Apologies for cross-posting
Call for Papers: Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting (AAG) 2012, New York, February 24th – 28th 2012
Migration and Activism: Geographies of Resistance
Session organisers: Nick Gill (Exeter University, UK), Deirdre Conlon (St. Peter’s College, US), Ceri Oeppen (Exeter University, UK) and Imogen Tyler (Lancaster University, UK).
Migration is an increasingly contested field. As global inequalities widen, and potential global mobilities develop, states are pouring more money into the control over borders than ever before. This has led to the proliferation of new technologies of enforcement that are reconfiguring the border itself: from smart borders that risk-manage flows of people, goods and information, to graduated sovereignty that renders citizenship flexible and selective, to remote controls that extend state sovereignty well beyond its territory.
In the face of the growth of states and inter-state co-operatives in the area of migration control, resistance by and on behalf of migrant groups is faced with a series of challenges. Practically, the intentional churning and dispersal of migrants in time and space makes mobilizing support as well as opposition difficult to organise. Symbolically, enforcement logics coupled with the systematic downsizing and outlawing of migrant support activities stifles these efforts. Politically, the co-option of migrant support groups through government contracts and softer forms of co-operation (even as funding is withdrawn) makes political opposition increasingly precarious. Emotionally, the relentless criminalization of ‘irregularity’ threatens to sap the energies of progressive groups and oppositional networks.
This session aims to do two things. First, submissions are invited that describe and theorise the new strategies that states, firms and immigration restrictionists are devising to control human mobility at different scales. Second, contributions are invited that describe and theorise the ways in which these strategies are being, or could be, effectively countered by groups that seek to support migrants. The intention here is to generate trans-national debates around effective counter-strategies in a difficult era for migrants and migrant support organisations alike.
Papers are invited that cover one or both of these themes. Possible paper topics include, but are not limited to:
Detention practices and resistance
Artistic and creative modes of resistance
Migrant-led activism
Legal geographies of activism
Border controls and border activism
Migrant activism in times of economic hardship especially in relation to the ‘Big Society’ and austerity impacts
The impact of new social media on migrant activism
Professionalisation of migrant activism
Bodies and resistance
The nexus between criminalisation, prisons and activist geographies
Researcher/researched relationships in migrant activism
Please submit abstracts of no more than 250 words by September 10th 2011. Abstracts and inquiries can be sent to:
Nick Gill [log in to unmask] and Deirdre Conlon [log in to unmask]
Dr. Nick Gill
Lecturer in Human Geography
Room B302
Geography
College of Life and Environmental Sciences
University of Exeter
Amory Building
Rennes Drive
Exeter
UK
EX4 4RJ
Tel: +44 (0) 1392 723333
Fax: +44 (0)1326 371859
Secretary of the Political Geography Research Group of the Royal Geographical Society