Transnational Affect and Emotion in Migration Research

Digital media and the affective economies of transnational families

“…The experience, interpretation and expression of emotions, being fundamentally social, are only possible within the cultural and linguistic frameworks that shape the possibilities of both subjectivity and communication (Hochschild, 2008; Wise and Velayutham, 2017). This means that researching emotions in cross-cultural, transnational contexts can be particularly challenging.…”

“…Our argument is that the devices that migrants use as part of the mundane, routinised practices of everyday life are tools for the circulation of emotions that produce the boundaries, surfaces and mutuality of being that give substance to their transnational families and communities. These are examples of what Wise and Velayutham (2017: 121) refer to as ‘the circulation of bodily affects between transnational subjects and between subjects and symbolic fields’ that intensify ‘belonging to and boundaries of transnational fields’, including the transnational family (see also Greene, 2019).…”

Making digital ‘home-camps’: Mediating emotions among the Sahrawi refugee diaspora

“…Some digital migration scholars raise the question of how migrants utilize digital media to maintain transnational relationships. Some authors have focused on the notion of ‘transnational affect’ (Wise and Velayutham, 2017) in view of the importance of such circulation of affects, which ‘can function to bind individuals with other individuals into a social grouping’ (Wise and Velayutham, 2017: 117). At present, transnational affect practices are mediatized by digital technologies (Leurs, 2014).…”

“…According to Amanda Wise and Selvaraj Velayutham (2017), social ties in particular communities reproduce affective mechanisms that compel their members to continue a cycle of reciprocity, obligation and responsibility to one another on the basis of feelings of togetherness. Adnan’s words reflect his aim of making life easier for other Sahrawi refugees and his emphasis on affective engagement with similar others to facilitate ordinary life through his business.…”

“…Thus, home has become an emotional experience rather than a place of attachment because of the condition of exile, which recurs in the collective memory and is associated with the place of origin as well as the current situation of displacement. Since emotions are inherently communicative (Wise and Velayutham, 2017), it is comprehensible that a renegotiation of a sense of home is currently mediated by digital technologies, which enable the transcendence of immobility through digital connectivity. The digitally connected nature of the refugee camps of Somalis (Horst, 2006) and Palestinians (Aouragh, 2012) has allowed those refugees to develop transnational practices of interacting online, challenging their isolation, and improving their dwelling places.…”