You are different, that is why I exist

When reading around the European southern borders, I often encounter with the description of border enclave cities or islands as limboscapes [1]. The metaphor of limbo indeed suits the city of Melilla: it is a place in between, neither a space of danger, nor a land of the European prosperity. Multiple routes lead to Melilla, but there are very few that lead out towards the land of wealth and joy. Space and time are experienced differently there: history has its own rhythm in this conservative city. It feels like Melilla has always been like it is now, and that it will always remain the same. However, unfolding this metaphor further, we might realise that it is not that accurate: in limbo, all the souls waiting for the decision regarding their destiny being taken, are equal to one another. They are faceless in their waiting, they are neither saints, nor sinners, just for their limbo time being.

However, in Melilla the “otherness” reaches its peak. The city space is dramatically heterogenised, hierarchised and fragmented in accordance with the socially exclusive practices. Migrants are excluded from social participation, communities, public spaces, etc. This very “otherness”, often associated with the proximity of the international boundary, is what constitutes the multiplicity of invisible separation lines, internal borders, that fragment the city of Melilla.

Michel Agier, in his recent book “Borderlands” [2], is embarking on an anthropological journey through cosmopolitanism in the frontier zones, in order to test the idea that:

the person who seems ‘foreign’ to me is the ‘other’ subject that my identity needs in order to exist and endure [Agier, 2016, page 16].

In other words, we need this “otherness” in order not to lose who we are. In our everyday experiences we never stop comparing ourselves to our surroundings, because this is how we construct our unique identities: my colleagues eat meat and I don’t, I am vegetarian; our kids have pink faces and fair hair, and yours has a brown face, we are locals; I am being stopped at the passport control in Newark for twenty minutes, while American citizens use a separate queue and pass faster, I am a foreigner; I am being stared at and men whistle and scream ugly things when I pass by, I am a young European woman in Nador.

Construction of this otherness might be peaceful, with due respect given to diversity, for example, when we talk about construction of otherness through the food preferences. However, usually construction of otherness is mixed with power relations and hierarchisation: the other one is looked at as someone inferior to the homogenous majority, even when this homogeneity is only percieved.

In Melilla the national otherness is constructed through a dramatic contrast: we have males occupied in military, which constitute Melilla’s majority, on one hand, and waves of illegal migration, on the other hand. Patriotic conservative sentiments neighbour with the outsiders, constituting a drasctic contrast. The otherness is also constructed through legality and illegality. This otherness often takes a form of stigma, so the construction of the urban identities is happening through stigmatisation of irregular elements, foreigners, migrants.

The purpose of this blog is to suggest alternatives. Even though those might be merely dreamy ideas of harmony, I still believe that naive ideas of peace are better than solid and well-rooted ideas of confrontation.

Construction of otherness and reinforcement of our identities’ uniqueness is guided by fear of being average. It is socially determined that being average means being inferior, while uniqueness is considered to be a feature of outstanding personality. I believe that this assumption is the driving force for establishing identities through othering.

There must be other ways of constructing identities, which are not driven by the fear of average, and not driven by the hostile sentiments of otherness. This involves a more mindful approach to who each of us are and what we represent in the society, based on habits and points in common we can find with other members of society. Identities can be constructed through celebration of diversity, rather than through creation of violent otherness, which is based on fear and despite.