Reimagining Migration
Three Experts Call for More Migrant Voices in Our Media
by Louisa Barker
In the on-going debate over migration, it is often the voices of the migrants themselves that are missing. Lensational is remedying that.
In its latest exhibition, Transit In Doubt, Lensational created a platform for the personal narratives of migrant workers to be seen and experienced through the medium of photography. One woman who has made photographs through the Lensational program is Sulikah, from East Java, who has worked in Hong Kong since 2008.
Within Southeast Asia labour movements into the domestic service sector by women have fuelled the increased feminisation of migration patterns. Photographs taken by ten Indonesian domestic workers in Hong Kong capture these women’s everyday routines and experiences and reveal the ways in which they navigate the challenging terrain of cultural alienation and class discrimination.
Panel Discussion
As part of Transit In Doubt, hosted by Art Represent, Lensational organised a panel discussion in the gallery, on 16th September, 2015.
The panel, titled Reimagining Migration: Intersectionality and Empowerment in a Global Age, invited Professor Shani Orgad from the London School of Economics (LSE), Tara Mikhael from the organisation Migreat and Professor Cathy McIlwaine from Queen Mary. Attendees sat amongst the women’s photographs and heard from three speakers.
Speakers
Professor Shani Orgad discussed representations of migrants in the media. She explored this through the concept of imagination, defined as the capacity to form conceptions of something or someone that is absent. Although imagination is often conceived as a private faculty of the mind, Shani explored how the media nourishes people’s imagination. Shani argued that today the “media is the primary feeder of how people make sense of migrants.” She highlighted the binary narratives of migration often promulgated by the media, either as a nightmare or a dream.
The nightmare narrative is based upon the notion of crisis. All too often newspaper headlines depict waves of migrants arriving on foreign shores. Shani does not question the fact that many migrants are in desperate situations, yet she highlights two problems inherent to a crisis imaginary. Firstly, migration is described as “unexpected, sudden and urgent” rather than an on-going process with structural causes. Shani argues that there is “no sense of understanding the process which caused people to makes these journeys.”
“Media is the primary feeder of how people make sense of migrants.” — Prof. Shani Orgad.
Equally, the nightmare narrative plays on an exclusionary politics whereby national security is threatened by the penetration of ‘the other.’ This leads onto the second limitation, migrant’s voices are often not included within this narrative; the image that is fed into people’s imaginations is of helpless and hapless victim. The dream imaginary, although less dominant, provides a celebratory narrative of the promise and potential of migration.
So, how can we re-imagine migration?
In order to move beyond the rigidity of this binary, Shani argues for the concept of ambivalence. The reality of migration is complex, neither a nightmare or a dream: “Lives are always liminal and precarious, fraught with contradictions.” When social media and other platforms, including the press, enable migrants to “give accounts of their own lives” it is possible to re-imagine migration and stretch “moral horizons.” It is for this reason that Shani praised Lensational as a platform for reimagination, allowing migrant workers agency to present their own personal narratives.
When social media and other platforms, including the press, enable migrants to “give accounts of their own lives” it is possible to re-imagine migration and stretch “moral horizons.”
Tara Mikhael discussed the important work of the organisation Migreat that provides information and help for migrants moving to some EU countries and the USA. The organisation attends to the complexity of migration: both celebrating migrants as entrepreneurs eagerly seeking to succeed as well as recognising the many kinds of support that migrants needs when they reach host countries and many of the problems many are faced with.
Migreat also provides support for migrants’ voices — they have created a platform for migrants who are making similar journeys to speak to one another. She noted that it is important to consider the great diversity of migrants from different cultures across the world who arrive in ‘host countries’ including differentiation through the migrant tier system. Tara argued that the platform of Migreat facilitates networking and discussion across differences and enables a sense of solidarity.
It is important to consider the great diversity of migrants from different cultures across the world who arrive in ‘host countries.’
Cathy McIlwaine has a background in international development, social justice and the rights of migrants. Much of Cathy’s qualitative research is based upon the narratives and stories of migrants. Following the theme of migrants’ voices not being heard, she also argued that many migrants are not being seen.
Drawing on her work with Latin American migrants in London, Cathy argued that their invisibility is twofold. Despite their significant economic contribution to London many migrants are not seen as important contributors to the city’s economy, certainly not as the entrepreneurs that Tara described. Equally, she noted a “physical invisibility” as many migrants take jobs that start very early in the morning or very late in the evening.
Cathy then went on to discuss migrants and gender, the ways in which international migration does or does not empower women. Supporting the argument of Shani she also argued for ambivalence, providing examples of important changes to gender practices that enabled empowerment but also the exploitation that can occur. She gave examples of gender empowerment and the blurring of gender boundaries that can occur. Her research with Bolivian migrants highlighted that many women and men had started taking on similar roles within the household, both cleaning and taking care of the children.
Equally, Cathy discussed the independence many women felt at the ability to earn an income and support themselves. However, it is important to stress that the trajectory of migration should not be seen as a move away from traditional households to more liberating ‘host countries.’ Cathy has worked with migrants who come from communities where gender relations are are quite equal, she noted that this is often dependent on class.
Despite their significant economic contribution to London many migrants are not seen as important contributors to the city’s economy, and certainly not as entrepreneurs.
However, her research has also highlighted distressing stories of exploitation. She told the story of an Ecuadorian cleaner who has been victim to sexual abuse from her boss. This migrant worker is irregular; therefore, her boss used this as a means of power against her and threatened to denounce her if she reported him. Cathy argued that this is a “common story.” Here, the intersectionality of gender and migration status leads to exploitation. Cathy thus concluded that “international migration is not uniformly empowering or exploitative, the outcomes are dependent on class, nationality and gender.
Reimagining Migration
Each of the speakers grappled with the binary narratives often adopted in the discussion of migration. Each highlighted the complexities and diversity of migrants experiences, often contributed to by the intersectionality of class, nationality and gender. Shani, Tara and Cathy all argued for the importance of migrants’ voices.
At Lensational we work to provide a platform for the voices and stories of women to be seen and heard, the action of telling their stories and expressing themselves is an action of empowerment and can also feed into the re-imagination of migrants by host countries.
Louisa Barker is a Researcher at Lensational. She holds a MSc in Urban Studies from the University College of London (UCL), and a BA in Geography from the University of Durham. She is currently working at UCL City Leadership Initiative as a Researcher. Her research interests include the campaigning role of charities, multiculturalism and gender. She is based in London, the United Kingdom.
