to call their family, especially considering “the excellent coverage and stability of mobile connectivity in the Netherlands” (Awad & Tossell, 2019, p. 7).…”

“…At the same time, the current literature has focused mostly on refugees' use of mobile technologies in Global North countries (Leurs & Smets, 2018). Notable exceptions include scholarship on the appropriation of mobile phones among forced migrants in border spaces or refugee camps in Turkey (Smets, 2018, 2019), Kenya, Jordan (Twigt, 2018; Wall, Campbell, & Janbek, 2017), as well as in resettlement and displacement contexts in Brazil (Alencar, 2020), Ethiopia (Leurs, 2014), and a few others. Although this growing body of work still has critical gaps and shortcomings, it warrants a review of its own.…”

Digital placemaking and the datafication of forced migrants

“…Researchers on the hotspots of refugee settlement outside Europe have strengthened the argument that digital performance needs to be studied in its intersections with embodied practices. They have pointed to existing digital gaps that have forced refugees in Kenya, Turkey, Brazil, and Southeast Asia to depend on embodied types of sociality that are powerful in social and cultural reproduction (Alencar, 2019;Jack, 2017;Kivikuru, 2013;Smets, 2019;Twigt, 2018).…”

“…A solid corpus of empirical evidence shows that forced migrants build physical location as well as sociocultural and political belonging on their own terms by engaging with digital media and embodied sociality (e.g. Alencar, 2019;Gifford and Wilding, 2013;Leurs 2017;Smets, 2019). Previous studies have highlighted that placemaking after settlement is a multiscalar and multidimensional process (Hoellerer, 2017;Kordel and Weiding, 2019).…”