Migrant Narratives

With a focus on migrant narratives, or the storytelling about migration, this

volume considers the ways in which migration is and has been shaped by indi-
vidual and collective experiences of agency, belonging and community.
Driven by an agenda of deep listening, each chapter presents a narrative
directly derived from qualitative research, an outline of the methodological
framing as well as narrative analysis. Through close attention to the narrative,
its performative aspects and its ruptures and silences, authors identify patterns
and material in the fabric of such telling and retelling of stories that open up
new perspectives on the migrant experience. This book develops a methodology
of “dwelling with stories” that allows for sustained and slow interrogation of
the migrant experience and the accompanying decisions that shape narratives
around mobility across borders. Its structure is innovative by emphasising the
migrant voice and reflecting on the scholars’ positionality, while also offering
new theoretical contributions that will advance the field of narrative analysis.
The book will appeal to academics, students and practitioners in a wide
range of subject areas within the humanities and social sciences, including
anthropology, sociology, human geography, migration/​ refugee/​
diaspora
studies and oral history.

Brigitte Bönisch-​Brednich is Professor of Anthropology and Director of the

Stout Research Centre for New Zealand Studies at Victoria University of
Wellington, New Zealand. Her research interests are in migration, narrative
inquiry, storytelling and ethnographic practice. She has published widely on
these subjects. Her current project looks at migrant storytelling.

Anastasia Christou is Professor of Sociology and Social Justice at Middlesex

University, UK. She is also Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy,
an academic activist, a trade unionist, feminist and anti-​racist. An interdis-
ciplinary critical scholar whose work is fully immersed in the humanities,
social sciences and the arts in the pursuit of a public sociology which is rele-
vant, meaningful and transformative, she extensively researches, publishes
and teaches on issues of identity, emotion, inequality, intersectionality, ethics,
decolonial and feminist pedagogies, social justice and exclusions as regards
gender, class, sexuality, race and ethnicity in migrant, minority, youth and
ageing groups, having engaged in multi-​sited, multi-​method and comparative
ethnographic research in the US, UK, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Cyprus,
France, Iceland, Switzerland, while recently engaged in collaborative research
in the Middle East, Asia, Africa, as well as with communities in Israel and
Palestine.

Silke Meyer is Professor of European Ethnology at the University of

Innsbruck, Austria where she also heads the Research Area “Cultural
Encounters –​Cultural Conflicts”. She researches and teaches on economic
anthropology, migration and remittances as well as narrative analysis. Her
publications include a monograph on The Indebted Self: Narrative Handling
of Private Insolvency (2017) and an edited volume on Remittances as Social
Practices and Agents of Change: The Future of Transnational Society (2023).

Marie Johanna Karner is a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of

Geography at the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany. Within
her dissertation she studied neo-​diasporic communities to understand the fun-
damental transformation of former ethnic groups. Apart from topics related
to migration and diaspora, her research interests include urban utopias, the
touristification of former colonial towns and cinematic experiences. In 2015,
her diploma thesis on the transformation of the historic centre of Byblos/​Jbeil
(Lebanon) received a special mention within the Otto-​Borst-​Prize. In 2017,
she was funded as a doctoral fellow at the Orient Institute Beirut (Lebanon).

Anton Jakob Escher is Professor of Cultural Geography at the Johannes

Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany. After obtaining his PhD at the
University of Erlangen-​Nürnberg in 1985, he qualified as professor in 1990
with a habilitation thesis. From 1998 to 2019 he was Managing Director of
the Institute of Geography and from 2005 to 2019 Director of the Center for
Intercultural Studies (ZIS). His research focuses are North Africa and the
Middle East, the field of migration, historic towns and film geography.
Studies in Migration and Diaspora

Studies in Migration and Diaspora is a series designed to showcase the inter-

disciplinary and multidisciplinary nature of research in this important field.
Volumes in the series cover local, national and global issues and engage with
both historical and contemporary events. The books will appeal to scholars,
students and all those engaged in the study of migration and diaspora. Amongst
the topics covered are minority ethnic relations, transnational movements and
the cultural, social and political implications of moving from ‘over there’, to
‘over here’.

Series Editor:
Anne J. Kershen, Queen Mary University of London, UK

African Heritage Australian Youth

Forced Displacement, Educational Attainment, and Integration Outcomes
Tebeje Molla

Race and the Colour-​line

Boundaries of Europeanness in Poland
Bolaji Balogun

Migration and Families in East and North Europe

Translocal Lifelines
Laura Assmuth, Marit Aure, Marina Hakkarainen and Pihla Maria Siim

Migrant Narratives
Storytelling as Agency, Belonging and Community
Edited by Brigitte Bönisch-​Brednich, Anastasia Christou, Silke Meyer,
Marie Johanna Karner, and Anton Jakob Escher

For more information about this series, please visit: www.routle​dge.com/​sociol​ogy/​ser​ies/

ASH​SER1​049
Migrant Narratives
Storytelling as Agency, Belonging and
Community

Edited by Brigitte Bönisch-​Brednich,

Anastasia Christou, Silke Meyer,
Marie Johanna Karner and
Anton Jakob Escher
First published 2024
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Names: Bönisch-Brednich, Brigitte, editor. | Christou, Anastasia, editor. |
Meyer, Silke, 1971– , editor. | Karner, Marie Johanna, editor. | Escher, Anton, editor.
Title: Migrant narratives : storytelling as agency, belonging and community /
edited by Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich, Anastasia Christou, Silke Meyer,
Marie Johanna Karen, and Anton Jakob Escher.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York : Routledge, 2024. |
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Subjects: LCSH: Emigration and immigration–Social aspects. |
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ISBN: 978-​0-​367-​63745-​3 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-​0-​367-​63749-​1 (pbk)
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DOI: 10.4324/​9781003120520
Typeset in Times New Roman
by Newgen Publishing UK
The Open Access version of chapters 5, 6, 7 and 13 was funded by University of Innsbruck
Contents

List of figures x
List of contributors xi
Foreword xiv
Acknowledgements xvi

1 Analysing migrant narratives as an ethnographic

project: Academic representation as storytelling 1
B RI G I T T E BÖ N I SC H -​B R ED N I C H

PART I
Scripted narratives –​Continuities and ruptures 15
A NAS TAS I A C H RISTO U

2 Narratives of absence: Making sense of loss and liminality in the

post-​war Bosnian diaspora 19
L AU RA H U T TU N EN

3 Home at last: Narrating community and belonging through

retirement migration to Spain 31
AN YA AH ME D

4 Homecoming as exile? Experiences of rupture and belonging 43

ANAS TAS I A CH R I STO U
viii Contents

PART II
Agency –​Resourceful victimhood 55
S I L K E ME YE R

5 Female agency, resourceful victimhood and heroines in migrant

narrative 59
S I L K E ME YE R

6 “When you win, you are a German, when you lose, you are
a foreigner”: Claiming position beyond the meritocratic and
discriminatory migration discourse 72
C L AU D I U S S TRÖ H LE

7 “None of these are jokes, it’s just my life…”: Migrant narratives

and female agency in Shazia Mirza’s comedy 86
U L L A RAT H EI SER

PART III
Silences and voids in gendered narratives –​What can and
cannot be told 103
A N T ON JAKOB E SC H ER

8 The Syrian taxi driver: Migrant narratives or narratives of a

researcher? 107
AN T ON JAKO B ESC H ER

9 Reluctant stories: Silences in women’s narratives of war and exile 121

MARI TA E AS TMO N D

10 Planting the colonial narrative: The migrant letters of James

Taylor in Ceylon 134
AN G E L A MC C A RTH Y

PART IV
Collective narratives –​Stories as a way of doing community 149
MARI E J OH AN NA K A R N ER

11 The “Titanic legacy”: Collective narratives as resources of

diasporic communities 153
MARI E J OH A N NA K A R N ER
 Contents ix

12 Migrant ethnography on YouTube: “GermanLifeStyle” and the

German “refugee crisis” 171
MI TA BAN E RJEE

13 The migrant storyteller: Mnemonic and narrative strategies in

migrant stories 185
B RI G I T T E BÖ N I SC H -​B R ED N I C H A N D SI LK E MEYE R

Index 205
Figures

10.1 James Taylor (in white suit) and friend, Ceylon, c. 1863.
Courtesy of Tom Barron 135
10.2 Bust of James Taylor at the Mlesna Tea Castle at Talawakelle,
Sri Lanka. Copyright Angela McCarthy 140
11.1 Facebook comment by a Kfarsghabi with reference to the
Hollywood movie Titanic (8 May 2015). Courtesy of George
Daniel 156
11.2 Instagram post by a Kfarsghabi using a historical
photograph of RMS Titanic (22 August 2020). Courtesy of
Courtney Abood 158
11.3 The (re)production of diasporic communities through
collective narratives. Copyright Marie Karner 167
Contributors

Anya Ahmed is Professor of Wellbeing and Communities and Academic

Director of the Doctoral College at Manchester Metropolitan University,
UK. She has an academic background in social policy and sociology and
is primarily a qualitative researcher, specialising in structural narrative ana-
lysis. The overarching focus of her research has been on marginality and
social inequalities. She has significant experience of researching migration
and minoritized communities, housing, homelessness, health and social care
and ageing. She has produced publications which are theoretically informed,
advance qualitative (narrative) methodologies and have also impacted on
policy and practice.
Mita Banerjee is Professor of American Studies at the Obama Institute for
Transnational American Studies, University of Mainz, Germany. Her
research explores questions of race, citizenship, and naturalization (Color
Me White: Naturalism/​Naturalization in American Literature, 2013), as well
as medical humanities and health equity (Medical Humanities in American
Studies, 2018). She is co-​speaker of the research training group “Life
Sciences, Life Writing: Boundary Experiences of Human Life between
Biomedical Explanation and Lived Experience”, which is funded by the
German Research Foundation.
Brigitte Bönisch-​Brednich is Professor of Anthropology and Director of the
Stout Research Centre for New Zealand Studies at Victoria University of
Wellington, New Zealand. Her research interests are in migration, narrative
inquiry, storytelling and ethnographic practice. She has published widely on
these subjects. Her current project looks at migrant storytelling.
Anastasia Christou is Professor of Sociology and Social Justice at Middlesex
University, UK. She is also Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy,
an academic activist, a trade unionist, feminist and anti-​racist. An interdis-
ciplinary critical scholar whose work is fully immersed in the humanities,
social sciences and the arts in the pursuit of a public sociology which is rele-
vant, meaningful and transformative, she extensively researches, publishes
and teaches on issues of identity, emotion, inequality, intersectionality,
xii List of contributors

ethics, decolonial and feminist pedagogies, social justice and exclusions

as regards gender, class, sexuality, race and ethnicity in migrant, minority,
youth and ageing groups, having engaged in multi-​sited, multi-​method and
comparative ethnographic research in the US, UK, Denmark, Germany,
Greece, Cyprus, France, Iceland, Switzerland, while recently engaged in col-
laborative research in the Middle East, Asia, Africa, as well as with commu-
nities in Israel and Palestine.
Marita Eastmond, Senior Professor of Social Anthropology. School of
Global Studies, University of Gothenburg, Sweden. Research interests
include: Forced migration and exile, Medical anthropology, Anthropology
of war and conflict. Areas of ethnographic work: Chile, Cambodia, Bosnia-​
Herzegovina, Sweden, USA.
Anton Jakob Escher is Professor of Cultural Geography at the Johannes
Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany. After obtaining his PhD at the
University of Erlangen-​Nürnberg in 1985, he qualified as professor in 1990
with a habilitation thesis. From 1998 to 2019 he was Managing Director of
the Institute of Geography and from 2005 to 2019 Director of the Center
for Intercultural Studies (ZIS). His research focuses are North Africa and
the Middle East, the field of migration, historic towns and film geography.
Laura Huttunen is Professor of Social Anthropology at Tampere University,
Finland. She has worked extensively on issues of migration, and she has
conducted long-​term ethnographic research among the Bosnian diaspora
since 2001, doing research both in Finland and in Bosnia. She has focused
on ways of living in the diaspora, with a specific focus on the ways of
relating to the violent past among the Bosnian diaspora. Her previous pro-
ject focused on the question of the missing and disappeared persons in post-​
war Bosnia, while her current project analyses disappearances in migratory
contexts. Her book Violent Absences, Haunting Presences: Missing Persons,
Political Landscapes and Cultural Practices will be published by Manchester
University Press in 2024.
Marie Johanna Karner is a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of Geography
at the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany. Within her disser-
tation she studied neo-​diasporic communities to understand the funda-
mental transformation of former ethnic groups. Apart from topics related
to migration and diaspora, her research interests include urban utopias,
the touristification of former colonial towns and cinematic experiences. In
2015, her diploma thesis on the transformation of the historic centre of
Byblos/​Jbeil (Lebanon) received a special mention within the Otto-​Borst-​
Prize. In 2017, she was funded as a doctoral fellow at the Orient Institute
Beirut (Lebanon).
Angela McCarthy is Professor of Scottish and Irish History and Director of the
Centre for Global Migrations at the University of Otago. She is the author
 List of contributors xiii

and editor of many books on migration including Personal Narratives of

Irish and Scottish Migration, 1921–​65: “For Spirit and Adventure” (2007)
and Narratives of Migrant and Refugee Discrimination in New Zealand,
(with Jacqueline Leckie and Angela Wanhalla) Migrant Cross-​Cultural
Encounters in Asia and the Pacific (2017) and (with T.M. Devine) Tea and
Empire: James Taylor in Victorian Ceylon (2017) and New Scots: Scotland’s
Immigrant Communities since 1945 (2018).
Silke Meyer is Professor of European Ethnology at the University of Innsbruck,
Austria where she also heads the Research Area “Cultural Encounters –​
Cultural Conflicts”. She researches and teaches on economic anthropology,
migration and remittances as well as narrative analysis. Her publications
include a monograph on The Indebted Self: Narrative Handling of Private
Insolvency (2017) and an edited volume on Remittances as Social Practices
and Agents of Change: The Future of Transnational Society (2023).
Ulla Ratheiser is Senior Scientist at the Department of English at the University
of Innsbruck where she teaches English Literature and Cultural Studies.
Her research interests are Postcolonial Studies, contemporary migrant
writing and popular culture.
Claudius Ströhle is a PhD candidate in the Department of History and
European Ethnology at the University of Innsbruck, affiliated with the
Doctoral Program “Dynamics of Inequality and Differences in the Age
of Globalization”. His research focuses on migrant transnationalism,
remittances, economic anthropology, inequality in the education system,
and ethnography.
Foreword

The migrant experience takes many forms. These include refugees in search of
sanctuary having escaped from war and/​or ethnic, religious and gender per-
secution; economic migrants seeking a better and more fulfilling life; spouses
joining partners and retirees keen to spend their closing years in warmer
climes. Researchers in migration have focused on all these conditions, often
meeting with, and discussing, the process of immigration with individuals who
have settled successfully, with those trying to make new lives for themselves
and their families and with those for whom migration and settlement has not
worked out. All migrants have stories to tell. Frequently their histories are
incorporated in the researcher’s narrative, at other times as direct quotations
from one-​to-​one interviews which complement the text. However, rarely are
the narratives of the interviewed closely analysed. All too often there is little
time or space available to explore the “story and person” behind the words.
This volume dramatically reverses the pattern. In the chapters that follow the
migrant narrative is the priority, the authors paying due justice to the words
of the narrators, or as in one instance, to letters written by a migrant more
than 150 years ago. As Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich and Silke Meyer say in their
closing chapter in this book, “the migrant is the storyteller”.
However, this does not mean the accounts of the migrant experience can
just be taken at face value: they need to be forensically examined. As the
authors contributing to this volume were aware, the information or story may
not always be a true reflection of the reality. A subject might embroider the
narration to maintain the researchers’ interest or recount it as she or he would
have liked it to have been as opposed to how it was.
Positionality is an important aspect of the interview procedure. Who is in
charge while the interview is under way; who leads and who follows? As the
chapters illustrate, whilst some storytellers will take control of the interview,
some maintain a subservient manner. Still others may feel unease at the aca-
demic presence. Undoubtedly, an important facet of this area of migration
research is the relationship between researcher and subject, one which may
need developing over a period of time.
The “stories” told in this book cover a range of migrant experiences, some
heart rending, some disturbing and two which are told through the media –​the
 Foreword xv

broadcast and the social. A refugee from the Bosnian war describes how she
continues to exist in a liminal state, not knowing whether her husband, taken
by Serbian soldiers as the family tried to escape twenty years ago, was dead
or alive. Another story, which comes from the same war, tells how a Croatian
family that escaped to Sweden, have rebuilt their lives. But as the “story” draws
to its close the narrator hints at the horrors of the war and the experiences
she underwent which are still deeply embedded and, even after all this time,
not ready to be fully revealed, even to her family –​two examples of how the
horrors of war affect the narrator and the narration and which can remain
hidden and silent for decades.1
The story of British women finding happiness and belonging on the Costa
Blanca provides a positive side to the migrant experience whilst the examin-
ation of the Cypriot migratory pattern highlights the temporal, emotional and
spatial dimensions of diasporic migration and return. Contextualisation is also
vital to understanding the migrant’s story and the geographic and mental place
in which they are positioned when the story is being told. A television inter-
view carried out by Jonathan Ross with a British born Muslim comedienne is
partially reprinted in Chapter 7. It exemplifies the way in which the interviewee
decided to characterise herself as of migrant origin and direct the interview in
that direction rather than as one which was a purely comedic narrative. Both
this story and the one told by the Austrian born woman of Turkish origin in
Chapter 5, underline the way in which agency enables success in a country in
which the narrators’ families are viewed as outsiders, a position in which those
women at times still find themselves. When analysing the migrant story, the
relationship between interlocutors invests the interview. Thus, in the case of the
Jonathan Ross interview, the YouTube discourses posted by the young Syrians
in Germany and the letters sent home from Ceylon by the young Scottish
migrant in the 1850s, forensic analysis is vital to fully appreciate exactly what
the narrative is telling the reader, as there is no direct interaction between the
researcher and interviewee.
Whilst the narratives, their subjects and their narrators all vary, the chapters
all follow an agreed structure, thus enabling the reader to appreciate the full
value of this analytical approach. For this is not just a book of migrants’
stories, it is a means of introducing those working in the field of migration
studies to an impressive and original methodological and theoretical approach
to the study of the movement of people and, as such, it is a volume not to be
ignored.
Anne Kershen
Queen Mary University of London, UK
Editor, Studies in Migration and Diaspora series

Note
1 The hiding from narration for many years of painful and/​or horrific experiences has
been a common factor in the retelling of the experiences of holocaust survivors who
kept their stories hidden for decades.
Acknowledgements

As mentioned in the first chapter, this book is the outcome of several workshops
at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), organised by Anton Escher
and Marie Karner since 2017. Several other scholars participated in these small
conferences who all gave presentations, inspired us and helped to shape the
design of this volume and sharpen our thinking. Thank you to Louise Ackers
(University of Salford Manchester), Rolf Wilhelm Brednich (Georg August
University of Göttingen), Veronika Cummings (JGU Mainz), Fatma Haron
(University of Innsbruck), Ahmad Izzo (JGU Mainz), Olaf Kleist (Osnabrück
University) and Helena Rapp (JGU Mainz).
The workshops were funded by the Center for Intercultural Studies of
the JGU under the management of Heike Spickermann. For hosting the
meetings, the Institute of Geography at the JGU kindly provided rooms and
facilities.
As editors we would like to thank our fellow authors for their great
contributions and hard work. This book is a group effort and it is richer for
every single chapter in it.
The biggest thank you, however, has to go to our migrant storytellers: Amela,
Zoe, Ferit & Şadiye, Mirza Shazia, Abu Khalil, Maja, Hatice, Mabel, James
Taylor as well as the Kfarsghabis and Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham. You
made it possible for us to tell part of your stories and you generously shared
your narratives. By all of us being able to listen and discuss these, we received
an invaluable gift.
Lastly, we would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their helpful
comments, and our senior editor Neil Jordan and editorial assistant Gemma
Rogers for their patience. We would also like to thank our colleague Graeme
Whimp (Victoria University of Wellington) for his input and support.
newgenprepdf

Acknowledgements xvii

This book has been written during the global pandemic; several of us were
also severely ill at different times and suffered personal tragedy. Now we are
there and hope to make a valuable contribution to the body of migrants’ stories
in this world.
Brigitte Bönisch-​Brednich, Wellington, New Zealand
Anastasia Christou, London, UK
Silke Meyer, Innsbruck, Austria
Marie Johanna Karner, Mainz, Germany
Anton Jakob Escher, Mainz, Germany
December 2022
1 Analysing migrant narratives as an
ethnographic project
Academic representation as storytelling

Brigitte Bönisch-​Brednich

By way of an introduction, this chapter will explore the analysis of migrant

narratives as a scholarly project.
Doing research on migration as narrative inquiry constitutes an academic
practice/​choice that comes with a set of framings requiring reflection on a
number of levels. The narrative turn seems, in retrospect, a logical progression
of both cultural and ontological turns (Bachmann-​Medick 2016; Goldstein
2015; Holbraad et al. 2014). But this logic cannot be applied without reflection
on the politics of storytelling (Jackson 2002). It is this change in perspective
that has, in turn, changed the way we work and altered how we design and
construct the research process and its representations. To reflect on this choice,
it helps to ask ourselves, with Martin Kreiswirth, “Why have we decided to
heed the story, to trust the tale? And what does that say about how we define,
talk about, and organize knowledge?” (1994, p. 61). “Story”, he continues, “is
no longer in the spotlight, but the lamp by which other things are seen” (ibid.
p. 62). This means, of course, that we are using stories not only to shine a light
on the migration experience; we utilise stories to gain a qualitative and deeper
sense of migrant narratives by training spotlights on particular “genres” or
modes of storytelling. Thus, in this volume, we are exploring the “how”, the
modes of storytelling, of migration. We are choosing topical narratives for
such exploration, but the book is structured along lines of narrative modalities.
Choosing to emphasise the migrant voice and doing deep listening exercises
are political as well as academic choices. We made this choice in an environ-
ment where the term “migrant narrative” is often used in the context of how
policy makers, politicians and NGOs create official narratives on how to deal
with migration (D’Amato and Lucarelli 2019; Banulescu-​Bogdan et al. 2021).
“Narratives”, as James Dennison has rightly pointed out, “are an increasing
part of the current discourse on the politics of migration” and are used to nor-
matively load such discourses (2021, p.5).
Privileging one approach over possible others also requires explanation
and reflection. Choosing to give the migrants’ voices the pole position in the
analysis of migrant storytelling reflects an interdisciplinary approach that is
located in the ethnographically inclined humanities and qualitatively oriented

DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-1
2 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich

social sciences. Our disciplines lean towards deep engagement with listening,
reading and interpretation. They are committed to a sense of lingering with
texts and stories that is informed by an ethics of honouring experience, its
memory, its expressed agency. In short, we trust the story because it offers
one clear path into articulations of migrant experience. Saying that we trust
the story does not mean that we unconditionally believe the stories we are
engaging with; indeed, it is our task to (dis)believe and (un)trust as we listen
to, unsettle and re-​assemble narratives. By setting the migrants themselves as
actors, storytellers and communicators, we are moving away from the concept
of migrant narrative as a technique of externally driven normative loading and
entering a space that allows for a deep communication with and about migrant
storytelling. Our goal was to allow for a plurality of voices and to offer ana-
lysis of a selection of diverse migrant stories.

How this book was conceptualised and written

In this volume, our choices for such analysis were guided by a set of aligning
principles: A focus on a narrative approach that centres on “identity and
positioning” (Ahmed, this book); the articulation and expression of identities
(Christou; Karner, this book); and narrative positioning and agency (Meyer;
Ratheiser; Ströhle; Banerjee, all this book). We are working with these guiding
principles while also “emphasising the importance of situating the narrative
analysis within a social and political context” (Huttunen, this book; also
McCarthy, this book), in this way to “challenge societal discourse, and stereo-
typical notions of victimhood” (Ratheiser, this book), honouring silences,
ruptures and liminality (Eastmond; Escher, both this book) and requiring
alternative ways of listening to migrant voices.
Every chapter in this book starts with a story. As I am attempting a reflec-
tion on migrant narrative analysis as an academic choice and exercise, I would
like to begin with the story of how this book was developed, how it was written,
and how we would like it to be read.
The book developed over a series of workshops at the Johannes Gutenberg
University of Mainz’s Center for Intercultural Studies and its Institute of
Geography. The first workshop concentrated on migrants’ storytelling; for
the second, we invited each participant to “bring” a migrant story in order to
jointly reflect on the analysis of migrant narratives and develop a methodology
for analysis. We workshopped on a common structure for all our chapters that
would foreground the migrant storytellers and their voices. Listening deeply
to the stories presented enabled us to establish the themes that are present in
this book. We paid close attention to silences, to tightly scripted narratives,
to ruptures, to unfinished stories, to the strategic use of humour, agency and
collective memory building and to narrative maintenance and developed those
categories into sections of the book. We recorded our discussions and took
detailed minutes to make sure we got this right and to ensure that we could
retrace our steps if we got lost in our quest for developing pathways into
 Analysing migrant narratives as an ethnographic project 3

reading and listening to migrant stories and to working out the modalities of
these narratives.
Hence, every draft chapter presented during the workshop followed a
jointly set structure of story, methodological reflections and (narrative) ana-
lysis. These three sections were retained to structure the final manuscripts. In
this way we hope to foreground storytelling and listening, focusing on migrant
voices and encouraging readers to engage with concepts of deep listening and
reading. By presenting a migrant narrative account at the beginning of each
chapter, we also invite readers to first engage with the story and then follow
various pathways of analysis. We employed what Anya Ahmed calls (in this
book) undertaking a staged reading of a constructed and chosen text. During
the workshop, every author brought a story to the group and offered an ini-
tial, often very striking, analysis. This was discussed and explored by the whole
group offering insights, sharing what each of us “heard” from the story, and
developing shapes that could guide further interpretation. Subsequently, the
methodology and analysis were written up once more by the authors for a final
version of their chapters.
Each story is thus followed by an exercise in academic scene setting and
the wider research project and its methodology are laid out. The social and
historical context of the story and its teller is developed and the reader learns
how the research is embedded in fieldwork or data collection, often long-​term.
The migrant scene is also sketched out: Is the story about refugees, is it told by
immigrant’s children, is it an émigré or expatriate who is speaking to us? Or are
we listening to someone who has been on a quest for a better life and retraces
a journey rather than a flight?
The final part of each chapter is the analysis of the migrant narrative. The
story serves as an anchor for the exploration of a mode of storytelling that is
saturated by a much larger set of stories (data) that underpins the theorising of
the formation of migrant narratives. In this part, the academic authors answer
a set of questions that have been indicated by their choice of story. How are
narratives scripted to make a coherent plot? How are collective narratives
formed and communicated to support long-​lasting identity projects? How
is agency performed and how do we tell stories that epitomise resourceful
victimhood? And how do we frame silences and voids in a way that leaves us to
complete the story or work into the ruptures? Each of these modalities makes
a part of this book and each has its own theoretical introduction.

On making choices –​creating the ethnographic story

In writing each ethnographic story, and in choosing one for each chapter
(thus highlighting a particular genre or performative technique of migrant
narrative), we are taking on a responsibility that demands academic justifi-
cation. Kirin Narayan has reflected on such choices, pointing out that “while
all ethnographers extract, curtail, and rearrange materials from their field-
work situations to make texts, perhaps it is in the editing of other people’s
4 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich

stories that the interventions of an anthropologist as editor come into clearest

focus” (2007, p. 133). By comparing ethnographic authorship with creative
non-​fiction writing, Narayan illuminates the heart of what it means to create a
representation by working with ethnographic material, in this instance, stories.
She points out that “writers of personal narrative are especially familiar with
the challenges of looking back through lived and gathered materials to high-
light a story” (2007, p. 132). And Narayan goes on to cite Vivian Gormick to
clarify how we can frame a story that is powerful, leaves a lasting image, and
simultaneously supports us towards writing analysis: “The situation is the con-
text of circumstances, sometimes the plot; the story is the emotional experience
that preoccupies the writer: the insight, the wisdom, the thing that one has
come to say” (Gormick 2001, p. 13).
All the authors in this book chose a story with which to start their chapters.
The choice itself demanded constructing or even writing a story. As the topic
and the aim is to reflect deeply on migrants’ modes of storytelling, we had
to make editorial decisions as to how our story, chosen from the “heroes” of
our data set, was to represent our analysis as a whole and as a starting point.
We chose conversations, edited interview transcripts, recounted memories
evoked from fieldnotes, letters and media stories, and transcribed film clips.
Some of these narratives involved translation from the original languages; in
these cases all authors tried to maintain the flavour of the conversation and the
personal narrative style of our informants (Spieker 2021). All of these story-​
choices came from saturated datasets; they were either part of a much bigger
research project, some long-​term fieldwork, a considerable archive, the oeuvre
of a storyteller comedian or all of the above. Being asked to come up with a
story and work with it invites the author to deeply hang out with the person(s)
involved in the story, to engage in deep listening, and to develop data-​saturated
hunches about what our choices and the stories themselves might teach us
about migrants’ narratives (Bönisch-​Brednich 2018b; Geertz 1998). A deep-​
reading exercise can come close to an academic meditation leading to the
choice of the right story, the story that stands for others to support analysis.
Out of our joined listening and contemplation, however, we developed a col-
lective sense of where that story might sit in both the author’s focus and in our
book project. The aim was always to privilege the migrant voice as a starting
point, which meant we had to act simultaneously as authors and listeners. In
many ways this pertains to an exercise which Viveiros de Castro would call
“controlled equivocation” (2004; see also Holbrood, Pedersen and de Castro
2014). This kind of editing and shaping also takes courage, as we consciously
shape representations built on our academic interests and thus perform aca-
demic “agency” in permitting oneself to analyse deeply rather than widely.
When Anya Ahmed reflected on academic emplotment for her project on
migration of English women to Spain, she suggested that we have to ask our-
selves “how [do] analysts bring together discrete incidents into a complete
story in order to create an analytical unit?” (Ahmed this book; also Ahmed
2015). She pushes us to reflect on how we think about the narrative framework
 Analysing migrant narratives as an ethnographic project 5

employed by scholars to create an emplotment for a convincing and helpful

academic representation. We are storytellers, after all, when we engage in
writing the ethnographic story (Bönisch-​Brednich 2018a).
The choices of which story to choose and tell were also guided by a set of
aligning decisions that reflect our analytical goals. Anton Escher argues that
“the focus of the analysis is a reflection of the choices the researcher made
when re-​telling the migrant story” (this book). Thus, the selection of which
story to tell not only means that we chose which themes we decided to fore-
ground for the analysis but there was also an underlying sense of hinting at
what is not discussed, not told. We hope readers will pay attention to the
silences that might guide their thinking into the missing elements of narratives;
these are, after all, framed by the choices the storyteller determined and which
were accepted and followed by the researcher. Thus, Marita Eastmond speaks
of her decision of “gradually allowing the listener to understand that there
is an underlying, much more terrifying story not being told” (this book). By
accepting the agency of the storyteller, we accepted limitations in questioning
the “validity” of some narratives in terms of a reality check. While Marita
Eastmond’s and Laura Huttunen’s stories spare us the much more gruesome
realities of the history of the wars in former Yugoslavia, most other narratives
present us with a different socio-​ historic background: Strong statements
that conceal other possible stories rather than open silences, some degree of
humorous gaslighting, conscious narrative control by the storytellers and a
choose and click approach to history.
This means, for example, that there are only subtle hints pointing to
narrative gaps when we needed to protect the dignity and privacy of our part-
ners in the field or the archive. Their “truth” is subtly questioned in the framing
of the stories as narratives. Readers will no doubt think further and explore
the untravelled pathways and contest the more controlled narratives of the
storytellers in this book. They might accept our choices for our analytical
purposes, but we assume they will keep thinking on about, say, the male iden-
tity of a Syrian taxi driver and the gendered aspects of the narrative. They
might doubt the supposed efficacy and agency of Turkish migrant women in
their Austrian context. They might ask themselves if the comic aspects, and
thus the confident presentation, of diasporic immigrant lives on stage or film
would hold in private accounts of the same storyteller. They would certainly
want to explore the historical facts of a collective memory of a whole com-
munity narrative that is framed by perceived group unity and shared sense of
values. Narratives are situated in their communicative setting and appeal to
specific audiences; they might change according to context. There is not one
story truth in them but a number of significant (cultural) messages.
Without explicitly discussing this in depth, we are following Narayan’s
thoughts on constructing academic narratives when she reminds us that:

It’s crucial to remember that people we might seek to represent as characters

are always far more complex and have a life separate from our texts. However
6 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich

much we disguise people through pseudonyms or other identifying features,

we are ethically accountable to them in ways that fiction writers can happily
bypass.
(2007, p. 134)

The ethnographer’s presence in re-​told narratives

What, then, is our presence in our text we choose to “construct”? Narayan
argues that “presence in a text emerges partly from the narrative stance implicit
in the point of view, the tone of voice, and how close or distant one is from
events being described” (2007, p. 136). Our presence as authors in the stories
we have chosen as a framing representation seems first of all to situate us as
qualitative researchers. We chose to work with a single person, a couple of
people or a bounded community. We chose to work with a story, one story,
at least to start with. What do such choices for writing up tell about us as an
academic collective of authors? Do we reveal our disciplinary backgrounds or,
rather, the current paradigm of the narrative turn that might affect our discip-
lines (Bibler Coutin and Vogel 2016)? As geographers, anthropologists, litera-
ture specialists, historians or cultural studies’ scholars we seem to lean towards
the narrative and ontological turns. But we do so within certain parameters
that guard us against random choices. We consciously privilege the migrants’
stories, but we make certain to situate them in their respective social and his-
toric environments, thus ensuring that their migrant narrative is understood as
a historic and a social set of problems. We might trust the story, to come back
to Kreiswirth, but we make sure to anchor it in its field. Ahmed reminds us to
reflect on the narrative framework we choose to employ when writing our story
about the stories in our projects (this book). She is encouraging reflection on
emplotment rather than anchoring, but both are important devices for writing
about and with stories.
By writing the ethnographic story, as we have done in this book, we are using
devices of scene setting that are reminiscent of storytelling in ethnographic
films. By starting with a migrant’s story we are writing what Barrington calls
“the close-​up, the camera zooming in”; similarly to a film shot introducing the
main person, we are setting the scene by going as close as possible to a face, a
voice, a story (1997, p. 82). This is followed by the methodology section which
describes the whole research project in question. This second section is doing
“the long shot … that pulls back to a great distance, embracing first the whole
house, then the neighbourhood, and then … it takes in the whole city and
maybe the surrounding mountains too” (Barrington 1997, p. 81). By tagging
back and forth and shifting perspectives between the story (the close up) and
the long shots (method and analysis), we are creating a conversation and a
story that allows for exploration, context and summaries that move through
time and emotions (Narayan 2007, p. 138). This enables analysts to “bring
together discrete incidents into a complete story in order to create an analytical
 Analysing migrant narratives as an ethnographic project 7

unit” and by so doing we are offering analysis with persuasiveness and coher-
ence (Ahmed, this book and 2015).

The ethics of academic storytelling

I have touched on the ethics of academic storytelling above when discussing
the issue of leaving silences and respecting gaps. But there is more to such
active honouring of the story than just showing a general respect. “Narrative
ethics”, Silke Meyer argues, “focus on the link between stories and the moral
values portrayed in them. Narratives are seen here as an explicit or implicit way
of expressing what one should think or do rather than what one does think
or do” (Meyer 2018, p. 51; Phelan 2014). Meyer is referring to the analysis of
narratives formed by her participants, but her argument is just as valid when
we task ourselves with analysing how we as ethnographers deal with the ethics
of representation. If we decide to foreground the migrant voice and construct
our analysis alongside the stories we have been offered, it is inevitable that we
will encounter ethical challenges, if not dilemmas.
As the politics of representation have changed, we are much more conscious
of the fact that the stories we collect are given to us and, thus, they are in many
aspects on loan, not a keepsake. Data collections are not for us to simply mine
but to mind and carefully hold and share. Most qualitative researchers are
now deeply aware of the responsibility attached to working with other people’s
stories and, thus, their lives. The stories offered in this book are no exception.
Discomfort, compromises and ways of framing the process of re-​telling were
very much part of our discussions. When Anton Escher decided to offer us
the stories of his friend Abu Khalil, the offer came with caveats. Much of his
adventures had to be left out, some interpretations and analysis equally so. The
nature of their bond, the cultural background, and concepts of honour and
respect to the family curtailed the academic narrative (Escher, this book). This
is similar to Maya’s story that starts Marita Eastmond’s chapter (this book; see
also Huttunen this book). Her painful liminality, the necessary silences, and
the impossibility of resolving the narrative tension means that an incomplete-
ness is part of so-​haunting a trauma narrative.
There are always questions of how far an analysis can go and at which point
interpretation can morph into insult or hurt to the interviewee. When discussing
matters of emplotment, we are also talking about narrators who take the lis-
tener in a certain direction and employ strategies to silence doubtful questions.
Such silencing also serves as a narrative stopgap for the storytellers them-
selves: To think otherwise would unsettle a carefully constructed narrative and,
thus, unsettle life itself. The analytical term emplotment can signal towards a
technique of storytelling that is opinionated, strong-​willed and one-​sided; but
then it is also an opening to discuss the content and message of these stories
in their context and their reasoning. When Hatice, Zoe, or Mabel (in Meyer,
Christou, Ahmed, all this book) tell their stories, we encounter a reasoning
8 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich

that requires deep listening. They control their narratives and their messages
and ensure that their versions are represented in our texts. They restrict our
choices, but, by forcing us to listen in ways that require questioning, doubt
and even disbelief, they enable our analysis to go deeper. And they also require
an ethics of writing up which balances listening and reading, the storyteller’s
agency and the author’s disquiet.
This is one of the most difficult challenges when we engage in such deep
listening: The encounter with messages that are framed as common sense for the
narrator but not the listener. If we examine this with the tools we are offered by
Ann Laura Stoler, we have to admit that our narrators’ “epistemic habits” and
their “repertoires of common sense” can run right against our own academ-
ically trained ones (2008, p. 350). They curtail our ambition as analysts and
require a scholarly silence that often is hard to carry; it might even challenge
our ethical commitment to our critical scholarship. The storytellers’ own “ver-
nacular epistemic practise” (ibid. p. 359), their knowing of the world and, thus,
their narrative that communicates this knowledge, can be deeply challenging
as we see in Angela McCarthy’s chapter on James Taylor’s letters (this book).
The stories we have chosen, we chose to exemplify a voice but also a mode of
storytelling that teaches us something and offers itself as an example of how to
transform these choices into text. Our narrators’ politics of storytelling, their
actual worldview, their politics, their relation to a specific reality might not be
ours, might even contradict and shake our epistemic frames. Stoler suggests
that such “sentiments are not opposed to political reason but are modalities
and traces of it”. She treats “them as judgements, assessments, and interpret-
ations of the social and cultural world” (ibid.).
Such epistemic dispositions are experiences based in life worlds that might
indeed be worlds apart from ours and from our desk work of writing up and
thinking through. The inherent logic of our narrator’s world of what Bourdieu
refers to as “the feel for the game” (1990, p. 9) makes that listening work harder
as it distracts us from our task of analysing modes of narration, not tropes.
It does not necessarily evoke our constant curiosity and it also raises doubts
and even opposition. It can also make us feel utterly helpless when it comes to
narratives that have no possible solution or even hope. Of course, we see this
as part of our tool kit as ethnographers; but such respect is especially difficult
to uphold when we treat migrant narratives and narrators as companions in
our analysis.
The ethics of storytelling also have to pay attention to the performative
elements or the level of individual ability to articulate themselves by different
storytellers. The performance of a storyteller can reveal fluency in narration
or deep difficulties in expressing themselves when it comes to uncomfortable
topics. Thus, ruptures, silences, second-​language problems can give rise to too
great a power imbalance between author and storyteller. Incomplete sentences,
sighs, tears and despair need to be worked through and indicated. But the dig-
nity, the quality and the generosity of sharing stories is front of mind in these
chapters. Again, we need to consider our responsibilities as researchers, as it
 Analysing migrant narratives as an ethnographic project 9

equally applies to the field and the discipline. Begonya Enguix has argued,
when discussing the limits of ethnographic authority, that “complete identity
[sic] or identification with a subject, is not –​and should not be –​a prerequisite
of knowledge or of understanding” (2014, p. 91). In her eyes, a certain distance
of researchers from the field is appreciated by both the participants and the
researchers, especially when it comes to emotional involvement and levels of
empathy. Thus, “Strangeness is both a precondition of ethnography and a trait
highly valued by informants. Being ‘stranged’ confers authority and shapes a
particular kind of experience in the field and about ‘the field’ ” (ibid.).

Reconciling the contradictions in the writing of the ethnographic narrative

John Van Maanen was one of the earliest ethnographers reflecting on the pro-
cess of ethnographic writing. In his seminal text, Tales of the field, he argues
that we have to organise and bring to light the often “overlooked narrative
conventions of ethnography”. He asks, with James Clifford, “If ethnog-
raphy produces cultural interpretations through intense research experience,
how is such an unruly experience transformed into an authoritative written
account?” (Clifford cited in Van Maanen 1988, p. 1; Clifford 1983, p. 120).
Clifford, in his essay on ethnographic authority, challenges us to reflect on the
possibility for ethnographers to produce an “adequate version of a more-​or-​
less ‘otherworld’ composed by an individual author?” (1983, p. 120). Clifford’s
argument in this essay is that we, by constructing ethnographic narratives,
not only make “cultural objects” visible but also move into creative processes
of writing (ibid, p. 130). He challenges us to unsettle the groundedness in
experience that fieldwork brings to ethnographic representation and, thus, its
narrative.
I would argue that this volume, as well as other recent work, shows that we
have moved on from this and have taken up the challenge in ways that could
not be anticipated in 1983, when his essay was written. Instead of concen-
trating on the poetic possibilities of ethnography, academics have developed
a style that presents itself as a conversation between our data and our ethno-
graphic task of writing. We have learned to endure and live with contradictions
in our writing and, especially, the contradictions that arise from listening to
our participants and partners in the field. The aim has shifted from delivering
a coherent narrative of “cultures” to offering an ethnography that can hold a
field of ruptures. To accept, live with, endure and even enjoy the visibility of
contradictions is a marker of ethnographic presence. This is true for both the
migrants’ narratives and our own writing.
Clifford seems correct when he states that “henceforth, neither the experi-
ence nor the interpretive activity of the scientific researcher can be considered
innocent” (1983, p. 133). The “deskwork of fieldwork”, as Van Maanen has
termed the process of writing up, has opened up more possibilities since we
ceased to proclaim full ownership of our narratives. As Susan Bibler Coutin
and Erica Vogel have so aptly summed up: “Ethnographers thus position
10 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich

themselves at the crossroads of being activists, storytellers, and academics,

even as they locate their informants’ narratives along trajectories of tragedy
and possibility” (2016, p. 631).
Ethnographers, at the end of the day, are still the authors and thus main-
tain final control of the published text, but the writing process, as well as the
reading one, is shared with a variety of participants; they are also shared with
a new set of ethical and reflexive standards of producing these representations.
By privileging the migrant voice, by integrating a process of deep listening into
the writing exercise, we hope that the meaning of ethnographic authority has
shifted to an ethnographic companionship.
What needs to be reconciled with this is our own need to choose narratives
that seem to fit our desire to push migrant-​narrative research in new directions.
If we use stories of tragedy, of hopeful quests, of ongoing painful liminality,
or seemingly reckless emplotments to establish agency, we are using them to
make our own arguments. We do so to drive an academic quest and to change
and enrich our own epistemic practice. There is a need to ask ourselves, what
stories do ethnographers choose to tell and why (Bibler Coutin and Vogel
2016); and to consider whether Bibler Coutin and Vogel are right to point out
that such dilemmas of academic practice “are particularly sharp with ethno-
graphic accounts of migration” (ibid., p. 635). And, furthermore, to accept that
these dilemmas are equally sharp in relation to our analyses of how to read and
listen to accounts of migration. Or to accept, as Heath Cabot argues, that “the
representational practices of ethnography and advocacy alike are haunted by
various ‘ghosts’: traces of silenced subjects who index both the limits and pos-
sibilities of representation” (2016, p. 645.)

Some notes on how to read this book

As we are concentrating on the “how” of migrant storytelling, the narrative
modalities, this book is not structured around motifs or themes. We decided
to structure the book around four parts of narrative modalities; each part
has two or three chapters. Thus, the chapters concentrate on modes of story-
telling, and themes will pop up in unexpected places and connections can and
should be drawn between the different chapters and across the whole volume.
The chapters invite the reader to explore these modalities. Each of the four
parts has a theoretical introduction discussing specific modalities of story-
telling. In part one, “Scripted narratives –​continuities and ruptures” we are
analysing migrant storytelling as something that is highly structured and con-
trolled by its narrators. To control and structure a narrative to “hold” one’s
own personhood and one’s family’s identity is inherent in personal memory
and reasoning. In migrant narrative, it can also serve the purpose of a justifi-
cation narrative. The storytelling techniques guiding the narration are roughly
about narrative strategies of sense-​making (Huttunen, this book), narrating
belonging (Ahmed; Christou, both this book). The reader will detect genres
across the book, such as justification narratives, as they are central to migrant
 Analysing migrant narratives as an ethnographic project 11

storytelling. Some such genres are discussed in the last, concluding chapter
(Bönisch-​Brednich and Meyer, this book).
Part two centres on “Agency and resourceful victimhood” and their modes
of narration. Its chapters concentrate on how such challenges as being labelled
as foreigner, living with framing stereotypes, being in a state of liminality, and
commuting between two worlds are expressed in migrant narrative. World-​
making as a narrative skill is a mode of storytelling that is evident in migrant
narratives of resourceful victimhood. This might be narrated as female agency
against the odds (Meyer, this book), claiming a position of agency and con-
trol against an academic discourse of migrants as victims (Meyer, Ströhle,
Ratheiser, all this book), and using humour as narrative practice of resistance
and perspective-​turning technique (Ratheiser, this book).
“Silences and voids in gendered narratives –​What can and cannot be told”
are the focus of part three, and so are their gendered expressions in migrant
storytelling. What can or cannot be told depends not only on context and per-
sonality. Narrative silences and voids are gendered and culture-​dependent and
such voids are also constantly shifting. What is necessary to conceal in one
generation might not be in another. What is concealed is also a task for the
ethnographer to own, as discussed above. The conversations of Anton Escher
with a Syrian taxi driver are a potent example of all of the above. The gen-
dered narrative and its representation by the chapter’s author are unsettling
and revealing of such silences. Silences as discussed by Marita Eastmond take
us from a holding pattern as reader into a story that –​in the mode of slow-​
burning prose –​reveals the terror of war and the impossibility of telling it all.
The revelation of horror behind the narrative is carefully processed to make
it bearable for the narrator, the interviewee and the reader. The last chapter
in this part interrogates an archive of letters and the emotional work that is
inherent in storytelling of and about trauma and terror (McCarthy, this book).
The fourth and final narrative-​modality part explores narrative modes of
doing community in storytelling: “Collective narratives –​Stories as ways of
doing community”. Shared cultural codes and historical and present identities
produce collective narratives of diasporic community-​making. Stories are the
glue that binds communities and allows individuals to place themselves within
them. Stories such as the “Titanic Legacy” are essential narrative resources for
diasporic communities. They serve as moral grounding and reassure migrants
of their shared identity and history (Karner, this book). Doing community can
also be a narrative technique to challenge the host country and the national
narrative about refugees. Mita Banerjee (this book) sets out to complicate aca-
demic analysis of migrant narratives; her migrant actors and storytellers use
comedy and storytelling to unsettle a raft of narrative modes discussed in other
parts of this book. They also create narrative community by establishing a
narrative of resistance that is aimed at a generation of young German hosts
and Syrian refugees alike.
In the final chapter on “The migrant storyteller. Mnemonic and narrative
strategies in migrant stories”, Silke Meyer and I conclude the volume with
12 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich

a focus on the migrant storyteller and performative modalities of migrant

narrative. Collating the material presented in this volume, we will ask how
such storytelling is done and discuss three aspects that are closely related to
modes of migrant storytelling: time, memory and storytelling techniques. By
foregrounding the migrant storyteller, we want to emphasise the migrants’
voices and the ways in which they construct their stories. This is the central
message of this volume: being able to tell one’s story is one essential part of
how to be a migrant. Unfolding those stories and thereby understanding story-
telling as a core narrative strategy carried out by migrants has been at the heart
of our project.

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narrative. Culture & Psychology, 19 (3), 348–​368. doi: 10.1177/​1354067X13489316
Gormick, V., 2001. The situation and the story: The art of personal narrative. New York,
NY: Farrar Strauss and Giroux.
Holbraad, M., Pedersen, M. A. and de Castro, E. V., 2014. The politics of
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Kreiswirth and T. Carmichael, eds. Constructivist criticism: The human sciences in the
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debt relief. Fabula: Special Issue: Narrative Analysis, 59 (1–​2), 50–​69. Doi: 10.1515/​
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Narayan, K., 2007. Tools to shape texts: What creative fiction can offer ethnography.
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narratology. Berlin: De Gruyter.
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Konzept. In: Hinrichs P., Röthl, M. and Seifert, M., eds. Theoretische reflexionen.
Perspektiven der Europäischen ethnologie. Berlin: Dietrich Reimer Verlag, 69–​87.
Stoler, A. L., 2008. Epistemic politics: Ontologies of colonial common sense. The
Philosophical Forum, 39 (3), 349–​361. doi: 10.1111/​j.1467-​9191.2008.00303.x
Van Maanen, J., 1988. Tales of the field: On writing ethnography. Chicago, IL: University
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Viveiros de Castro, E., 2004. Perspectival anthropology and the method of controlled
equivocation. Tipití: Journal of the Society for the Anthropology of Lowland South
America, 2 (1), 3–​22. https://​dig​ital​comm​ons.trin​ity.edu/​tip​iti/​vol2/​iss1/​1/​
Part I

Scripted narratives
Continuities and ruptures
Anastasia Christou

The core analytical focus of the chapters in part one is to look at highly
structured narratives that are central to a migrant experience, both indi-
vidual and collective. The empirical insights through the narrative stories in
the chapters by Laura Huttunen (Chapter 2), Anya Ahmed (Chapter 3) and
Anastasia Christou (Chapter 4) illustrate that very often, migrant groups
develop and follow a collective script when talking about their experience.
Scripts are set to help the individual to make sense of the migrant story, or
to protect and safeguard strongly held beliefs or secrets that should not be
revealed, or would at the very least, disrupt a migratory framework that offers
some kind of ontological security. In a sense, we understand the storytelling
device used here as “scripted narratives”, and within those, we find both con-
tinuities and ruptures in the stories that are told by the narrators.
Migrant narratives in this sense have a particular role to play when inter-
weaving dimensions of personhood and socio-​cultural experiences as part of
identity construction and negotiation. The narrative storytelling device then
becomes a rhetorical tool that might include a range of thematic traits, from
traumatic to happy, to nostalgic and forgotten, with common features to other
migrant stories. There is frequently a canonical grounding layer, that is then a
pathway to a journey of unfolding movements and fragments of microstories
which all share common threads and become instruments of articulating the
migrant “self ”. Such a process is often emotionally charged in producing
interconnections and interweaving the personal, political and cultural through
the narrative (Gómez-​Estern and de la Mata Benítez 2013).
At the same time, migrant generations can be bestowed (as legacy and
cultural inheritance) family stories of rupture, which become transposed
intergenerationally in preserving historical narratives of the nation. Some of
these narratives might potentially shape existential un/​certainty for offspring
in the social imaginaries of both parents and children in their mobile futures
for the next generation. It is these kinds of multi-​temporal and generative qual-
ities of the ruptures of intergenerational stories that this section explores, and
which are valuable interpretative resources for analyses within and beyond
migrant communities (Drnovšek 2020). The dialectics of migrant narratives

DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-2
16 Anastasia Christou

and the way the experiences of migration are narrated can be centred on how
the poetics and politics of representation (Leurs et al. 2020) and the aesthetics
of both actors and the phenomena shaping mobilities unfold in time and space.
Laura Huttunen’s long-​time ethnographic engagement with the Bosnian
diaspora between Finland and Bosnia-​Herzegovina offers in this chapter the
story of Amela; a woman of Bosniak origin, born in 1965 in a village in nor-
thern Bosnia-​Herzegovina, one of the federal republics of socialist Yugoslavia.
Amela’s story is situated within the history of the dissolution of Yugoslavia,
the protracted armed conflict in Bosnia-​Herzegovina between 1992 and 1995
which followed the declaration of independence in Bosnia, and the extreme
forms of violence against civilian populations during that conflict. Amela’s
narrative is a depiction of her escape from the scene of the atrocities with her
children, and her narrative is structured by the disappearance of her husband.
Amela’s story and its open-​endedness help us to understand the painful limin-
ality with which people with disappeared loved ones are forced to live. Thus,
the narrator is in a perpetual state of anticipation, in an over-​extended mode
of waiting, within the political violence of enforced disappearance, which
inherently disrupts the migrant relationship with their country of origin as a
political community.
Similar ruptures can be highlighted in Zoe’s story, the narrator in the chapter
by Anastasia Christou which also draws from long term ethnographic research
and explores diasporic memories, trauma, gendered identity and a sense of
exile when one returns to their ancestral homeland in search for “home” and
belonging, but cannot reconcile the fragmentations that divided communi-
ties bring with them. Zoe left her ancestral homeland Cyprus at a young age
and migrated to the United Kingdom, where she resided for a quarter of cen-
tury, marking 25 years of “absence-​presence” when a lot of political turmoil
was unfolding in the divided island of Cyprus. While the ongoing politics and
history of division and bi-​communal relations in Cyprus are complex and
contested, the story of Zoe is one which is articulated as a verbose account
reflecting an educational, professional and socio-​cultural journey from the
“cosmopolitan” and “multicultural” global city of London of the 1980s–​1990s
to a relocation to her ancestral homeland in 2002. Zoe’s account is lengthy,
exasperated and emotional, almost narrated in one breath, and upon com-
pletion, many hours later, it seemed that the weight of the world had been
lifted from her shoulders. She tackles many aspects of her fascinating life, from
experiencing patriarchy and sexism as a girl and an adult, her struggles as a
single mother working full-​time and trying to complete a doctoral degree, to
her return to a conservative, xenophobic and claustrophobic divided island
homeland, while focusing on issues of gender and feminism, motherhood and
mothering, family, and, belonging and rupture. This is a story of homecoming
and return migration, but one which is saturated by intense emotions, negoti-
ations and divisions, both personal and political.
Finally, Anya Ahmed gives us Mabel’s narrative, an 83-​year-​old British
retired teacher who decided to relocate to Spain. Mabel chose to leave
 Scripted narratives 17

the UK as she felt she no longer belonged there –​it no longer represented
home. Throughout her narrative the multiple motivations for migrating are
illuminated and placed into the context of wider structures, and a close inter-
rogation of Mabel’s narrative illuminates her unique biography and experience,
how she positioned herself while making decisions to move, and, then how
she lives in Spain and also how she sees herself and her life in context. This
is also a narration of how Mabel anchors herself in the world, and, how she
exercises agency within the context of structural opportunities and constraints.
Mabel constructs an idealised attachment to Spain’s natural physical environ-
ment linking to a romantic and utopian attachment to the Mediterranean idyll,
while Spain as a place, represents a better quality of life which entails escape
and freedom from responsibility. Mabel’s unique biography shaped her migra-
tion choices, the decisions she made, and, the life she lived, once she found her
final “home” there. Mabel presents her relationship to Spain in a selective way,
as it represents escape, rejuvenation and ultimately home; a place where older
people are highly valued. Thus, Mabel’s narrative bridges ruptures with con-
tinuities, and, ultimately rationalises this bridging as “homecoming”.

Bibliography
Drnovšek Z. Š., 2020. Cultures of risk: on generative uncertainty and intergenerational
memory in post-​Yugoslav migrant narratives. The Sociological Review, 68 (6), 1322–​
1337. doi:10.1177/​0038026120928881
Gómez-​Estern, B. M., de la Mata Benítez, M. L., 2013. Narratives of migration: emotions
and the interweaving of personal and cultural identity through narrative. Culture &
Psychology, 19 (3), 348–​368. doi:10.1177/​1354067X13489316
Leurs K., et al., 2020. The politics and poetics of migrant narratives. European Journal
of Cultural Studies, 23 (5), 679–​697. doi:10.1177/​1367549419896367
2 Narratives of absence
Making sense of loss and liminality in the
post-​war Bosnian diaspora

Laura Huttunen

Narrative –​A story of the disappeared husband

I saw my husband for the last time in 1992, in the courtyard of our house.
He was standing there between two soldiers. I watched him through the bus
window, as we were being transported from the town. I was in the bus with my
two children, the bus was full of women and children who had been forced to
enter the bus. I watched my husband, and after that, I never saw him again. It
was the 25 July 1992, afternoon.
The war had been raging for some time then, the Serbs were persecuting us
Muslims. We were hiding in the house of some relatives, and later in the woods,
me and my family, because horrible acts of violence had taken place there, we
had seen what was happening. The Serbs invaded the place, they had killed
many Muslims already. And we heard rumours from other locations. Houses
were taken, people were killed. We did not know what to do. We did not have
much to eat, and we knew that we had left some flour in the house. We went
there to fetch the flour. But the soldiers came to the house while we were there.
They took my husband, and they pushed us, me and my children, onto a bus.
Other women and children were being forced onto the bus as well.
We spent the next night in the camp at Trnopolje, it was an old school turned
into a camp. Very frightening. The following day we were transported, like
animals, in a truck, under a tarpaulin. We did not know where we were going.
A woman gave birth to a child during that hot, painful travel. We were sent
across the river to Croatia, and there we were taken to a refugee camp. Lots of
people, very crowded. I was worried for my husband all the time, constantly.
I made some enquiries, but nothing, nobody knew anything. I heard some
rumours that somebody had seen him being shot, but nobody knew exactly
who had seen that. It remained unclear.
After a year of camp life, we got permission to move to Finland, me and my
children. Later also my sister and her family came. It was a long time waiting.
I made many enquiries about my husband, in the camp and later in Finland.
I filed an enquiry through the Red Cross. I knew that many people had found
their family members through the Red Cross. But always nothing. They just
told us that such a name was not on their lists, not on the lists of refugees,
DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-3
20 Laura Huttunen

or prisoners, or dead persons, or anywhere. His name was nowhere. He was

nowhere.
We have lived now in Finland for twenty years. Life seems to be normal. My
children are growing up, becoming adults. The younger one does not remember
his father. But life is not normal, not for me. I go to work, I take care of my
children, outwardly everything is normal. But it is not, I am thinking of my
husband all the time. Every day.
I know, by now, that he has to be dead, that’s the only reasonable alterna-
tive. But I have to get certainty. I have to bury him, to give him a proper burial.
A proper funeral. Otherwise there is no peace, not for me, not for him. It is our
custom, that people have to be properly buried. With respect, so that their soul
can rest. I go on living my life here, but my mind is back with him. The doubt
creeps in: after the Second World War, somebody from my grandmother’s
village, a soldier who had been sent to fight, was missing for many years.
Everybody thought that he was dead. But then, suddenly, he appeared. He
had been in a prison camp, somewhere. He was not dead, he returned. This is
what I think: maybe also my husband is still somewhere. Maybe he has lost his
memory, maybe he does not know who he is. Everything is possible as long as
I do not get his body back.
Our life continues. We go to Bosnia almost every summer, me and my chil-
dren, to visit the house that was returned to us after the war and to visit my
parents who live there. I am not happy there, I am afraid when the darkness
falls. I lay awake and listen to sounds from the outside, as if fearing that
someone will come in, someone with bad intentions. I am happy to see my old
parents there, but the place makes me afraid. And I think about my husband
all the time. Other missing persons have been found and identified, and we go
to the funerals. Neighbours’ and co-​villagers’ funerals. All killed during the
war, un-​armed men and boys. But not my husband.
Our life continues. Sometimes I feel really bad, and my employer who is a
wise person tells me: “Amela, go home and rest! Come back tomorrow!” I go.
Life continues, my children at least have a future. My daughter is grown up
now, and she is pregnant, maybe something good will come in the future.
Just now, some weeks ago, there was news again: a new mass grave has
been found in Tomašica in Bosnia. The thought came again: Maybe this time!
Maybe they will find him! I began to shake all over, my whole body was trem-
bling, and I needed to run to the toilet. I do not know if I hope or fear more.
I have to find him; I have to be able to give him a proper burial.

Methodological reflections –​Situating the narrative within ethnography

This chapter emerged from my long-​time ethnographic engagement with the
Bosnian diaspora between Finland and Bosnia-​Herzegovina. I have worked
with Bosnian participants since 2001 focusing on different themes, ranging
from diasporic life, questions of return, as well as questions of therapy and
witnessing after violent conflicts (Huttunen 2005, 2009a, 2009b, 2010, 2014b,
 Narratives of absence 21

2017). My latest project with the Bosnian diaspora was on the missing persons
issue in the post-​war, post-​1995 Bosnia (Huttunen 2014a, 2016); there were
some 30, 000 persons reported missing by their family members when the war
in Bosnia was ended by the Dayton peace agreement in 1995. The narrative
account extract above is among the interviews that I collected in relation to
those studies. The narrator is a woman born in 1965 in a village in northern
Bosnia-​Herzegovina, one of the federal republics of socialist Yugoslavia at
that time. She is of Bosnian Muslim origin, or Bosniak1 origin as the group is
most often called nowadays; the ethno-​national affiliation became significant
in particular ways during the war years in Bosnia (1992–​1995), as I will discuss
below. In this chapter, I use the pseudonym, “Amela”, in order to protect the
participant’s privacy and maintain anonymity.
I met Amela for the first time in Finland in 2013. She had moved to Finland
from Bosnia-​Herzegovina as a refugee in 1994, at a time when the war was
still raging in Bosnia. I interviewed her for the research project on missing and
disappeared persons in Bosnia, and she told me her story from that point of
view. Rather than a structured interview, our encounter was a loosely thematised
discussion during my visit to her home. I met her through a common Bosnian
acquaintance, and as I told her about my interest in the Bosnian missing, she
kindly invited me to visit her and talk about her experiences. I asked her to
tell me about the disappearance of her husband, and I did not need to ask too
many questions, as she actively narrated her story and I only inserted some
enquiries for clarification.
She did not want me to tape record the interview, so I took notes while
we were talking. Afterwards, I reconstructed her story based on my notes.
The narrative above is my reconstruction soon after my visit to her home. It
follows her way of plotting the narrative, but there are no verbatim quotes. The
encounter with her was very intensive, and I remember well how she spoke,
what points of the story she emphasised, and how emotional the topic was
for her. She repeated a couple of sentences throughout her narrative, such as
“I have to find him!”; “I need to know what happened!” and “I have to be
able to give him a proper burial!”. I wrote down these sentences while she was
speaking, and I have repeated them in the narrative construction above, to
convey the urgency that was connected to the phrases. It is significant to high-
light that she repeated those key phrases also when closing the interview.
The interview took place in Finnish, as Amela had lived in Finland for
about 20 years at the time of the interview and her Finnish is fluent. Thus,
there was no need for interpretation or translation. However, Finnish is not
Amela’s first language, and one can ask if this affects the way in which she tells
her story. Analysing the linguistic aspects of her narration would, however, be
a different analytic focus and I leave it aside here.
The fact that I approached Amela with the frame of disappearances certainly
affected the way in which she told her story. This allows me to ask analytical
questions about the disappearance of a loved one as “a critical experience” that
structures the way in which a person understands her life. My formulation of
22 Laura Huttunen

critical experience is inspired by the anthropologist Veena Das’s (1996) concept

of “critical events”; she argues that critical events are moments that restruc-
ture time and collective narratives for communities that live through them.
Similarly, I suggest that a critical experience is a moment in an individual’s life
which rearranges her understanding of the plot or trajectory of her life. I argue
that, for Bosnians who have experienced the disappearance of a loved one, the
disappearance becomes a critical experience that structures their relationship
to their migratory history, as well as to their country of origin and to the global
diaspora of Bosnian refugees.
The key to my methodological approach is ethnography. In other words,
I understand all narratives by interlocutors as embedded in social, political
and cultural contexts, and my task as the analyst is to build such a context
through an ethnographic engagement with the narrator and her social milieu.
In this case, the relevant social and political landscape stretches from Finland,
Amela’s present place of living, to Bosnia, to ex-​Yugoslavia and to the history
of the dissolution of Yugoslavia. I analyse this particular narrative in relation
to my long-​term ethnographic engagement with the Bosnian diaspora, and to
my larger research project on experiences of living with the disappearances of
family members during the Bosnian war.
My understanding of ethnography grows from the anthropological ethno-
graphic tradition. In that tradition, ethnography is not simply a methodo-
logical tool in a technical sense, i.e. a tool for gathering observational data.
Rather, it describes an orientation to research as a process of combining mixed
methods and various kinds of data, with participant observation at the heart
of the approach (Aull Davies 2008, Cerwonka and Malkki 2007). Thus, my
research on narratives of absence combines stories told by interlocutors, and
long-​time ethnographic work with diasporic Bosnians both in Finland and in
Bosnia (on multi-​sited ethnography, see Marcus 1995, Hage 2005, Hannerz
2013). I understand oral narratives as ways in which individuals struggle to
make sense of their life situations in changing circumstances (Jackson 2002).
The analysis of a single narrative means constant movement between the text
or the narration and the contextualising ethnographic material.
Narrative analysis in social sciences and humanities has flourished for
decades, with different approaches to narrative as the object of analysis. While
I read the narratives by my interlocutors in relation to the ethnographic con-
text, I take inspiration from some rather early theorising of narrativity. Gerald
Prince (1982) suggests that telling stories in narrative form is an anthropo-
logical universal, and that there is often something that can be called a “min-
imal story” to be recognised in the variety of narrative accounts. In other
words, there is a basic grammar or structure of storytelling that arranges the
formation of narratives in most cases. Such a basic narrative grammar, a kind
of skeleton of narratives, consists of three interrelated parts, of which the first
one and the last one refer to a state of being, while the middle one is an active
state, depicting change that leads from the first state to the last one. The last
 Narratives of absence 23

state is often the reversal of the first one,2 and there is a causal or temporal
connection between the two. In my analysis, I will ask how this minimal story
or basic grammar of narrativity with a temporal structure helps me to under-
stand the particularity of the narratives of the disappearance of a loved one.
Rather than a strict, formal analysis of the narrative, however, my reading
of Amela’s story applies Prince’s ideas heuristically to think about the narrative
as a structure with a temporal orientation. In my understanding, such min-
imal stories are not narratives that define the interlocutor’s identity in any
definitive sense; each narrator may produce several minimal stories of his or
her life and identity. Like any narrative identity making (e.g. Linde 1993),
such minimal stories are situational and changing. However, a similar kind
of open-​ended story structure is repeated in many interview narratives that
I have gathered from family members of the disappeared Bosnians; this points
to the compelling nature of such an experience. At the same time, the analysis
of these stories contributes to the theory of minimal stories by sensitising
us to moments and cases when this grammar of narrativity is broken, thus
suggesting that the very breaches of the grammar may give us keys to under-
stand such deviant cases.
When doing research on sensitive issues such as death and disappearance,
interlocutors often prefer to talk without making recordings. As a conse-
quence, the researcher works with narratives that are not verbatim creations by
the interlocutors themselves, but rather stories reconstructed afterwards by the
researcher. In such cases, it does not necessarily make sense to work with strict
formal narrative analysis. Instead, a more flexible understanding of narrative
structures, such as the one adopted here, enables one to do credible analysis,
and still tease out insights into the ways in which narratives are employed by
people in various circumstances.
Liminality is another conceptual key for my reading of Amela’s narrative,
and the issue of the missing in Bosnia-​Herzegovina in general. I claim that the
missing are a particular kind of anguish for those left behind, when compared
for example with the death of a loved one, and liminality as a concept helps us
to understand this particularity. The concept was introduced to the anthropo-
logical vocabulary by Arnold van Gennep as the middle phase in rites of
passage; later the concept was developed further by Victor Turner (1969).
In van Gennep’s (2004 [1909]) schema, all rites of passage, including rituals
connected with death, follow a linear three-​partite structure: separation (from
the community of the living in the case of death rites), transition or liminal
stage, and incorporation (as a dead relative/​ancestor). People who go missing
for a long period of time do not go through this transitory process as expected.
They stay in between, in the liminal stage. Understanding the missing persons
as liminal figures is a key to my reading of the issue in Bosnia, and to reading
Amela’s story of her missing husband. The disappearance of her husband
organises her whole story, its structure and temporality, as I will argue below,
producing a sense of over-​extended liminality.
24 Laura Huttunen

Analysis –​Liminality of disappearance and the open-​endedness of the

narrative
I argue that in order to understand Amela’s story, we need to situate it within
the history of the dissolution of Yugoslavia, the protracted armed conflict in
Bosnia-​Herzegovina between 1992 and 1995 which followed the declaration
of independence in Bosnia, and the extreme forms of violence against civilian
populations during that conflict. There were around 100, 000 dead, 2 000 000
refugees and IDPs (internally displaced people) pushed from their homes and
1 000 000 refugees exiled from the country. Moreover, extreme forms of vio-
lence towards the civilian population characterised the conflict, witnessed by
journalists (e.g. Maass 1996, Gutman 1993) writing at the time, as well as by the
proceedings of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia
(ICTY) in the Hague.3 Consequently, “ethnic cleansing” was coined as the
term to depict the nature of the violence during the conflict.
More specifically, we need to situate Amela’s story in the context of large-​
scale disappearances of civilian people in Bosnia during the conflict. As noted
above, there were some 30, 000 people reported missing by the family members
when the war ended. Now, more than 20 years after the peace agreement,
about 80% of the missing have been identified and returned to their families
for burial. The location and identification of the missing, however, has been
an extremely demanding process, surrounded by political tensions and tech-
nical and professional challenges (see e.g. Wagner 2008, Stover and Peress
1998). Most of the missing have been found brutally executed either in shallow
unmarked surface graves or in mass graves. The search and identification
process has been going on for more than two decades, carried out with the
leadership of the International Commission of Missing Persons (ICMP), an
intergovernmental organisation working with donor money, independent of
any state power even if co-​operating with the new regime in post-​war Bosnia.
During these two decades, the practices of identification have developed in
essential ways, moving from the so-​called traditional identification methods to
new applications of DNA-​based techniques. The search and identification of
the missing has been a long and difficult project with many social and political
implications (Wagner 2008, Huttunen 2016).
Amela’s narrative is a depiction of her escape from the scene of the atroci-
ties with her children. The narrative is, however, structured by the disappear-
ance of her husband. The disappearance opens the story, and the unsolved
question of his whereabouts closes the story with future-​oriented claims, such
as “I have to find him!” In the opening, Amela gives the exact date and location
of his disappearance, or more precisely, the exact time and place when she saw
him for the last time. I interpret the exact timing as a truth-​making device –​it
is important for her to make clear that her narrative is a true one, situated in
the documented history of the war in Bosnia (cf. Huttunen 2014b, 2017). This
is not just another migrant story, this is also an eye-​witness story (cf. Malkki
1997, pp. 94–​97, Huttunen 2014b, 2017) from the site of brutal atrocities that
 Narratives of absence 25

profoundly changed the history of the country. What Amela describes is a crit-
ical event (Das 1996) both for her and for the whole Bosnia (or ex-​Yugoslavia).
Locating the first night after their capture in Trnopolje is another truth-​making
device, as Trnopolje is one of the well-​known sites of genocidal violence during
the war years, made especially public by BBC reporting in 1992.4
Moreover, the exact date anchors her own personal critical event in his-
torical time. The event that changed her life forever, the disappearance of her
husband, is embedded in the flow of events in Bosnia on that particular date.
However, I suggest that beyond this witnessing function, the flash-​like char-
acter of that particular memory, of her husband standing between two soldiers
in the courtyard in that exact time, echoes research-​based descriptions of how
traumatic memory works (e.g. Kirmayer 1996, see also Cappeletto 2003).
As I suggest above, stories have a temporal structure; in other words, a
sequence of events is the core characteristic of a narrative. Narrativised events
take place in three-​dimensional time: past, present and future are linked to one
another. The particularity of the narratives by the family members of those
still missing is the open-​ended temporal structure: the time of the stories is
painfully future-​oriented, and in this sense there is no closure in these stories.
Even if the narrator would know that the missing loved one is probably dead,
without a body there is no certainty, and the narrative remains open. In Amela’s
story, this future-​orientation can be read from expressions such as: “I have to
know what happened to him, otherwise there is no peace!” or “I need to bury
him properly! Without a proper burial, there is no peace, not for him, not for
me!”. The liminal character of the disappeared loved one keeps the narrative
obsessively future-​oriented. When reconstructing Amela’s story, I use exclam-
ation marks and repetition to convey the emotional urgency that coloured her
narration in these places, pointing to this traumatic open-​endedness.
Between the opening scene, the last sight of Amela’s husband, and the
ending, the urge to find and bury her husband, there is a story of escape, a
story of refugee camps and of being relocated in Finland, of slowly building
a new life in the new country. In this sense, and on the surface, her story is a
rather typical story of forced migration, with a kind of happy ending of being
able to build a new life, –​or, if not a happy ending, at least a story of survival.
Her daughter’s pregnancy may be read as a happy mode of future-​orientation,
a promise that life continues beyond mere survival. Moreover, it is a story of
building a diasporic or transnational way of life (Vertovec 2009): after the
peace agreement in 1995, and in growing numbers in the new millennium,
exiled Bosnians have been able to visit their villages and cities of origin. Some
have moved back more or less permanently (e.g. Eastmond 2006), while others,
maybe a majority of the exiled, have kept on travelling between Bosnia and
their new countries of settlement (e.g. Huttunen 2005, 2009a, 2009b).
Amela is among those exiled Bosnians who have stayed in their new coun-
tries of settlement, but who keep on visiting their villages of origin. However,
what is peculiar to her story when compared with many other narratives by
migrants, there is no nostalgia connected with the country of origin. Quite
26 Laura Huttunen

the contrary, visits to the village of origin are imbued with fear and anxiety;
the atrocities that she witnessed there have marked the site forever. She depicts
fear that creeps in when the darkness falls, and she pictures herself listening
to sounds from the outside. However, she keeps on travelling back. Partly that
is explained by the house that she still owns there, and particularly by her old
parents who have returned to the village. I argue, however, that also the missing
husband is one of the compelling anchors that draw her back to the site of the
atrocities. As she points out herself, most probably her husband is dead –​and
that means, most probably he is buried somewhere in Bosnia, existing as a dead
body in the soil, an invisible presence in the landscape. This belief is nurtured
by the fact that many disappeared neighbours and relatives from the same area,
people who went missing during the same onslaught on the village on the 25
July 1992, have been found dead in mass graves, identified and returned to
their families for reburials –​she comments on the recurring funerals of other
relocated bodies in her narration. But her husband is not found, and she
keeps on commenting on the lack of burial as a disturbing, disquieting fact
that keeps the narrative open; the burial is an essentially important task that
remains unfulfilled. “There is no peace, not for him, not for me”, she says.
In the terminology of van Gennep and Turner, burial is the final stage that
closes the ritual sequence connected with death in the Bosnian Muslim con-
text, a closure that ends the liminal stage and establishes a new social order. In
such a post-​burial social and cultural order, the deceased person would have a
new status as a dead and properly buried dignified member of the community.
By the same token, the family members of the dead-​and-​buried person get new
statuses, such as the status of a widow. Such a closure has effects beyond the
clarification of social statuses: it opens up the possibility of mourning, and
of going forward in life through the process of mourning. Amela has seen
this process taking place around her, as she has participated in funerals where
other formerly missing persons are being buried by their relatives, after being
located and identified. At the time of our meeting, the finding of the Tomašica
mass grave in Northern Bosnia was rather recent news,5 another event that
kept on nurturing her hope that her husband would be found. Such events keep
her thinking about him, all the time, as she repeated several times during her
narration. It is worth noticing in this context that the number of the located
and identified missing in Bosnia is exceptionally high when compared with
other sites of mass atrocities with significant numbers of disappeared people
(Rosenblatt 2015); moreover, the time span of the search and identification
work in Bosnia is more than two decades. Amela’s anxious expectations are
situated in this landscape of recurring news of new mass graves and identified
missing neighbours.
Ori Katz and Karen Shalev Greene (2020) suggest that such a future-​
orientation may turn into accepting the absence of the missing person as an
ontologically ambivalent permanent state, “perpetual time” of disappearance,
if there is nothing to feed the hope. However, they also show that such acceptance
is easily turned back into a state of waiting, and painful future-​orientation, if
 Narratives of absence 27

anything suggesting the possibility of closure turns up. In the Bosnian context,
the long duration of the period of search and identification, with recurrent new
locations of unidentified dead bodies turning up, has kept the family members
of the missing alert through two decades, constantly waiting for news, and for
closure in the form of the identified body of the missing loved one.
Horrific pictures of the mass graves have been circulating in the post-​war
Bosnian public. These pictures point to the double nature of the liminality of
the Bosnian missing: they are not only between life and death, they are also
between life and proper burial. For the families of the missing, it is not enough
to get the certainty that the missing person is dead; the dead must also be buried
with dignity. The mass graves are blasphemous sites for the dead, with violated
bodies intermingled with each other, buried without names and without proper
rituals. Only proper, dignified burial accompanied by rituals carried out in the
presence of the close family members could end this harrowing liminality of
the mass graves.
The historical layers of violence and loss in the area also creep into the
narrative and feed the uncertainty: the stories of people who went missing
during the Second World War, but who returned after a rather long time cir-
culate in the area, and also Amela remembers such stories being told in her
childhood. “Of course I know that he must be dead by now,” Amela says, as do
many other Bosnians with a missing family member with whom I have talked.
However, as long as there is no body, there is no certainty, and the narrative
remains open-​ended. There is always the slight, even if improbable, possibility
of the person returning alive. Other missing persons being located and identi-
fied around her keeps the question raw. But, as Amela says, toward the end of
her narrative, she does not know if she fears or hopes that her husband would
be found in the mass grave. My interpretation is that she hopes for the ending
of the horrifying uncertainty, while fearing to face the fact of the brutal killing
and undignified burial of her husband, things that finding him in the mass
grave would imply. After years of absence, the uncertainty of the whereabouts
of the missing loved one is not hopeful anymore. Rather, it signifies a horrifying
absence and a ghostlike presence that cast a heavy shadow over her whole life.
In terms of the minimal story, or the basic narrative grammar heuristically
devised after Prince’s ideas, I claim that Amela’s story does not have a proper
ending. The disappearance of her husband would require his reappearance,
either dead or alive, to create a proper story with a closure. But he does not
reappear, and the story ends with the painful orientation towards a moment
when she would be able to bury him, with dignity, and to have finally peace
both for him and for herself.
Amela’s story and its open-​endedness help us to understand the painful
liminality with which people with disappeared loved ones are forced to live.
However, I argue that in order to properly understand the significance of the
liminality of the Bosnian missing, we need to look beyond psychology and the
pain of individuals –​which, of course, does not mean that their pain would not
be significant or worth all of our sympathy. It means, instead, that individual
28 Laura Huttunen

pain is embedded in historical events that changed the world profoundly for
Bosnians who lived through them. In her narration, Amela is well aware of
this: she anchors her personal experiences within temporal and spatial co-​
ordinates that situate them within the larger frame of the genocide in Bosnia.
In other words, her story is not only her personal story, but points to collect-
ively shared experiences.
Scholarly work on the search, identification and reburial of the Bosnian
missing has shown that the reburials have become politically tense events
imbued with political and cultural meanings (Wagner 2008, Huttunen 2016).
In the reburials, the families of the missing are able to give a proper, dignified
burial to bodies that were previously situated in mass graves and other undig-
nified liminal sites. At the same time, the bodies of people who were wiped out
of the political landscape as victims of genocidal violence are brought back
to the political community as dead but rightful citizens, thus ending a kind of
political liminality or a limbo-​like political non-​existence. At the same time,
however, questions of political accountability remain open, and this openness
affects continuously the political climate of post-​war Bosnia. When a missing
person who disappeared as a victim of purposeful political strategy is never
found, s/​he stays in a liminal state not only in a ritual and cultural sense, but
also in a political sense. As Amela’s husband stays missing, he is denied not
only a proper and dignified burial, but also the status of a dead member of the
political community. As a consequence, also Amela’s and her daughters’ pos-
ition stay unclear, in an over-​extended mode of waiting, and the political vio-
lence of enforced disappearance disturbs their relationship with their country
of origin as a political community.

Notes
1 The group that was called “Bosnian Muslims” during the socialist period are mostly
called “Bosniaks” in the post-​war, independent Bosnia, see e.g. Malcolm 1996,
Bringa 1995. In her narration of the events that took place in 1992, Amela uses the
term “Muslim” consistently.
2 In Prince’s example, the minimal story goes like this: a man is poor –​he gets a lot of
money –​he is rich (Price 1982, p.16–​37).
3 www.icty.org/​, accessed on 9.11.2020.
4 see e.g. http://​news.bbc.co.uk/​onthis​day/​hi/​dates/​stor​ies/​aug​ust/​18/​new​sid_​2499​000/​
2499​135.stm, accessed 9.11.2020.
5 www.bbc.com/​news/​world-​eur​ope-​24778​713, accessed 26.11.2020.

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3 Home at last
Narrating community and belonging
through retirement migration to Spain

Anya Ahmed

Introduction
This chapter draws on data from a study (Ahmed 2010 –​and see also Ahmed
2011, 2012, 2013, 2015, Ahmed and Hall 2016) of British women’s retirement
migration to the Costa Blanca in Spain. It uses one case study “Mabel” to
examine how a structural narrative analytical approach centring on iden-
tity and positioning, as well as plot, and the deployment of linguistic devices
illuminates experiences of migration. Presenting my narrative of Mabel’s
narrative through such an approach provides theoretical insights to how her
migration in retirement is located within the context of structural, cultural
and demographic change in contemporary society. Mabel was the oldest –​at
83 years of age –​of 17 women who participated in a study of British women’s
retirement migration to the Costa Blanca in Spain. She and her husband
became surrogate parents for their only grandchild when her son and his wife
died in a car accident when her grandson was ten months old. The chapter
is structured in the following way: first Mabel’s story is presented and then
I address the methodological and theoretical underpinnings of my analytical
approach.

Narrative –​Constructing community and belonging through retirement

migration to Spain
Prior to the interview which took place at her house, I had met Mabel on
two previous occasions in a social setting (both times at the “Ladies’ Club”
which met every Wednesday afternoon). It was at this second meeting when
she agreed to take part in my study, having asked about what I was “doing” in
Spain. I couldn’t help but warm to Mabel, the interview itself was relaxed and
there was a lot of laughter and a lovely rapport between us. I felt very pleased
when the next time we met in a group of people she introduced me as her hon-
orary granddaughter. I anticipated that a flexibly structured narrative inter-
view was more likely to encourage Mabel to tell her own story about moving to
Spain, so, I began the interview with a “grand tour” question (Spradley 1979),

DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-4
32 Anya Ahmed

asking her, “can you tell me something about yourself and how you came to
be here in Spain?”.
I’m 83 years old, I’m a retired teacher, headteacher, I’m a science graduate
from [Oxbridge] … I was a London teacher; I loved Cockney kids and I loved
you know teaching in a big school … I retired in 1980 with my husband who
was an ex metropolitan police officer, we were kind of refugees from city life if
you like, to put it that way, and we converted a church strangely enough and
we lived a bit sort of hand to mouth whilst we were doing the conversion which
had already been started. We completed it and we had a lot of fun … It was
near the sea, we went down to the sea, and you know it’s a beautiful part of
the country, so you might well ask why did these longings start in me cravings
to have another scene, can I start now on the reasons why I decided to move,
to leave?
My husband died in 1990 and as soon as my grandson had grown to the
point, he could care for himself, be independent which is what young people
like, I decided that I wanted to go, abroad, to live. To Italy? Too expensive.
To France? Too many wartime memories, Spain, where I was as a child, as a
very small child I lived with my family in a place called Rio Tinto, there were
then copper mines here, our father was one of the engineers who’d opened it
up electrified it, built a railway, and that sort of thing. And I lived here and
thought I spoke fluent Spanish, I was wrong, it’s too long ago. Words come to
me and they’re coming thicker and faster but I’m still struggling with Spanish.
I love Spain; I love its history. I’m a kind of spoiled Roman Catholic! This is
the land of Torquemada, the Inquisition, it’s a land of violence and romance,
civil war, and beautiful places to see. So, I decided that this was where I was
going to settle.
Now to come on to the reasons why I decided to emigrate, well I’m a polit-
ical animal and I didn’t like the spin and the way things were going in England
… I didn’t like the political atmosphere, but most of all, I couldn’t live with
the attitude towards old people, which is endemic you might say in England
today. It ranges from being very patronising to the point of rudeness, there’s
an unspoken unwillingness to give any healthcare that’s worth anything, but
that, that is a contradiction because should you collapse in the street, they will
do things to revive you and bring you back, nurse you and care for you, and
probably they shouldn’t if you’re very old, but if you have particular, have a
condition, and you go to them for help it isn’t there …
Since I’ve come here –​of course at first you get cold feet –​… you say “what
the heck am I doing here?” and go to the supermarket, it ranges almost, really
fantastically funny things, for example I went to Consom which is one of the
big supermarkets here in Spain, they’re all over the place and I saw a couple,
a Spanish couple coming towards me with an empty trolley, so wishing to be
helpful I rushed over to them and took their trolley. I didn’t know that you paid
one euro for the trolley and there was a torrent of Spanish and I thought: “My
God what am I doing?” It … ranges from the ridiculous to the quite ser-
ious, and you really can’t make yourself understood. But it was fun, and you
 Home at last 33

buy things from the supermarket which you don’t really know what you’ve
bought. And you take it home and cook it, a friend of mine made a lovely
delightful, tasty dish of, dare I say it, bull’s testicles, they don’t waste anything
in Spain, from chickens’ legs, I don’t know what do you know what they do
with chickens’ legs? I can’t work … packets of chickens’ legs, yellow with claws,
with feet I don’t know what they do. So, it’s going to the supermarket, it’s an
adventure, it’s something that, you know, and I love Spain now because, from
that first time of trauma, of making mistakes and not knowing where I was
and everything. Now I realise something is always happening.
I have made more friends since I came to Spain than I made in all the
20 years I lived in [the west of England], and I’ve only been here for one year.
But I’ve enjoyed every moment of it, I joined an organisation which is called
the “Silver Ladies” and they truly are [wonderful], and there’s a different
atmosphere, it reminds me of the London blitzkrieg in the Second World
War, everybody was friendly, everybody thought that tomorrow they might be
dead, not that we think that in Spain, but it was a kind of camaraderie, which
is quite prominent here in Spain, the camaraderie, this feeling of friendship,
of people. The other day I went to the supermarket –​I have a trolley, I like
to walk you see because that’s good for me –​and I realised that I’d bought
too much, and, I had two plastic bags and the trolley, and a total stranger
came up to me and said: “you can’t manage that”, and, walked all the way
back, about 10 minutes’ walk back. That wouldn’t happen in England … and
it’s a kind of love the Spaniards have, the los linios, the children and for old
people. It’s an innate thing, you see Spanish families out, they are all together,
grandparents, parents, children, everybody and sadly one makes, inevitably
makes comparisons with, very sadly, children are safe here, they run around,
they’re free, they’re not told to hush, nobody, no Spanish families look for
babysitters, no they take the children with them because they like their chil-
dren and want to be with them…
I love the weather, the fact that I’ve left it this long in my discourse, it’s, the
sunshine does something to people, if it’s cold and wet people are cold and wet,
especially the cold bit, but here we smile and say “hola” to total strangers and
they smile back and say “hola” to you. And that’s Spain and I love that too.
And last, but not least, I love the things that I haven’t done yet, I look forward
to seeing the Alhambra, we’re going to have lots and lots of outings I hope,
day outings, perhaps even a bit longer, and, if I can’t do it through an organ-
isation, I’ll probably do it on my own. I want to explore Spain, you have to get
your eyes accustomed, sort of changed in a way, you have to, in a way think
differently, because Spain isn’t as beautiful as the west country where I came
from, it’s not green, but it has a kind of savage beauty that I like. There are
aspects of Spain that I don’t like, but dare I say, there are so many of us now
coming here, and the developers are moving inland now, away from the costas
there’s 600,000 of us here, already … Here we can buy palm trees, and all the
plants that are indoors are tiny, you can cherish, out here, they’re trees. And
you think my god. I had a rubber plant, but I didn’t stand under it. So, I love
34 Anya Ahmed

… the flora and fauna. I love the excitement of finding a praying mantis in my
garden. I mean they’re about two and a half inches long. I love the song of the
cicadas, that “zz” sound. I love the heat, not when it’s too hot, you can have it
too hot. And even the Spaniards have been going around this particular year
saying “mucho caliente”, very hot …
I don’t think there’s anything really serious, that I don’t like here, and I came
to Spain for something else too, my ignorance of Spanish politics … in Spain
you’re either ignorant of it, or if you know about it, you don’t take any notice,
and the Spaniards are so laid back and they don’t care …
Life in Spain is full of the unexpected and it’s full of the fact that the people,
some of the people who come here, not a significant number, but some of
them, have got problems and I’m a Samaritan, ex for some 18 years and I seem
to collect the, and there’s something about being able to do something in a for-
eign country, they’re here for a reason and it’s, it’s that you can just, if you feel
fed up here, the weather, you can go out, sit in a café, and here, where there’s
so many Brits, that’s good and bad, it should be more Spanish but it isn’t, but
the likelihood is that you will be talking to someone, someone will come up to
you, do you mind if I sit here, or even from the next table, they’ll see you sitting
there and before you know, and sometimes you make a friend like that. That
doesn’t happen often in England with English reserve, it just doesn’t happen …
It just shows it’s another thing that I hate in England, age prejudice. The
west is suffering from that because when people get, knowledgeable about life,
about experience they’re sacked, and I’m not just talking about octogenarians
I’m talking about men of 40, 45 and women of, you know really skilled people,
losing out even in education, you get a young teacher much cheaper and you get
rid of the older teacher who’s got the experience and the ability, and they ask
themselves what’s wrong with our schools, there’s another teacher of course
and that’s really highly qualified women who used to have to go into teaching,
there wasn’t very much else, they can go elsewhere now and that’s a very big
leap of skill and then there’s the curriculum but don’t get me started on that …
Yes, no, in a way it’s wonderful. I carry a stick because it helps me, it’s not
because I can’t walk without a stick. I have found it an advantage, oh my
goodness me yes, the Spaniards will stop for no-​one, but an elderly person
with a stick (makes noise like a car braking) and everybody stops, and, Mabel
crosses the road like the Queen of England; they’re wonderful to you, even in
the shop, they help you pack; the very first time I went to the supermarket the
local one here, he said you’re new here, he spoke English, very good English
the then manager, sadly he’s now gone, so I said yes, and he said you’ve bought
a lot of stuff and I had, an enormous pile of stuff because I was stocking up,
and he, so he said, “how do you get home”? I said, well, I deliver myself with
this and he said, “today I’ll deliver you”. Now, can you imagine in England
a supermarket manager helping you into his own van and driving you home,
with all your stuff, and coming in and helping you unpack it; that is Spain,
that is the unexpected, and of course it’s an adventure. I mean, I could’ve sat at
home with a little lace cap and a shawl around my shoulders in the rain, and,
 Home at last 35

listening to the rain, that endless rain, expecting at this time of the year winter
to come, and, with it flu and all the other delights, and look at me here, I’m ten
years younger.
I’ve shed some years and a lot, it’s different, I mean you have to be fortunate
in as much. I realise that for many, many immigrants they have problems of
finding work, and problems they are solvable, it’s amazing how the English have
adapted themselves, and there are many, many jobs open for them, and there is
one factor that you have to say, and that is Spanish is the easiest European lan-
guage to speak. Every letter has one pronunciation, and we know that. I mean
the Spanish alphabet is the same as ours, but the “w” you know jamos, many,
many letters are exactly the same, and if you know the vowel sounds, it’s the
same. Long before people could speak English, unfortunately many of them
just don’t, Spain has a habit of making you lie back and think “aah” that’s the
trap, but if more people bought the odd Spanish newspaper, listened to the
odd, I’ve got a radio, it’s upstairs at the moment because my grandson is with
me, there’s a separate flat at the top of here, but I listen to Spanish on the radio,
and I’m beginning to pick up more and more words, and they like you to do
it, the Spaniards love it, they laugh at you, of course they do, with your silly
accent you know, but even in the supermarkets they’re quite, I don’t think I’ve
met a rude Spaniard, or anybody that’s shown me any resentment. I daresay
perhaps it happens to younger immigrants and perhaps immigrants that aren’t
so careful about manners, you know because the Spanish set great store, they
have strange customs, they have two surnames for example and things like that.
So, this is my home now … I’ve even arranged my funeral. I shall be buried
on a shelf, just as the Capuchin Catacombs of Palermo in Italy, but there’s
a sad side to that too. In ten years if nobody comes to claim me and what’s
left of me, I will be taken and put into a lime pit. The Spaniards don’t have
much truck with, they prefer burial, it’s a catholic country, so I pass it on the
motorway, on the N332 (laughs) and I think that’s going to be my future home,
all done and paid for.

Methodological reflections –​Epistemological, methodological and analytical

premises
Narrative research can be understood as an aspect of life history or biograph-
ical research which attempts to illuminate people’s lived experience in struc-
tural, cultural, temporal and geographical contexts (Ahmed 2015). Narrating
is also a mechanism or process through which people can evaluate their lives
(Ahmed 2015, Ahmed and Rogers 2016, Bruner 1990, Polkinghorne 1988,
Plummer 2001, Ricœur 1984) and rigorous interrogation of people’s narratives
illuminates the nuances of their lived experience, and how they exercise agency
within such contexts (Ahmed 2015, Skrbis 2008).
The word “narrative” originates from the Latin gnarus, while “story” is
derived from the Greek “historia”: both terms mean “knowing”. However,
there is little agreement about what narratives “are”, or how they should
36 Anya Ahmed

be analysed. For me, narratives are recorded, transcribed stories, which can
then be scrutinised by analysts (Ahmed 2013, 2015). My narrative analytical
approach is undergirded by an interpretivist epistemology, framing narratives
as subjective, contextually located –​culturally, geographically, and tempor-
ally –​and as requiring interpretation. Within this epistemological rendering
language is not neutral: it (re)constructs, as well as reflects the world and as
such, can be understood as a cultural resource (Ahmed 2011, 2015, Ahmed
and Rogers 2016, Temple 2002, 2008). However, narratives are scarcely ever
obviously delimited. When we impose limits to them, judgements about
which narrative features should be analysed are inevitably interpretive, and
also, shaped by epistemological and ontological positions and interests
(Riessman 2000).

Analysing Mabel’s narrative

I recorded the interview and transcribed it verbatim shortly after it took place.
Transcribing narratives can be understood to be an act of translation, since
converting talk into written text involves interpretive decisions about how to
represent a narrative. I initially began with a rough transcription and then re-​
transcribed the narrative in a methodical manner. I gave words their “proper”
spelling, even if mis-​pronounced or abbreviated, to facilitate understanding for
the reader.
Analysis of narrative data can be thematic and structural (Ahmed 2015,
Riessman 2008, Temple 1996, 2008), although, it is difficult to separate the
content from the structure (Ricœur 1984). Thematic analysis focuses primarily
on “what” is said or the thematic categories in narratives, while structural ana-
lysis focuses on composition, or the “who”, “how” or “why” of a narrative
account. Further, there are myriad approaches to structural narrative analysis
which are also shaped by the interests of the analyst (Ahmed 2013, 2015, Gee
1985, Labov and Waletsky 1967, Tonkin 1982).
I applied a staged reading of Mabel’s narrative. After engaging with the lit-
erature on migration, belonging and community, I read the interview transcript
and focused on the themes and linguistic choices and devices deployed. I then
addressed the “who” of Mabel’s narrative, or how she shaped and performed
her narrative through her shifting positions. I then looked at how she told her
stories, in other words, at the ways she constructed her narrative in terms of
plot and time, and how she told a coherent, plausible and persuasive story of
successfully finding a new home in Spain. I was interested in Mabel’s subjective
truths –​why she chose to tell the story in a particular way. It is also important
to acknowledge that my understanding is shaped by my own subjectivity and
experiences, which are also both multiple and non-​measurable: I cannot edit
myself out.1 I therefore analytically bracketed (Gubrium and Holstein 1998)
to focus on particular elements of Mabel’s narrative –​identity, plot and time –​
while suspending interest in others. Mabel’s is a “success story”, and she fulfils
the “quest” to find a new home in a new place. Mabel’s story as I present it
 Home at last 37

here, also allows for an examination of a broader temporal perspective of her

experiences of migration in relation to her biography (putting her temporal
experiences in order), since people bring the past into the present through lan-
guage, thus making sense of their lives (Riessman 2008).

Narrative, identity and positioning

By narrating, people present and (re)construct their identities, rather than
reveal “who” they are (Ahmed 2011, 2015, Temple 2008). Narratives are fre-
quently moral tales and people perform acceptable or desirable “selves” –​or
identities –​(Goffman 1969, Riessman 2003, 2008) which can illuminate soci-
etal norms within particular context(s) (May 2008), and how people see them-
selves in such contexts. “Positioning” (Ahmed 2015, Somers 1994) is a useful
way to describe how a narrator presents and negotiates how they want to be
known through the story they tell, or how narrators establish subject positions
(Day Sclater 1998, Harré and van Langenhove 1999, Meyer in this book).
Similarly, “narrative footing” describes how the position of the narrator can
shift throughout their account (Gubrium and Holstein 1998). In this way,
rather than being fixed or essentialist, narrative identity is pragmatic, shifting
and performed through the act of narrating (Ahmed 2015, Goffman 1969,
1975, 1981, Riessman 1993, 2000).

Narrative and plot

The plot of a narrative is what coherently brings together separate events

(Czarniawska 2004), how people structure their lived experiences through
narrating, making a whole story (Ricœur 1984, Riessman 1993, 2008), and
importantly, also how analysts bring together discrete incidents into a complete
story in order to create an analytical unit (Ahmed 2015). Such “emplotment”
representing the creative centre of the narrative (Ricœur 1984) manifests in
several ways: in the narrative itself, by the narrator (through the narrative act),
and, also by the analytical framework deployed. Inevitably, plots are situated
in, reflect and reconstruct the social, temporal, cultural and spatial contexts in
which they are produced, and interrogating narratives illuminates this (Ahmed
2013, 2015, Ahmed and Rogers 2016).
Through narrating, lived experiences are rendered meaningful through the
“temporal dialectic” (Ricœur 1984, 1985, 1988) or the configuring of past, pre-
sent and future which order life (and narrative). Narratives of “lifestyle migra-
tion” are often presented as a “quest” for a better life (Benson 2011). When
analysing plot, it is important to be aware of the “end point of plot movement”
(Bakhtin 1981, p. 89), or, the ending embedded in the plot (Czarniawska 2004),
as this is where the links between disparate events in the narrative become
clear. However, it is also useful to carefully consider how a narrator begins
their story. Mabel’s narrative is typified by the quest plot (Booker 2004), and
her search is for a new home in a different place –​“a new scene” –​(see also
38 Anya Ahmed

Ahmed 2013, 2015, Ahmed and Rogers 2016), because there was something
wrong with the old one. Her “cravings” and “longings” for this were triggered
by a “call” (Booker 2004). In order to fulfil the quest Mabel needed to over-
come obstacles (Oliver 2008), and, be accompanied by quest companions.

Analysis –​Locating unique biographies in theoretical and structural contexts

Migration occurs within a framework of “economic and other opportunity
differences” (De Haas 2010, p. 1589) and there are widely thought to be three
overarching categories: economic, to benefit from improvements in financial
circumstances; forced, to seek asylum; lifestyle, to take advantage of a different
way of life (Geoffrey and Sibley 2007). From the late twentieth century through
to the first decade of the new millennium, retirement migration to Spanish
coastal resorts (costas) gathered momentum among Northern Europeans.
Initiated by the 1992 Maastricht Treaty which allowed EU nationals to settle
and buy properties in EU countries, it was then accelerated by the rise in inter-
national estate agents, facilitating mobility. Previous holiday experiences,
longer life expectancy and early retirement combined with increased affluence
made this new form of “lifestyle migration” (Benson and O’Reilly 2009) a pos-
sibility for increasing numbers of people (Huete and Mantecon 2012). The
Costa Blanca, in the south-​west of Spain is one such area benefiting from
tourist infrastructures and transport links (King et al. 1998), which enabled
large numbers of UK retirees to move to Spain, and people moved to enjoy the
climate and associated better quality of life (Casado-​Díaz et al. 2004, O’Reilly
2000, 2007).
My approach to theorising retirement migration is situated in the cul-
tural turn (1990s onwards), which embeds migration in global processes and
structures, and, in the context of migrants’ life courses (Halfacree and Boyle
1993, King 2012). Through analysing Mabel’s narrative, the global processes
and structures facilitating her migration are illuminated: EU freedom of
movement created by the Maastricht Treaty, existing tourist infrastructures
and transport links between Spain and the UK, and speculative housing devel-
opment marketed by estate agents operating between Spain and the UK. Yet,
her unique biography, and agency, are also significant and apparent throughout
her narrative. Mabel positioned herself as the central character in her story,
and told an account of her life, going back to when she retired, living a simple
“fun”, “hand to mouth” existence with her husband and grandson, which she
returns to: “they don’t waste anything in Spain”. At the start of her narrative,
Mabel established how she wanted to be heard by the audience: narratively
footing, she listed her credentials –​being an Oxbridge science graduate, a
headteacher –​and gave a resume of her life post retirement leading up to
deciding to move to Spain. She also recounted back to her previous experience
of Spain as a child and weaved this into her life story.
Certain aspects of Mabel’s unique biography illuminate “the call” signifying
the beginning of the quest, or the pushes and pulls migrating to Spain: the
 Home at last 39

death of her husband, her grandson becoming independent, compounded by

disillusionment with the UK’s political scene, and her experiences of age preju-
dice. The language Mabel used to describe her desire for a new home –​her
“craving” and “longing” for “another scene” –​suggests a strong and emotional
desire for a different life in another place. Nostalgic recollections of the “cama-
raderie and feelings of friendship”, which are found again in Spain, also con-
tribute to her decision to move. Justifying the decision to leave the country
of origin is a key feature of migrants’ narratives (see Bönisch-​Brednich and
Meyer, this book), and, often this is presented as post-​hoc rationalisation
(O’Reilly 2000). Throughout her narrative, Mabel positioned herself as critical
spirit (“a political animal”), an adventurer, embracing challenges or “trauma”
of unfamiliarity with relish and good humour. Overcoming such obstacles,
and, in the company of her quest companions –​the “Silver Ladies” and the
many friends she made –​contributed to her successful quest for a new home.
Mabel persuades the audience that her quest has been fulfilled. She positioned
herself as contentedly on the margins, disengaged with the reality of modern
Spain and minimised the things that she did not like, framing these as insig-
nificant. Mabel constructs an idealised attachment to Spain’s natural physical
environment (Sherlock 2002), linking to a romantic and utopian attachment to
the Mediterranean idyll; and Spain, the place, also represented a better quality
of life which entailed escape and freedom from responsibility. She uses hyper-
bolic language to describe Spain (violence/​romance/​beautiful places to see/​civil
war/​the Inquisition), and also romanticises and eulogises its history. Mabel’s
unique biography shaped her migration choices, the decisions she made and
the life she lived once she found her final “home” there. Mable presented her
relationship to Spain in a selective way; it represents escape, rejuvenation and
ultimately home, a place where older people are highly valued. By applying a
staged reading of Mabel’s narrative, engaging with the literature on migration,
belonging and community and identifying themes –​the pushes and pulls in
migration, structural contexts framing migration, experiences of community
and belonging, relationships with the host and new country –​I was then able to
interrogate Mabel’s interview transcript, and focus on the emerging themes and
linguistic choices and devices she employed. Building on this analysis, I was
then able to focus on how Mabel positioned herself and how she emplotted the
story. Underpinning this analytical approach, was a focus on the persuasive-
ness, or coherence of Mabel’s subjective truths about finding a new home in a
new place.
Through narrative analysis, I was able to examine Mabel’s migration experi-
ence within the wider structural contexts framing her agency. Mabel presented
and examined her life, positioning herself as the central character, and, by
recounting a successful quest narrative. By analysing how Mabel positioned
herself, I was able to situate Mable in wider structural contexts and make
meaningful relations between these public realms (Mills 1959), and her unique
biography (private realm). Attending to the thematic content and structural
composition of Mabel’s narrative, allowed me to examine her reflexivity, and,
40 Anya Ahmed

how she anchors herself in the world, as well as how she exercises agency within
the context of structural opportunities and constraints.
In summary, Mabel chose to leave the UK as she felt she no longer belonged
there –​it no longer represented home. Throughout her narrative, the mul-
tiple motivations for migrating (Halfacree and Boyle 1993) were illuminated
and placed into the context of wider structures, and, a close interrogation of
Mabel’s narrative illuminates her unique biography and experience, how she
positioned herself while making decisions to move, and, then how she lived in
Spain but also how she saw herself and her life in that context.

Note
1 Beyond the scope of this chapter but see Ahmed 2015.

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4 Homecoming as exile?
Experiences of rupture and belonging

Anastasia Christou

Narrative
Zoe left her ancestral homeland Cyprus at a young age and migrated to the
United Kingdom where she resided for a quarter of century, marking 25 years
of “absence-​presence” when a lot of political turmoil was unfolding in the
divided island of Cyprus. While the ongoing politics and history of division
and bi-​communal relations in Cyprus are complex and contested, the story of
Zoe is one which is articulated with much elaboration. As a verbose account
it reflects an educational, professional and socio-​cultural journey from the
“cosmopolitan” and “multicultural” global city of London of the 1980s–​1990s
to a relocation to her ancestral homeland in 2002. The pseudonym “Zoe” for
this participant, etymologically from the Greek meaning “life” is indeed appro-
priate, as Zoe is full of energy, in not only contemplating her life, but asserting
her existence against all odds and obstacles.
Her account is lengthy, exasperated and emotional, almost narrated in one
breath and upon completion many hours later, it seemed that the weight of the
world had been lifted from her shoulders. She tackles many aspects of her fas-
cinating life, from experiencing patriarchy and sexism as a girl and an adult, her
struggles as a single-​mother working full-​time and trying to complete a doc-
toral degree, to her return to a conservative, xenophobic and claustrophobic
divided island homeland. As I am interviewing Zoe at her holiday cottage in
Cyprus in the summer of 2008, following a number of email exchanges, phone
conversations and informal visits, I am finally able to record in person her life
story, captivated, while immersed in her biographical narrative which is told
almost in a single breath for several hours.
This chapter encapsulates most of the above themes and will focus on issues
of gender and feminism, motherhood and mothering, family, and, as the title
suggests: belonging and rupture. This is a story of homecoming and return
migration but one which is saturated by intense emotions, negotiations and
divisions, both personal and political. It is the story of “Zoe”, a first-​generation
Cypriot-​Greek (or is it “Greek”-​Cypriot? The story will be the catalyst of
narrating this!). Where does the story begin? What are the socio-​aesthetics of
Zoe’s life as beginnings to a migrant life story? What are the gazes she has
DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-5
44 Anastasia Christou

allowed for the researcher into that journey, to expose the link between indi-
vidual experience and the social context of lived migrancy? Let’s set the scene
with a number of key timespaces that interject in the framing of the personal
narrative. It will be through the voice of Zoe and her words that we are led into
the narrative storytelling of key phases of her diasporic experience, and those
are italicised, so to be discussed in the methodological and theoretical analysis
sections that follow the extracts below:
I am glad that I can participate in such an interesting project. I hope that
your visit to Cyprus is really creative in all respects, and, I will try to describe
briefly to you a life of migration and diaspora. I was born to a diaspora family
because since 1932 my father’s brother was the first who migrated to London
and then followed all my mother’s siblings, that is, three very young men who
went to war. Thus, coming from a colony of Britain, my family started to grad-
ually disperse. In general, Europe is my country since my family is dispersed
there in many ways. Approximately at the age of four, I started to dream of
Britain and specifically of Cambridge University where my cousin was. This
cousin sent us a picture of him wearing the Cambridge gown at the University
on commencement day. You could see the grass and those beautiful university
buildings in the background. So, I started to dream of the day I would also end
up, I thought, I hoped, there for studies. Of course, my family was poor, we were
a farming family and the issue of studies was not something to be discussed.
They had fields but they lacked cash. They didn’t have cash for daughters. I was
the second child and unfortunately for my father I was a girl again. He awaited
his sons to come. When his sons were born it was taken for granted that they
would study whereas their daughters would get married. What our father did
for us as a big favour was to send us to high school. When I was eighteen,
the rest of my classmates planned their studies abroad. I happened to be at
the Pan Cypriot High School where all students came from middle or upper
class families. Everyone knew that they would end up in Vienna, New York
or London. The only thing I had as a cultural asset was my uncles in London,
and, it seemed natural to ask my parents to let me go to my uncles who used to
come on holidays. I hoped I would end up somewhere there. My parents were
adamant. So, they didn’t allow me to study abroad. They helped me become a
teacher, but at the same time I studied in secret with the help of the librarian of
the Pedagogic Academy in Cyprus, and, I sat an exam at the British Council.
It was something I could hide from my parents. Thus, I got my BA at the
same time as the other three-​year degree. At that time, one had to study at the
Pedagogic Academy for three years and the degree was equal to the English
University degree of Education. So, with these two degrees I was accepted by
the University of London to do a postgraduate course. Then, my parents’ dream
was realised because right after I finished my studies, through matchmaking, they
married me off and the first child was born; I got engaged in 1970. However, in
1970 I took a rebellious step. On the occasion of my youngest sister going into
labour, who was already in London, I went there. Since she was already there,
and, she was going to give birth, she invited me to go because she wanted me to
 Homecoming as exile? 45

help her. Then, I enrolled at the University of London. I was given the chance,
so I grabbed it. So, I went there for studies and I did so with a child. My little
child, then, was two and turned three years old. I was divorced which is another
big chapter of my life, a period when there was lots of distress and generally the
conditions were not conducive to studies; nevertheless, I went to London, and,
actually I didn’t do classical studies as I thought at the beginning, but I did
general sociology and psychology, and, then I specialised in the sociology of
education. They were difficult years and I had to work of course to pay the first
fees. My uncles did put me up and one of them gave me half of the university
fees. For the other half I had to sell all my jewellery, even my Christening cross,
but I did that easily. Now that I think about it, I was not sorry at all about the
jewellery I would miss. I got some cash, and, I remember I was given the choice
to pay all the fees, in which case they would be less, or pay in instalments every
three months. I paid everything to avoid paying as much as I could.
So, I got on the bus and I followed its route. At dawn, I set off, after I had
left my child at the kindergarten, and I ended up at work. I had a full-​time job
until three. Then I picked up my child from the kindergarten, and, we went
to a Greek school where I taught. That was my second job. Then, we went
home; I tucked in my child, and, studied until early in the morning. This is how
I spent my postgraduate year, and, then I registered directly for my PhD with
a dissertation topic which I changed on the way, because I took another direc-
tion, which others considered a disadvantage for my academic development. I
am glad I chose this subject and I found answers to my serious queries; the sub-
ject was the position of woman in Cypriot society, with specialization in the
aftermath of the invasion; the people who were the research subjects were the
wives of the missing, a subject no one dared to touch upon. It was considered
a sacred subject. The missing had to be there alive and their wives had to await
them like Penelope did. I asked the question: why they should wait, and which
for this role, for society and church, they (the women) were in such pain and
in this limbo. This is why my dissertation subject was attacked fiercely at the
beginning, and, then they said, “ah, what a great research she did”. Until now,
there are people who remember the lecture I gave at the Open University of
Nicosia in ’84, after I had been invited by the municipality of Nicosia. One
person of the organizing committee stood up and disputed the validity of my
research subject, and said it was not right for me to talk about Cypriot women,
the wives of the missing. He added that even the Cypriot Democracy had
answered positively to the question whether there were missing men, so there
should be women who had to wait. “Why did Penelope wait for twenty years?”
he asked. I answered that if we are humans, it is exactly for these Penelopes that
we had to think why we had turned them into Penelopes, and, in English I used
the term “an ancient myth”. “An ancient myth has a role but why make women
pay for this”. So, that was my question, in a way. It was a painful experience in
many respects, but I did find it challenging.
In the meantime, I had to do some small projects in England, and, my
supervisors were famous professors, a great linguist, as well as one of his
46 Anastasia Christou

colleagues from the Department of Sociology of the University of London,

the Institute of Education. He used to be the Director of the Social Research
Unit then, and at the same time the Head of the Sociology Department. In
the methodology courses I was asked to study the role of the Cypriot dias-
pora woman. So, then I went from home to home. At that time, in that area,
there were many Cypriots and several first-​ generation migrants –​I had
already interviewed second and third generation migrants –​as well as several
refugees. I have learned many things from these women, and, then my interest
in a certain subject started to develop, rather, not started to develop, but
was rekindled because it always existed due to my family story. The subject
included the Hellenic diaspora, the study of problematic relations between
Hellenic and Greek Cypriot community, specifically in London, as well as in
general, the study of the phenomenon according to which Greek Cypriots,
who I interviewed, talked fiercely against the English conquerors of Cyprus,
of the English torturers, of all those heroes of EOKA1 who were important
figures to them. On the other hand, they lived amongst them, they worked for
them, and tried to come to terms with the situation mostly on an emotional
level, that is, to admit that they still depended on English in Britain now. At
the same time, I studied the subject of bilingualism because I grew up as a bilin-
gual child. I was a teacher at schools, and, then I took over a European Union
programme, I got appointed by the English Ministry of Education with the
approval of Greece and Cyprus, as a coordinator of a programme. That was a
difficult task, but we were successful. We introduced Greek in English schools,
and it was then that I realized that we had to embark on a process called “con-
sciousness raising” of the communities. …but, it was a good experience, as we
tried to raise consciousness so that the oral history of communities could be
studied, and mainly, so that the issue of the absence of cooperation between
Hellenic and Greek Cypriot communities, in the whole of Britain, could be
dealt with.
I apologize for being so talkative; I keep talking to my trees and my cat
about these things, but they don’t answer back. I have decided not to talk with
the people a lot here. Our conversations are limited to greetings. If academics
want us to talk a little bit more, they could come and we could talk, or they
could invite me to their offices and talk. I don’t have strength to do anything
more until…It’s soul-​destroying. It is, a lot. It’s a pity to admit this in your
sixties, but I prefer to gather strength and fight for this cause in the right way,
than be limited and flap like a bird in a cage. The situation I experience is like a
cage for me. I have to get out of this cage to be able to exist in the way I used to
some creative years ago. Fortunately, they were twenty-​five years. At least I have
lived a quarter of a century as a human being. I am positive that what is going
to follow will be very creative and very dynamic. We’ll see. I have started being
afraid. I feel a little bit of anger with God who made women so vulnerable to
age and many responsibilities. If I think of my personal story, I remember that
since I was twelve, I trembled to think that a man would get me pregnant. They
had talked to me so badly about what a man could do to me that I didn’t
 Homecoming as exile? 47

go out here and there, in case someone said something, anything. Once I got
married and the situation evolved the way it did, my identity as a woman was
always a disadvantage, it was torture; I wanted to love; it’s so beautiful to give
birth. A woman can do the housework and at the same time make the house
more beautiful due to the artistic characteristics she carries in her DNA, to
a bigger extent than what a man does. I remember with delight this aunt of
mine, her nice character, the fact I felt proud when I was near her; I was near
her since I was very small and I remember her narrating fairy tales. Being close
to her gave me confidence. I felt beautiful I was a woman, I felt beautiful I was a
Cypriot, I felt beautiful I listened to her. Yes, but, I am feeling dizzy right now.
Out of the blue. My country is sweet and cruel.
While Zoe continued with her lengthy life story and unpacked each chapter
of her diasporic life and her return migration to her ancestral homeland, the
italicized themes that emerged in the narration above, are those that will be
further addressed in the methodological and theoretical reflections that follow.
Zoe’s performative stance mirrors that of many participants in the project: it
is a breathless narrative performance, dense and intense, eager to share and to
articulate the multi-​dimensionality of a richly reflexive life. The culmination of
the fragments of the life story reaches the apex of the chapter: homecoming as
a “sweet” and “cruel” encounter of two sets of extreme emotions when return
to the homeland becomes a reality, but not a choice. These experiences of rup-
ture and belonging render the return a perpetual state of migrancy for Zoe and
many other returnees (Christou 2006, Christou and King 2006, Christou 2011,
Christou and King 2011).

Methodological reflections
The narrative on which this chapter is based, is drawn from a large-​scale multi-​
sited, multi-​method comparative ethnographic research project funded by the
AHRC (Arts and Humanities Research Council, UK) and the research mono-
graph “book of the project” (Christou and King 2015) provides a lengthy meth-
odological chapter on the project. However, for the purpose of this chapter, I will
only contextualise my positionality within the Cyprus based data collection
stage of the project, and reflect on the methodological underpinnings, as regards
the researcher-​participant interaction, especially given our varying Greek dias-
pora backgrounds and differing migrant life stories.2 Also, the socio-​cultural
and politico-​historical parameters of the conflict and civil war in Cyprus, is
situated within the narrative and methodological reflections, so the reader can
understand the wider context of the research. As mentioned earlier, this was
one of many interviews with participants from a range of demographic, class
and educational backgrounds, based on a biographical/​life history approach,
situated in Cyprus where this part of the fieldwork for the multi-​sited com-
parative project took place. Following previous email correspondence, phone
and personal discussions with Zoe about the context, aims and objectives of
the research, the interview took place at Zoe’s summer cottage, in English, it
48 Anastasia Christou

was recorded and transcribed verbatim, and subsequently, the transcript was
returned to the participant for any corrections, omissions or additions.
In terms of further methodological reflections, concepts of “home”,
“borders” and “exile” are integral to research on diasporic communities, and,
are even more elusive when it comes to the transnational lives of migrants. In
the case of the still divided island of Cyprus, the conceptual and affective com-
plexities indeed surmount structural parameters, as more nuanced meanings
are involved in how identities are articulated and expressed. This contribution
grapples with the meaning of “home” for a member of the Cypriot diaspora,
who has return migrated from the UK back to their ancestral island homeland.
It draws from a pool of migrant narratives collected in Cyprus more than a
decade ago, and, focuses on issues of belonging and homing from the story
of Zoe. The analysis is grounded on a set of temporalities, spatialities and
emotionalities: the timespaces of the historical experiences of Cyprus; histor-
ical and personal trauma and reconciliation; mobilities and return experiences,
as well as, the affectivity of all these issues, situated in the passing of more
than a decade from collection, to reflection, to writing, and, publication. The
chapter juxtaposes the messiness of the lived experience, of migrant livelihoods
and of researcher field-​workings, to draw some insights on emotional and eth-
ical negotiations, as elements in the migrant story-​telling.
The core analytical focus of this chapter is to look at a highly structured
narrative that is central to the return migrant experience, both as an indi-
vidual life trajectory, and, also in the collective sense as a social experience.
The migrant and collective narrative fuse together as scripts, which are crafted
to make sense of the migrant story, to articulate rather strongly an agentic
account, which should not disrupt the holistic framework that offers some
kind of sense to the collective story. Hence, the interplay here is between the
scripted migrant narrative, and, any continuities or ruptures that might emerge
when this clashes with the wider ethnic group collective story. Here, the migrant
voice offers, not only visibility to the personal pathway of the storied account
of movement to and from the ancestral homeland, but also gives meaning to
the wider and nuanced collective representations of mobile lives, during, and,
in the midst of homeland crises.
Cyprus can be seen as a homeland in perpetual, or rather, protracted crisis,
as a divided island with a history of war, displacement, social and personal
suffering, and, ongoing trauma with efforts of reconciliation not material-
izing to a political solution. That is, conceptually, there is prominence focusing
how the narration of the return migrant life is a performative instance, deeply
reflecting on the methodological underpinnings of making links to wider struc-
tural issues. This is a glimpse into the spatio-​temporal revelations of the partici-
pant, in articulating historical and contemporary instances of how the nation
shapes narration. Moreover, these instances highlight the affective impact of
stories, which are integral to understanding social spheres, both public and
private, in shedding light on the discursive and conceptual underpinnings of
storied mobilities. Through the repertoire of storytelling of belonging and
 Homecoming as exile? 49

exclusion, with the cultural translations that bi-​communal island histories

entail, issues of the politics of border regimes come to the fore. The performa-
tive aspects of the narration include: the ruptures and silences developed as a
methodology of “dwelling with stories”, allowing for sustained and slow inter-
rogation of the deep listening to the depth of analysis.
The life history approach, applied here, followed intersectional theoretical
and methodological nuances, in contextualizing subjectivities shaped by social
categorizations, such as gender, class, ethnicity, as well as social experiences,
such as education, trauma, exile, memory and imagination, to understand
identities and the biographicity of everyday migrant lives (Christou 2009).
As a feminist, anti-​racist and activist working class academic and researcher,
with diasporic (Hellenic) ancestral heritage experiences as a second-​generation
Greek-​American having lived and worked in several European nation-​states
and currently in the shadows of Brexit and COVID-​19, the journey of re-​
visiting this life story, and, the context of collecting similar data in the summer
of 2008, exposes the layers of memory, trauma, divisions and loss. The two
dimensions here are reflective of the author/​researcher, but can potentially
be understood within the divisions of bicommunal communities in relation
to the participant. While there is frequently a tension between “insider” and
“outsider” positionalities, there are also tensions in the author/​researcher’s
positionality as “an insider-​outsider within”, that is, occupying simultaneously
spaces with both an insider and an outsider lens, and, often negotiating within
those spaces a middle ground, to develop rapport with participants, but also to
absorb and analyse their stories. Shared experiences can have advantages, but
they are certainly shaped by differing subjectivities and positionalities, inter-
sectional and diverse backgrounds.
Another layer of varying degrees of struggle, interestingly, was the recon-
ciliation with the somewhat unorthodox creativity of the template style that
was to guide the writing of this chapter, which was a new experience, and,
one overriding every previous one, in conceiving and articulating analytic-
ally empirical data. The prescriptive template style of three parts was indeed
celebrated by the Editorial collective and the anonymous reviewers, as a unique
and helpful device for the readership, teaching and learning purposes. But it
is unconventional in my experience, where the story as empirical data and evi-
dence is in constant conversation with the academic literature, and in response
to research questions and a robust theoretical framing. On the contrary, this
chapter has been a freefall immersion in a diving experience of an affective
abyss without a life jacket to keep me afloat from a paranoia of narcissistic
indulgence. Not following the precedent of traditional structure in a book
chapter, can be intimidating as much as it might be intriguing. Letting go from
that safe space of confined structure to articulate an account that unpacks the
data in this way, can be somewhat destabilizing at first, but also liberating in
telling the story, allowing the story to become a separate unit in itself, and,
uncoupled by methodological and theoretical framings that follow separately.
The next section thus focuses on the latter in concluding the chapter.
50 Anastasia Christou

Analysis
This is a story of homecoming and return migration, but one which is saturated
by intense emotions, negotiations and divisions, both personal and political.
The analysis is underpinned by a feminist and narrative approach (Christou
2016). The narrative case study used here, is as a form of narrative inquiry based
upon social constructionist, feminist ideas and practices. Viewed from this
position, stories of lived experience as data are co-​constructed and negotiated
between the people involved, as a means of capturing complex, multi-​layered
and nuanced understandings of the life story, so that we can learn from this
interplay, how wider issues of social lives unfold. This approach addresses
issues of relationships, collaboration and ways of knowing. Narrative inquiry
is a means by which we systematically gather, analyse, and represent people’s
stories as told by them, which challenges traditional and modernist views of
social reality, knowledge and personhood.
Subjective meanings and a sense of self and identity are negotiated as the
stories unfold, bearing in mind that stories are re/​constructions of the person’s
experiences, remembered and told at a particular point in their lives, to a
particular researcher and for a particular purpose. This all has a bearing on
how the stories are told, which stories are told, and, how they are presented
and subsequently interpreted. They do not represent “life as lived”, but our
re-​presentations of those lives as told to us. Hence, stories can be viewed as
socially situated knowledge constructions in their own right that value messi-
ness, ambivalences, differences, depth and texture of experienced life. In
narrative analysis the emphasis is on co-​construction of meaning between
the researcher and participants. While being involved in/​listening to/​reading
the conversations, researchers take in what is being said and compare it with
their personal understandings, without filling in any gaps in understanding
with “grand narratives”, but rather inquiring about how pieces of the stories
make sense together. The process of “data gathering” and “analysis” therefore
becomes a single harmonious and organic process.
There are two core components saturating the flow of the story, that of
affect and power. I draw from the conceptualisation of both, to link “affective
habitus” (Christou and Janta 2019) with “narrative power” (Plummer 2019)
in understanding the interactivity shaping stories, and, the complexity of
interconnecting storied migrant worlds. As Plummer (2019, p.5) suggests,
“behind every story there is a social –​often political –​story waiting to be
unpacked”, and herein lies narrative power in its threefold sense, as Zoe tells
her personal narrative while unpacking the social and political entanglements
of power shaping her life, and, how she exemplified agency in resisting some of
those structures. The analysis is grounded on a set of temporalities, spatialities
and emotionalities. These involve the particular timespaces of the historical
experiences of Cyprus; historical and personal trauma and reconciliation;
mobilities and return experiences, as well as the affectivity of all these issues
situated in the passing of more than a decade from collection, to reflection,
 Homecoming as exile? 51

to writing, and, publication. The chapter unpacks the messiness of the lived
experience, of migrant livelihoods and of researcher field-​workings, to draw
some insights on emotional and ethical negotiations, as elements in the migrant
story-​telling.
At the same time, an intersectional lens has been applied here “to consider
how an array of socially constructed dimensions of difference intersect to shape
each person’s experiences and actions” (Misra et al. 2020, p.1). Some of the core
tenets of this lens include the relational context, the complex dynamics and the
comparative elements of “here and there” in shaping the understanding of the
migrant life story journey. Zoe defines her experiences as clearly shaped by
family dynamics and normative ethnocultural values (as structural obstacles),
class and gendered parameters that have either constrained or enabled her
achievements. All these social categories become clear from the application of
an intersectional lens, and, they provide nuanced understandings of migrant
gendered social relations, and, the inequalities that emerge. The socially
constructed dimensions of difference that unfold in Zoe’s story, such as gender,
class, ethnicity, age and through the “coloniality of power” (Grosfoguel et al.
2015) in positioning herself as a Cypriot in the heart of the Empire (London)
are not static, but fluid intersections also translated through the complexity
of roles (woman, daughter, sister, single mother, divorced, student, academic
worker, returnee).
The politico-​historical temporal context that situates some of the emo-
tional signifiers that Zoe refers to, is one of a wider Cypriot history ridden
with conflict and violence, that followed a near five-​year, anti-​colonial struggle,
when Cyprus gained independence from Britain in 1960. While Greek Cypriots
(circa 80% of the population) and Turkish Cypriots (circa 20% of the popu-
lation) struggled for power and representation, a series of violent conflicts
erupted on the island three years later, and, again in 1964 and 1967; in 1974,
a nationalist coup d’état supported by Greece was followed by an invasion
by Turkey that displaced approximately 275,000 persons from both communi-
ties, and, led to the de facto division of the island (Agathangelou 2003). The
“Cyprus Problem” has remained a central phenomenon in political debates
with both sides quite intransigent on how to reconcile the differences, and, with
the participation of women in “official” political life quite recent a phenom-
enon (Karayianni and Christou 2020). Zoe highlights in her narrative elements
of “gendered violence” that women face with how ethnonational constructs
situate them as vulnerable, second-​class, victimized and denied freedom: [my
identity as a woman was always a disadvantage, it was torture; They didn’t have
cash for daughters; I was the second child and unfortunately for my father I was
a girl again. He awaited his sons to come. When his sons were born, it was taken
for granted that they would study, whereas their daughters would get married.
My parents’ dream was realised because right after I finished my studies, through
matchmaking, they married me off and the first child was born; The situation
I experience is like a cage for me. I remember that since I was twelve, I trembled
to think that a man would get me pregnant.]
52 Anastasia Christou

The analysis also draws on the conceptualization of “translocational

positionalities” (Anthias 2006, p. 29) (i.e. that positionalities are complexly
tied to situation, meaning and the interplay of our social locations) which
includes not just the research setting as one of many locations or the diasporic
settling, but also the in-​betweenness of those public and private spaces where
Zoe recalls instances of marginalisation. Those conditions are necessary to
enable intersubjective reflexivity, in order to overcome normalising and dom-
inant discourses that essentialise migrant positioning. Thus, in unsettling a
rigid grounding to the nation, we can appreciate how mobilities unfold, not
just beyond nation-​state boundaries, but also the psychological borders that
notions of class, colonial imaginary, gender norms etc. can assert onto the life
narrative.
This leads into the final theme discussed here, linking “translocational
positionalities” (Anthias 2006) to aspects of individual agency/​identity and
social norms, that mould roles where women engage with the affordances of
their visibility and voice. This is the interconnected segment of Zoe’s narrative,
where her mothering, professional, research and activist’s roles mould into
a pathway for her to transcend the traditional normative identities that her
family and ethnic group context would have associated with her, and, to con-
struct a new mosaic of her choice. This translates into her choice of single
motherhood while working two jobs and pursuing doctoral studies simultan-
eously, the topic of her thesis for which she received a lot of criticism, to her
future activist research and work in the area of “consciousness raising”, with
issues of language and the politics over Cypriot women’s voices and their pos-
ition concerning the missing persons who disappeared during the periods of
violence and war. Overall, Zoe gives an account which is wonderfully fluid,
situative and complex, in outlining a narrative identity that weaves together
a number of threads, notwithstanding a multitude of challenges to belonging
and pathways to empowerment. These are also multiple facets of her own
self-​image and personality, as every narrative piece is but a component to the
mosaic of selfhood.
This chapter has encapsulated themes and issues of gender and feminism,
motherhood and mothering, family, and, as the title suggests: belonging and
rupture. This ultimately points to the culminating threads that bind both
Zoe’s individual life history of “homecoming”, “rupture” and the quest for
“belonging” with the larger political history of her homeland, Cyprus, where
these issues are not only pronounced but also contested. These are new disrup-
tive, and, equally transgressive layers of memory and reconciliation. Historical
trauma is not simply transmissible through generations, but “rather, there
seems to be much ambivalence in the workings of memories that under some
circumstances may create openings for new identities”, with “implications
that focus on the notion of creating new solidarities without forgetting past
traumas” (Zembylas and Bekerman 2008, p. 125). The fragments of the life
story unfolding in this chapter have highlighted that remembering is an act
of forgetting, and, forging new creative potentialities in bridging trauma with
 Homecoming as exile? 53

agency, and, by extension, in a sense, healing the self from loss and pain,
marking the past, but not the future.

Acknowledgements
Research for this chapter was funded by the AHRC under their “Diasporas,
Migration and Identities” programme (grant AH/​E508601X/​1). I am particu-
larly grateful to all participants in this large-​scale comparative, multi-​sited
ethnographic study conducted in the United States, UK, Germany, Greece
and Cyprus. Both first-​and second-​generation migrants generously shared
life stories reflecting on their mobile lives and their experiences of “home”
and “belonging” over the decades in their richly meaningful and poignant
narrations. I am very appreciative of Zoe’s hospitality in welcoming me on
several occasions when visiting her in her remote location in Cyprus and
where I enjoyed many insightful conversations. Although “field-​ working”
during extreme temperatures and other logistical issues can be challenging, the
moments will be memorable for the depths and lengths of honesty about the
human condition, and especially that of migrant mobile existential crises and
creativities.

Notes
1 EOKA (National Organization of Cypriot Fighters) was a clandestine group
(established in the spring of 1955 and lasting about four years) with the initiative of
the Church of Cyprus and the consent and sporadic limited assistance of the gov-
ernment of Greece, with a purpose to wage a guerrilla campaign against the British
colonial administration of Cyprus. The colonial administration responded by issuing
a state of emergency and increasing its armed forces on the island to combat EOKA
(Demetriou 2007; Karayianni and Christou 2020).
2 The author/​researcher self-​identifies as a working-​class migrant academic, part of the
Greek diaspora and of Hellenic ancestral heritage.

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Part II

Agency
Resourceful victimhood
Silke Meyer

The analysis of agency and the individual capacity to act has become a special
focus of the humanities with the turn towards practice theory, actors and their
ways of constructing and reading the world. Scholars like Pierre Bourdieu,
Carlo Ginzburg and Anthony Giddens have contributed to shifting the
research perspective from the history of events, as well as, socio-​economic and
political structures to the angle of individual actors and their view of social
and cultural change. In narrative analysis, the concept of agency is regarded
as seminal when studying the constitution of self and of identity through
stories. Echoing eminent theories of subject formation, two perspectives can
be contrasted: narrative agency is either expressed in an act of self-​creation
of the subject with a story, or, it is constructed in the narrative practices of
individual social positioning along or against hegemonial discourse (and, of
course, somewhere in between). Agency is thus constituted, and, expressed in
two directions, which can be summarised in: “originating-​from-​person versus
originating-​from-​world” (Bamberg 2022, Bamberg 2005). In the latter per-
spective, individual narrative practices are caused by social, historical and
physiological forces determining the subject and its potential. In this sense, a
person appears to be product of the world, constantly negotiating inputs and
influences in the process of subject formation. In the first perspective, the sub-
ject creates itself based on free will and guided by a moral consciousness.
Narrative in this sense represents an engagement with world-​and self-​
making (Bruner 1990). The spectrum between these two positions is negotiated
by narrative structures, and, their implicit message of victory and defeat,
personal growth or failure, moral uprightness or fault. Narratives can pre-
sent speakers and other characters as accountable personae responsible for
moving the action forward, upholding, or, traversing power relations and
furthering social change. They attribute and transition the role of a victim
to that of the hero, they tell tales from people going against the odds and
finding victory as underdogs, or, they present change in the figuration of con-
version. Narrative agency positions the subject with regard to responsibility,
commitment and morality: Who drives the plot? Who is responsible for the
action and consequences? These questions are answered from a thematic and

DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-6
56 Silke Meyer

from a linguistic perspective. When downplaying or highlighting their, and,

others’ involvement and agency, narrators make sense of a story and constitute
its stance and morale. By their preferred order of events (emplotment) and by
their choice of syntax, semantics, lexis and deixis, narrators can relate or dis-
tance themselves from events, actions and characters.
To account for the fluid and hybrid character of subject formation, the notion
of social positioning plays a central role in the analysis of agency. Positioning
theory analyses the relation between narrator, story theme and interactions
(Harré and Langenhove 1999). Understood as a discursive practice, and sensi-
tive towards power constellations and normative structures, positioning theory
is particularly fruitful when looking at the relation between narrative subjects
and societal discourse and master narratives (what Bamberg calls the perspec-
tive of originating-​from-​world). Expressing a sense of agency correlates how
people acknowledge or dispute societal discourse and their imperatives.
In this light, Silke Meyer (­chapter 5) examines the narrative agency of a
third-generation Austrian-​Turkish woman. In Hatice’s account of family his-
tory, of belonging and social exclusion, she challenges master narratives of
ethnic and gender stereotypes by positioning herself through small stories
about female agency and resourceful victimhood. When talking about her
grandmother dealing with an Austrian landlord, about Muslim marriage
practices and work ethos in migrant communities, the punchline of her stories
is the unexpected agency of the female migrant. She thus positions herself
through counter narratives with an agentive migrant heroine as protagonist,
accounting for plurality through narrative and challenging the hegemonial and
discriminatory discourse on migration in Austrian society.
Claudius Ströhle (­chapter 6) also draws on empirical data gathered in the
context of labour migration from Turkey to Austria. His interview partners
take up images and metaphors of migrants as victims like a “milked cow” and
they describe how Turkish workers were used during the economic boom in the
1960s and 1970s only to be sent back, neglected and forgotten. This victimhood
is turned into a resourceful position by the success story of remitting money
and objects back to Turkey, and thus, contributing to strengthening their home-
land economically but also emotionally. Remittances are a social practice dem-
onstrating support, loyalty and helpfulness towards family and friends, and
thus, negotiating agency and success in migrants’ lives. Ströhle aligns this topic
of agency with linguistic devices and para-​verbal expressions like knocking on
furniture and on walls. Agency is not only the thematic emphasis, but stretches
into the performance of the story as well.
Performing migrant narrative is also the topic of Ulla Ratheiser’s chapter
(7) on Shazia Mirza’s comedy act as a migrant narrative. In her stand-​up per-
formance, Mirza draws on her stage persona’s experiences as a British-​Pakistani
woman satirizing stereotypical perceptions of Muslims in British society, as well
as, Pakistani endeavours of adapting to the British way of life. Her humorous
take on agency and resourceful victimhood is thus twofold: While she explicitly
criticises the shortcomings of dominant discourse on Muslim immigrants, she
 Agency: Resourceful victimhood 57

also implicitly admonishes her parents for over-​adapting to British culture (her
father’s name is Mohammed but he calls himself Bob). As a second-​generation
British Muslim woman, she negotiates various identity positions and strategies
of empowerment. In so doing, she proves the potential of migrant narratives
to challenge societal discourse and notions of victimhood therein.
The three chapters are united in showing how agency is constructed in
engaging with dominant societal discourse. But they also emphasise the com-
plexity of narrative practices of belonging when turning victimhood into
resources. Unfolding agency can thus compensate experiences of social exclu-
sion, and, offers the possibility to re-​assess social situations (Helfferich 2012,
Meyer 2018).

Bibliography
Bamberg, M., 2022. Positioning the subject. In: S. Bosančić, et al., eds. Following
the subject. Grundlagen und Zugänge empirischer Subjektivierungsforschung.
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ads/​sites/​180/​2022/​08/​Posi​tion​ing-​the-​Subj​ect-​2022.pdf.
Bamberg, M., 2005. Agency. In: D. Herman, M. Jahn and M.-​L. Ryan, eds. The
Routledge encyclopedia of narrative theory. New York: Routledge.
Bruner, J. S., 1990. Acts of meaning. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Harré, R. and van Langenhove, L., eds., 1999. Positioning theory: Moral contexts of
international action. Oxford: Blackwell.
Helfferich, C., 2012. Agency-​Analyse und Biografieforschung. Rekonstruktion von
Viktimisierungsprozessen in biografischen Erzählungen. In: S. Bethmann, et al.,
eds. Agency. Qualitative Rekonstruktionen und gesellschaftstheoretische Bezüge von
Handlungsmächtigkeit. Weinheim: Beltz, 210–​237.
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debt relief. Fabula, 59 (1–​2), 50–​69. doi: 10.1515/​fabula-​2018-​0004
5 Female agency, resourceful victimhood
and heroines in migrant narrative
Silke Meyer

Narrative –​Hatice’s story

This chapter is based on the story of Hatice, a third-​generation migrant woman
whose family came from Turkey to Austria in the 1970s. Hatice was born in
Innsbruck where she went to school, finished her A-​Levels and graduated
with a Master’s degree in Political Science. At the time of the interview, she is
34 years old. Hatice is married with two young children and has a part-​time
job in accounting. Her husband works in a Turkish supermarket chain and she
also helps out there.
To anticipate her biographical punchline: Hatice has “made it”. She talks
about her family history, about former dwellings and encounters with Austrian
authorities, Muslim marriage practices and gender roles as well as the signifi-
cance of work ethics in migrant lives. These collective experiences of social
exclusion and discrimination are encountered with stories about individual
agency and social mobility and thus turned into success stories.
Hatice’s and her family’s story is furthermore echoed in the history of
labour migration from Turkey to Austria (see Ströhle in this volume). Since
1964, the recruitment agreement between Turkey and Austria has channelled
the movements of men and women in order to provide work forces in growing
Austrian industries. In Tyrol, it was mostly men who came to Innsbruck,
Kufstein, Jenbach, Telfs and the Stubai Valley in the 1970s and early 1980s,
with their families following later. Hatice’s grandfather was the first of the
family to make his way to Austria, and, worked in one of the iron factories
in the Stubai Valley. His family followed in 1982 with his wife, four children,
his brother and his brother’s wife and children. The men found work in the
local industries. Hatice’s father married a girl from the neighbouring village in
Turkey and they have two children, Hatice and her brother.

SM: So, you know about this interview, we are interested in remittances
between Austria and Turkey, what people send to Turkey and why.
Can you tell me your experience, your point of view on remitting,
what you think is important about it?

DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-7
This chapter has been made available under a CC-BY-NC-ND license.
60 Silke Meyer

HD: Yeah, well, it all started with my grandfather, he came to Austria in

1978, with the recruitment agreement and he worked with [name of
factory], you know, in the industries. That’s what they all did, back
then, it was the factories, and all the Turkish men back then went to
work there, you know.
SM: And the families followed later?
HD: Yes, that’s what it was like with everybody. My granny, my two uncles,
my aunt and my dad followed a few years later. I mean they were all
glad, of course, there wasn’t much back home for them, it was a poor
country but still very beautiful. I have always loved it, with the history
and tradition, and the food, oh my God, the food. It is what I call
my “Turkish heritage”, my family history. But here, my grandpa had
work and we had a good life, look at where we are today, so I guess, it
was all worth it. Much like with the rest of our family, it was the same
for everybody, they found work here and a way to support the family.
You see, it was important back then, and I guess, it still is important
for a Turkish man to support the family. //​Yeah//​That’s why it is so
difficult for them now, when they are not in charge [laughs] but that’s
another story.
SM: No, no, tell me [laughs].
HD: I mean, you know, how can I say this? In our family, the men are very
strong, head-​strong, my father is, and, I also married a very head-​
strong man. But, in life, it is not about getting your way all the time, it
is about knowing how to make a deal and get what you want. This is
what I know and I know it from experience [laughs]. The men are not
so good at that, the Turkish men, and that is why women took over.
SM [with a tone of surprise]: Ehm, eh, they took over?
HD: Oh yeah, they did. You can believe me. For example, I will tell you
a story about that. With my uncle and aunt, when they moved to
Innsbruck, they were looking for a home, a flat, and they had found
a place, in Hötting, well, further down, at the Inn, St. Nikolaus. You
know, this used to be a place where many Turkish people lived, quite
a poor area back then, with the old houses. And when they moved
there, my uncle, his German was much better, he did all the talking
with the landlord. But it was totally clear that the landlord didn’t
really like my uncle, and he could not get it right with him. You know
what it was like back then. It was awful, really, with all resentments
against foreigners. But my aunt, with her broken German, and the
way she was, she could hardly look the landlord into his eyes, but he
would help out, repair the boiler, bring a new stove and such things.
That’s what it is all about: everybody thinks that with the Turks, the
men are in charge and the women are always quiet and have no say
but it is not like that, I can tell you that. The world is not always what
it seems.
SM: That is really interesting. How old were you back then?
 Female agency 61

HD: Oh, I was what, four or five? Doesn’t matter, not important//​OK//​
Anyway, nowadays, it is much more like this, the women have power
and they close the deal (5 seconds pause) for example, the young
women, like my friend, who brought a husband from Turkey and he
cannot speak any German and find a job or anything.
SM: Really, I mean, I never … why do they bring a husband from Turkey?
HD: It is quite simple [chuckles], because they need to find a Muslim hus-
band. That should be interesting for you: The way it is, it is quite
unfair really, because a Muslim man can marry a Christian girl, and
this happens quite a lot, I think. But a Muslim girl cannot marry a
Christian guy, and, then a man is brought from Turkey in order to
marry a girl from here.
SM: OK, I see, and this works out?
HD: Well, not always, people get divorced and then there is shame for the
family (6 seconds pause) but some guys, really, it is a disaster, they just
don’t get it, those Turks, the poor sods [chuckles].
SM: Why are they poor sods?
HD: They are just so helpless, they never do anything, just sit around and
talk and play games, go to the betting shop and hang about. They show
no interest in the Turkish community and what they have established.
They just don’t care.
SM: And these are all guys?
HD: All of them. Women have better things to do. They just get on with it,
I mean, they have to. They look after the children, they go shopping,
do the household chores, cook for everybody. And they just do it. […]
About the getting on with it, this is important, I think, I mean, I have
a friend, she is from Serbia, and her mum was a teacher there, some
sort of college teacher. And here, she is a cleaner and worked three
jobs. And the thing is, she makes three times the money than she did
in Serbia. So she gets on with it, she is not too good to be a cleaner,
but just adapts to the way things are for her at the moment. When she
does not work, she looks after her kids, that’s why she took the job in
the first place. And that’s what makes her strong, I think, that she does
not sit around and mope but gets on with her life, she always said to
us: “girls, get to a job and make the best of it”. And that’s what makes
her strong, a strong woman. […] I remember we would come home
after an afternoon playing outside and she would always have some
delicious snacks for us. I got to know the Balkan cuisine that way,
she was very traditional in her cooking, this is the taste of home, she
would say. And they would also celebrate Serbian traditions and sing
Serbian songs. It was different in our home. My parents were more
eager to adapt to Austria, live and eat like Austrians, so we would also
have spinach knödel [dumplings] and strudel. And this woman liked
me very much, because with me, her daughter would speak German
[laughs]. […] It was always about work. All my parents and family
62 Silke Meyer

talked about was work, and who got a job there, and how is he doing.
And only when you work, you can become somebody here, when you
work hard enough, get up and take any job, like the Turks did. Jobs
that only Turks would take on. The Turks are not afraid to get their
hands dirty, they do what needs to be done, they go about it. It is the
hard work that has given us the possibility to settle in this country, you
could say, it is all about work. And now look at us, where we are now,
I guess you can say that we have made it.

Methodological reflections and positionality

The interview is part of a research project on remittances as social prac-
tice and negotiation of transnational belongings. The project centred on
sending and receiving practices and the earmarking of money, objects and
goods, ideas and social norms. In the interviews, people talked about remittances
as a way of maintaining social ties with their homeland, but at the same
time, they circle around difficult living conditions, new workplaces, language
barriers, unfamiliar weather and food, homesickness and experiences of exclu-
sion in Austrian society. These tales of arrival, surviving, coping and belonging
have similarities in their account of work ethos, endurance and agency. Within
the context of the research project, I met with Hatice, her parents and her
brother several times. However, this is the only time I spoke with her alone. For
the interview, we met in my office at the university, and I believe the academic
environment contributed to her self-​confident demeanour and the detached
way of telling me her story.
Hatice is bilingual in Turkish and German which she speaks with a heavy
Tyrolean dialect. The interviews were conducted in German, and I have paid
special attention to reflect on linguistic devices and their meanings, without
losing them in translation. I have recorded and transcribed the interview ver-
batim and in a more readable version. Emphasised words are underlined, para-​
verbal markers are given in square brackets, e.g. [chuckles]. Omissions are
indicated with […], short answers and stimuli by the interviewer are marked
with //​.

Methodological reflections

Methodologically, I analyse the biographical accounts on a content and on a

linguistic level. In Hatice’s story, her main argument is about the construction
of female agency and the making of the “migrant heroine”, demonstrating
that identity politics in migrant narratives need an intersectional approach,
taking into account the social categories of ethnicity, gender and class. In
my interpretation, I cross-​examine linguistic forms with content, in order
to show how the arguments are weighed, what is foregrounded and marked
as reportable (and what is not). On a linguistic level, I pay special attention
to embedding (story within a story), forms of emplotment (where does a
 Female agency 63

story begin and end?), and, the establishment of tellability by using direct
speech (Riessman 2008). Evaluative comments detach the narrator from the
narrative and allow for a knowing external position. I also analyse the use
and shifts of narrative perspective in order to examine the social positioning
of the narrator, for example, representing the story as an individual report,
or embedding it into a collective experience. My main objective is to inter-
pret these narrative devices as forms of social positioning, with regard to the
hegemonial migration discourse in Austrian society. I thereby use narrative
as a way of evaluating one’s own story and constituting a specific subjectivity
(Jackson 2002).

Positionality and communicative roles

I conducted this interview at the very beginning of our research project, it

was, in fact, more of a pre-​test than an interview to collect data. Although
I started with the topic of remittances and frequently addressed them during
the conversation, I hardly got any information on financial and material
transfers. Hatice rather talked about the topic she considered important, which
is gender and female agency in the Turkish community. My own position was
twofold: I conducted that interview in the “powerful” role of a white univer-
sity professor leading a research project and claiming expertise in the field of
transnational studies. At the same time, I was a newbie eager to learn about
the social practices and narratives in this very field: My knowledge was sparse
and bookish, as I had not yet met with many interview partners and only read
about the history of Turkish labour migration, remittances and transnation-
alism. As a result, Hatice led the interview and I followed, and whenever I tried
to reverse the roles, she assertively shared her opinion of what was relevant
and interesting for me, and what was not (“That should be interesting for you”
or “not important”). We can see this right from the beginning: I ask about
remittances and she answers with her family story. Hatice’s story is about
gender and ethnic stereotypes, about labour migration and work ethos. What
it is not about, is remittances. Whenever I tried to focus the interview on the
topic of remittances, her answers were short and almost brusque, whereas she
became very talkative and relaxed when she addressed female agency and the
inversion of gender roles. I therefore followed Hatice’s lead in the interview,
and we talked about her life, her family and friends and her view on the Turkish
diaspora, migration and gender roles (and I never used the interview in the
context of the research project).
Reflecting one’s own role in field work is vital and the positions of Hatice
and myself were clearly attributed: she was the expert in the transnational
field, I was the rookie. She challenges my bookish and perhaps stereotypical
knowledge with her story. On a meta-​level, the entire interview can be read
as an account of agency and resourceful victimhood: her as the insider with
her transnational capital, inside knowledge and confidence to evaluate what
is important in this context, while I took the role of the passive listener and
64 Silke Meyer

learner. But, ethnographers know that it is exactly this role of the beginner in a
social field that generates data, gives insights, in short: is resourceful.

Analysis –​Narrative positioning, construction of agency and resourceful

victimhood
The concept of narrative identity claims that identity has the structure of a
life story (Bruner 1990), and as such, it is widely used in narrative analysis and
narrative theory. While it is undisputed that narratives are a site of expressing
membership and belonging and, thereby, of constructing identity, the notion of
narrative identity is problematic. The concept suggests a unified and coherent
idea of self, which can hardly be derived from the concrete, context-​based and
often fragmented stories people tell. Furthermore, non-​narrative aspects like
social practices and embodiment are excluded here (Deppermann 2013, p. 1).
I therefore suggest that, in order to get from the concrete story to an idea
of narrative identity, we need to look at the manifold ways of positioning in
narrative. Positioning theory, as introduced by Harré and Langenhove (1991,
1999), examines the relation between the narrator, the story’s content and its
performance and interactions. Positioning is a discursive practice, sensitive
to the situatedness and context of narrative, showing how “selves are located
in conversations as observably and intersubjectively coherent participants in
jointly produced story lines” (Davies and Harré 1990, p. 48). Positioning theory
is particularly useful in the narrative analysis of storytelling in conversations,
for it can grasp the communicative dynamics between interlocutors.
Furthermore, it examines story elements with regard to communicative inter-
action and societal discourse and therefore takes a relational approach to
narrative. Referencing Foucault and the idea of subject positions, positioning
theory also takes into account power constellations, legitimate knowledge and
normative expectations which determine the constitution of the self (Foucault
2002). Finally, by paying attention to small stories, i.e. snippets of conversation
about mundane, ordinary and everyday events, and their mode of embedded-
ness in the big story or master narrative (Georgakopoulou 2015, pp. 255–​272),
positioning can be analysed as a narrative evaluation of societal discourse.
Small stories are a way of personal sense-​making by resorting to, conforming,
contradicting and subverting a dominant master narrative (Bamberg and
Andrews 2004, Bamberg 1997). Hence, narratives are moral tales in which
people acknowledge or dispute social imperatives, expectations and normative
powers. In their stories, narrators constitute themselves as socially recognised
in a “lived patterning of intersubjective life” (Jackson 2002, p. 30, Christou
in this volume, Riessman 2008). Positioning theory thus acknowledges the
dynamic, multi-​faceted, complex and sometimes ambivalent process of con-
stituting a narrative self between individual experiences and societal discourse.
Hatice starts her story with her grandfather leaving Turkey for work, she
continues with the low points of living in a foreign country and experiencing
resentment and discrimination, and, finishes with a happy ending that it was
 Female agency 65

“all worth it”: “And now look at us, where we are now, I guess you can say that
we have made it.” As with many other migrant narratives, she tells a success
story (Bönisch-​Brednich 2014) in the form of a quest for a better life abroad
(Ahmed in this volume). The key to success is agency, for agency turns the
migrant narrative into a success story, drives the quest for a better life and
makes sense of migrant experiences as cathartic, enlightening, and, a turning
point for the narrator (see Bönisch-​Brednich 2008 and in this volume).
In this chapter, I argue that dealing with agency, respectively the lack of
it, represents a way of negotiating belonging and participating in society.
Agency is produced and presented subjectively in order to connect to socially
ratified “evaluations and stances with regard to who is morally right or at
fault” (Bamberg 2005, p. 10). Positioning oneself as an active, potent and effi-
cacious subject is a major goal in many of the migrant narratives analysed
in this volume (see Ahmed, also Christou in this volume). Unfolding agency
and turning victimhood into a resource can compensate experiences of heter-
onomy, lack of power and social exclusion in everyday life. Narrating one’s
story opens up room for new and individual evaluation that might contradict
a dominant narrative and re-​interpret social topics (Helfferich 2012, Lucius-​
Hoene 2012). In constructing agency in a story, a narrator can seize the
opportunity to re-​assess a situation and thereby express an individual moral
judgement, which challenges social norms and societal discourse (Meyer
2018). Storytelling offers a variety of lexical and syntactical choices for
constructing agency in figures and episodes, e.g. by choosing strong or weak
verbs, active or passive sentences and moving the storyline through capable
agents. Especially in migrant narratives, the linguistic marking unfurls possi-
bilities to which migrant narrators or protagonists have no, or only limited,
access in their lives.
Hatice in her narrative offers an unfolding of migrant agency along the cat-
egories of gender and ethnicity. Her main argument is the reversal of gender
roles: “That’s what it is all about: everybody thinks that with the Turks, the
men are in charge and the women are always quiet and have no say but it is not
like that, I can tell you that.” The almost proverbial character of the statement
that: “The world is not always what it seems” underlines the tellability of her
proposition. She thus challenges the big story about migration and ethnic
and gender stereotypes on passive migrant victims (Augustín 2003) through
a number of small stories about female agency (Innes 2016). Hatice marks
the significance of this point with evaluative comments, thereby shifting the
standpoint from the personal to an external, and all-​knowing narrator, who
is in a position to see “what it is all about”. When we remind ourselves of the
positionality in the interview set-​up, we could also say that she enlightens the
naïve interlocutor (a university professor) about common stereotypes and how
they are untrue. In three small stories about a quiet woman who gets her way,
about her female friends who import their husbands, and about the work ethos
of her friend’s mother, she turns around the big story and master narrative of
gender roles in Turkish society.
66 Silke Meyer

Resourceful victimhood: “how to make a deal”

For her first example, Hatice uses the narrative device of a “story within the
story”. The effect of the story here lies in the twist in its tail. At the begin-
ning, her aunt –​we are never given a name –​is portrayed as a helpless and
subservient Turkish woman (she cannot speak German and “she could hardly
look the landlord into his eyes”), subordinating herself to the landlord who
represents the male gender and Austrian ethnicity, thus a hegemonic position.
Hatice here gives voice to the silenced Turkish woman and presents a counter
narrative (Bamberg 2004). Although her aunt is not “strong”, she takes the
leading role in dealing with the Austrian authority of the landlord and knows
“how to make a deal”. This creativity turns the helpless woman into a smart
and agentive actor. At the same time, she manages to fulfil the obligations of
the common perception of Turkish women (“the way she was”) and constitutes
agency through a practice of resilience and reworking of ethnic stereotypes
(Rydzik and Anitha 2020). Although she acknowledges the Turkish patri-
archy in the beginning (“it still is important for a Turkish man to support the
family”), she later breaks with the stereotype of male authority in Turkish
society: “That’s what it is all about: everybody thinks that with the Turks, the
men are in charge and the women are always quiet and have no say, but it is
not like that, I can tell you that.” The evaluative comment (“That’s what it is all
about”) marks the statement as seminal in her narrative, reinforced by another
comment on a meta-​level (“I can tell you that”).
The counter narrative of the strong female migrant introduces an inter-
sectional perspective in the study of agency and leads us to the notion of
resourceful victimhood. As Judith Butler and others have pointed out in their
reflections on vulnerability and resistance: Even if agency is blocked in one
dimension –​here: the social position of the migrant –​, it does not mean that
it is blocked in every dimension and that there are ways to resist that blockage
(Butler et al. 2016). When we succeed in thwarting the dichotomy of vulner-
ability and resistance, we can discover the complexity of agency and vary, as
Talal Asad advocates, from its “triumphalist” reading which is found in the
focus on self-​empowerment and notions of responsibility (Asad 2000, p. 29).
Rather, research on agency should take into account pain and suffering as
an expression of a social relationship. Addressing another’s pain is a form of
enacting social relations. When Hatice tells me how shy and passive her aunt
was, she addresses her pain and turns it into a resource in the narrative.

Active women, passive men: “why women took over”

Hatice continues with giving further examples of reversed gender constellations

when she tells me about the young women who make use of their transnational
capital by bringing husbands to Austria: “the women have power and they
close the deal, the young women who bring a husband from Turkey and he
cannot speak any German and find a job or anything”. Now it is the Turkish
 Female agency 67

husbands who cannot speak any German, but contrary to Hatice’s aunt, they
are much less effective: “They are just so helpless, they never do anything, just
sit around and talk and play games, go to the betting shop and hang about.”
Although female Muslims are disadvantaged by the religious convention of
having to marry a Muslim (“it is quite unfair, really”), they eventually adopt
a position of power, when, in Hatice’s words and evidence, they “bring a hus-
band from Turkey”. “Bring from Turkey” –​rather than “come to Turkey” –​is
an active verb which highlights the women’s perspective and agency. The young
women thus deal successfully with a system of potential oppression and do not
lose their self-​determination. Although this practice is no recipe for a happy
marriage and a potential divorce can bring shame to the family, Hatice does not
dwell on this point but only mentions it in passing. If the marriage breaks up,
in Hatice’s eyes, the fault lies with the men because “they just don’t get it, those
Turks, the poor sods.” The men are reduced to their ethnicity (“those Turks”)
and pitied (“the poor sods”). They remain passive and have no resourcefulness
to turn their situation around.
Returning to the question of positionality: My own reaction to this episode
plays entirely into Hatice’s line of reasoning: When I utter –​or rather stutter –​
my surprise about the statement that “women took over”, Hatice reacts with a
feeling of vindication (“You can believe me”) and by pointing out my lack of
knowledge (“it is quite simple”). Within the interview, she again positions her-
self as the expert vis-​à-​vis an uninformed conversation partner.

The making of migrant heroines: “girls, get a job and make the best of it”

The third story about her Serbian friend’s mother also puts an agentive woman
centre-​stage. Again, agency is a key characteristic of the protagonist. In a few
sentences, Hatice makes her the model migrant: her work ethos, her flexibility
to “adapt to the things that are for her”, her willingness to take a job well
below her qualification and the motive for doing this all: to support her kids.
Most of all, she does not complain but takes it as it is: “girls, get to work and
make the best of it”. The direct speech resembling a saying or a motto marks
the significance of the appeal to fellow females. Her story within the story
is about the way she turns the position of a potential victim in a low-​skilled
and exploitative job into a resource: making money and making the best of a
situation.
While adapting to the demands in the workplace in Austria, at home,
the woman remains true to her ethnicity when preparing Serbian food for
her children and, as Hatice puts it, maintaining the traditions of her home-
land. The narrative produces a subject position of a migrant heroine with
a work ethos of diligence and stamina, solidarity towards the community
in both the country of origin and residence, upholding traditions of the
country of origin like cooking Balkan dishes and singing and folksongs,
while being open to acculturation and willing to integrate, here: to speak
German (Meyer 2023).
68 Silke Meyer

The coda of this story emphasises, again, the role of a work ethos both in the
Turkish community and in the Austrian society. Work dominates the conversa-
tion at the family dinner table and it dominated the interview. Hatice’s descrip-
tion of her family’s work ethos is related to a position of agency, being able to
succeed economically and socially in the place of residence: “only when you
work, you can become somebody here”. Social mobility through work ethic is
an important motive not only in Hatice’s migrant narrative (Nowicka 2014,
van Hear 2014). Furthermore, the work ethos becomes ethnicised because
“only the Turks” do these jobs, and, “are not afraid to get their hands dirty”.
The agency and attitude to taking any job makes the migrant worker superior
in this story, in short: it is the key element in constituting the subject position
of the migrant heroine.

Counter narrative and social positioning

Migrant narratives frequently deal with an exposed position, with being

“othered”. Narrators either make their exposed position meaningful through
individualisation, or they alleviate it through practices of solidarity (see Leurs
et al. 2020, Lehmann 1980, pp. 56–​57, Meyer 2017, pp. 105–​107). Hatice makes
use of both perspectives in order to make sense of her own story. First, she
arranges her family history into a collective experience of labour migration,
recruitment acts and diaspora community (“that’s what it was like with every-
body”). Being part of a social group takes on a supportive role: “one” is just
like “everybody”, no exception and therefore normal under circumstances that
generally deny this unmarked position to the narrator. But she also uses the
individual experience to underline her message of female agency. Especially
in the personal stories about her aunt and her friend’s mother, Hatice uses the
linguistic form of the embedded story and thereby marks the tellability of her
observation and opinion. The scenic descriptions further heighten the plausi-
bility of the content. The narrative device of the story within the story thus
strengthens her credibility: By recounting somebody else’s life, her message
becomes more general and believable (Nelles 2005).
Narrative analysis should always pay attention to gaps and silences, too.
Hatice does not tell me much about herself (with the exception of mentioning
her head-​ strong father and husband) and does not talk about her own
experiences as a third-generation migrant or as a Muslim. She also never
shares with me whether she prepares Turkish dishes for her family, though she
does tell us that her parents were eager to include Austrian dishes. When she
does identify with her Turkish background, it is in a historical perspective on
family history (“my Turkish heritage”). When she acknowledges experiences
of discrimination and social exclusion, she places them in the past (“You know
what it was like back then. It was awful, really, with all resentments against
foreigners”).
Despite these gaps, we can learn about Hatice’s point of view by exploring
the theoretical potential of positioning on three levels (Bamberg and
 Female agency 69

Georgakopoulou 2008). First, she positions herself in the “there and then” by
narrating the story of other female migrants and evaluating them positively.
By starting her story with the grandfather, she lays the groundwork for her
migrant subject position which then develops into the counter narrative of
female agency. As if to stress this position, she secondly takes an interactive
stand with me and places herself in the “here and now” of the conversation.
Here, she shows agency herself in confidently leading the interview away from
its original topic, and, by taking the position of a commentator pointing
out what I should consider important. For example, when I ask for her age
during the interview, she replies quite brusquely with: “Doesn’t matter, not
important”. She also underlines the twist of agency through her intonation
and emphasis of certain words and with para-​verbal comments. Her chuckling
suggests that she seems to enjoy my surprise at the twist of her tale. Thirdly,
she positions herself with regard to the dominant discourse of migration and
its master narratives of masculinity and femininity. Here, the relation between
small stories and big stories are telling: through her anecdotal descriptions
of lethargic men and agentive women she constitutes a counter narrative
contradicting ethnic stereotypes about the Turkish community.
Hatice’s main messages in the interview are the counter narratives which
break gender and ethnic stereotypes. She addresses female agency and the
reversal of stereotypes through embedded stories and thus offers a plurality
in her migrant narrative by challenging and re-​evaluating dominant discourse.
Her narrative motive is to turn a supposed lack of agency associated with
gender and ethnicity into a position of spirit and strength. This is what Hatice’s
story is about: challenging common perceptions of migrants and positioning
herself outside dominant discourses. Or, in her words, underlining the perspec-
tive that: “The world is not always what it seems.”

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6 “When you win, you are a German,
when you lose, you are a foreigner”
Claiming position beyond the meritocratic
and discriminatory migration discourse

Claudius Ströhle

Narrative –​“Milked like a cow”: Labour migrants from Turkey in

Central Europe
Ferit and Şadiye are a retired couple from Turkey who have lived and worked in
Germany. The two grew up in the village Dağyenice in the province of Uşak in
Western Turkey before Ferit followed his father to Germany in 1973 through the
bilateral agreement on labour recruitment. Two years later, they married, and
Şadiye joined Ferit in Germany. In 2007, Şadiye was granted an early pension
as a result of developing a serious neurological disease caused bodily and men-
tally by 30 years of work in Germany. Ferit retired in 2014. Since then, they have
commuted among houses in Germany and in the city of Uşak and a newly built
one in their home village of Dağyenice. Their house in the city of Uşak was
built in 1987 and was the first investment the young couple made in Turkey after
migrating to Germany. To begin with it stood empty, but then one floor was
rented out. Even though it was the couple’s house, Ferit’s parents kept the rent.

Ferit (F): Dad and mum took the rent, but I didn’t see (.) anything […].
For example, in the past, let’s say I gave my dad 1000 lira, gave
him 1000 German marks, you don’t get that back. (.) It used
to be a lot like that. Not with me, with almost everyone it was
like that.
Claudius (C): Did you also help the people who stayed here a lot (.) family,
your mum, or dad or?
F: For example, I have four brothers, eh, for example. Four
brothers. One brother went abroad. The brother who works
abroad, earns money, sends money to another brother here,
always, for example. Now he did this, did that, did that. At
some point he has a big family, got married, he got married,
the four brothers got married, then they have children. You
have (.) many years abroad (.) you have nothing, and the
others have a lot. What do you think then? (...) It happened a
lot like that, a lot, a lot. Unfortunately. (..) There’s a saying.
A cow (..) do you understand me?
DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-8
This chapter has been made available under a CC-BY-NC-ND license.
 Beyond the meritocratic and discriminatory migration discourse 73

C: Mhm (affirmative)
F: I am a cow, always milk, chh, chh chh (makes a milking gesture
with his hands). You saw that.
Şadiye (Ş): Laughs
C: Laughs
F: What does the cow do later? (...) Yes that is a saying.
C: A Turkish saying?
F: They milked me like a cow
C: Aha, yes, they sucked you dry
F: That is (.) That is also a saying
C: Was it true?
F: True, true. They always use, use, use you and at some point, when
you don’t give anything anymore, pfft (makes a sweeping gesture
with his hand) they dump you. Something like that. (.) Milked
like a cow, milked (.) and then at some point pfft (gestures). (.) Do
you understand? That’s how it happened a lot. Not to me. It
didn’t happen like that for me, but it happened to a lot of people.
I’ve heard it or seen it. A lot. And then at some point there was
a fight, a fight. (...) Too bad. Too bad. Too bad. Someday, no
matter if the whole world is yours, if your whole house is full of
money, or gold, what is the good of this? (...) Someday you’ll go
to hell. That’s why you have to be a good person, no matter what
[…]. And if someone needs money, then you can help. You do this
and that (...) and then it’s good (...) then you have to stretch out
your hand to them.
The situation of the young couple in Germany was very much
influenced by the beginning of their migration and how that was
embedded in the familial plans. Herein, Ferit’s father played a
decisive role.
C: And when you left here as a young boy, what did you think, do
you remember? Did you think about how long you would stay?
Or what you would do later?
F: Oh, when I left my dad said: ”We’ll stay for three or four years
and then we’ll come back. Maybe buy a tractor and then we’ll
come back.” And yet that’s what dad did, he bought a tractor, but
he left me over there.
C: He bought a tractor?
F: He did
C: And went back to the village?
F: Yes, that’s how he did it. But he didn’t take me with him. Because
I was married, 75 (...) and then he said, “this is” (...) –​we had
our first child –​(.) ”this is your child, this is your wife, this is the
house (.) now, you stay here.” (Knocks on the table every time).
Then he came back in 76.
Ş In 76 dad left-​came, right?
74 Claudius Ströhle

F: Mhm (affirmative) (...) Until 76, until 78, until 69-​79 (to Şadiye): Didn’t
we send money to dad until 79?
Ş: Until 81 we gave.
F: Until 81 (...) what I earned, the little money I saved (...) no matter if
you have 1000 German marks, or 2000 or whatever you can save. When
you come during the holidays, you have to give this money to your dad
(knocks on the table). That’s what we did. Until 81 (knocks on the table).
From 81 on I said: ”I don’t want to give any more money” (knocks on the
table), ”I want to work for myself now, for my family” (...) then I had the
second, third child, then I saved a bit, then I bought this [the property],
as I said (to Şadiye): Did we buy this in 84 or 85?
Ş: In 85.
F: In 85 I bought the property, as I said. Then we gave it to a company, 87 it
was finished (knocks on table). That’s how it was. For many people it has
been the same as for me, as with my life. (..)
From the beginning of their migration, Şadiye and Ferit regularly visited
Uşak during the summer months. Once, in 1978, they brought a television
from Germany and connected it to a generator in their home village of
Dağyenice. They invited many of the villagers to this event.
F: It was quite big (...) but at the bottom like this, not a narrow one like this,
you know. Two people have to carry it, not one, you can’t do it alone.
Televisions used to be so heavy.
C: (Laughs)
F: God, God, God (...) Now Europe is big, big, big. They always say that,
eh? (...) I lived in Neuss, I already told you, didn’t I?
C: Mhm (affirmative)
F: Look (traces the outline of the flat with his fingers on the table) we had
two rooms, brother, dad, and the two of us, and one child. That’s where
we lived (taps his fingers on the table). No bathroom (.) And one toilet.
C: In Germany?
F: In Germany, yes yes. And with the other tenants, Spanish people, we
lived there. And no bathroom […].
Ş: Five families, one toilet. Five families.
F: And now? In Germany we didn’t have a proper street, in the past, in the
village. Everything was so small and narrow (goes into a crouched pos-
ition). And now everyone acts big. And now everyone has a big mouth,
the whole of Europe.
C: Yes, of course, it used to be poor too.
F: Yes, that (..) you can say what you want. The Turks have helped Europe
a lot, a lot, a lot (knocks on the table with each “a lot”).
C: Sure!
F: Many guest workers (knocks on the table) did all the shit work, every-
thing. What I, my job, for example, not everyone can do it. A German
says ”ugh, that stinks, ugh”. We didn’t have a single German painter. Only
foreigners, for example. Where there’s dirty shit work, only foreigners.
 Beyond the meritocratic and discriminatory migration discourse 75

Most of them were Turks. Greeks, Italians, rarely. Spaniards, Portuguese,

almost not at all (...). Only Turks did the shit work (...)
C: Yes, that’s true for sure.
F: Then they don’t even say thank you, not once. Only help the PKK
[Kurdistan Workers’ Party]. Nothing else at all. If you see the correct
side (...) Europe is not our brother. Normally. Really, believe me (..) They
forget everything quickly, good times (..) Use, use, use, use (..) if you, for
example, I carry you, eh? Let’s say about five hundred metres. I carried
you, let’s say about four hundred metres. And then I say (puffs) ”oh, I’m
tired. I can’t go on.” What do you do? (.) “Oh hell, pfffff! Come on, next
one!” No thank you. Like that. Europe did it like that. (....) That’s how
it is. I don’t want to badmouth anything, but that’s how it is. Because I,
because I experienced it myself. I know that.
Repetitively, Ferit talks about the hegemonic behaviour of the Europeans,
which he also follows on German television. He has two satellite dishes,
for Turkish and German TV channels. On this day, he switches through
the German TV channels and then to Turkish ones. The breaking news is
announced that Mesut Özil is resigning from the German national football
team. We read together:
F: If you win
C: You are German
F: Then you are German. If you lose, you are a foreigner.
C: That’s what he said?
F: Yes Germany, many Germans have said that. Do you understand? (....)
C: Mhm (affirmative)
F: Was I right earlier, what I told you? As long as you carry, you are a good
person. If you say, “Oh, I’m tired, friend, please, I need a five-​minute
break, then I can carry you again.” –​“No! Either you carry me, or I’ll
dump you!” (in a loud voice) Something like that. See, you’ve seen this
case now. That’s what I meant. (...) You have to be a good person, no
matter what you are. Whether you’re German, or Turkish, or, black,
white, it doesn’t matter. What you believe, doesn’t matter. You have to be
a good person. That’s what I mean. You understand me now, don’t you?
C: Yes, I understand you.
F: And now you have seen it correctly?
C: Yes
F: That’s what I meant. Germany is like that. Do you understand? (...) Too
bad. For Özil, or for Germany. That’s what I think (Ferit switches to a
German television channel, where the crime series Tatort1 is on).2

Reflection –​A narrative analysis of remittance practices in the context of the

labour migration regime in Central Europe
Globally, migrants’ remittances have increased exorbitantly in the last decade.
In 2019, migrants sent 719 billion dollars to their families in their places of
76 Claudius Ströhle

origin (World Bank Group 2021).3 Correspondingly, research on remittances

has increased significantly since the 1990s, still mainly focusing on the impacts
of the money transfers on the receiving countries (Carling 2020). In addition,
studies have examined migrants’ motivations in remitting (Mahmud 2020), the
perceptions of the families who stayed in the places of origin (Nazridod et al.
2021), how remittances shape landscapes and transform architecture and space
(Lopez 2015), and how remittances are inevitably accompanied by a transfer
of social (Levitt and Lamba-​Nieves 2011) and political concepts (Krawatzek
and Müller-​Funk 2020). On the other hand, less attention has been paid to
questions of the role of remittances in shaping the biographies and identities
of migrant actors. For example, how far were remittances part of the migration
plans? How are social relations, gender positions and generational hierarchies
mirrored in remittance practices? How are decisions to migrate and to remit
negotiated and performed within the family and across borders? Most notably,
Carling (2014) identified remittances as embedded in a social script of sender
and recipient, fulfilling purposes such as compensation, gift, allowance or even
blackmail. Based on this, Meyer (2023) conceptualised remittances as social
practices that effect cross-​border social positioning and, subsequently, result in
the formation of migrant subjectivity.
My ethnographic research4 focuses on remittance practices within the
migration nexus of Uşak in Turkey and the Stubai Valley in Austria. In the
course of bilateral agreements on labour recruitment between Turkey and sev-
eral European countries since the 1960s, more than 3,5 million moved to and
stayed in Europe, and around 20 percent migrated from Western Turkey, to
which the province of Uşak belongs (Akgündüz 2016, p. 135, Içduygu 2012,
p. 12). The foreign workers were desperately needed to drive the economic
recovery after World War II. Nevertheless, from the perspective of the host
society –​which is also still overrepresented in the hegemonic historiography –​
the foreign workers were “wanted but not welcome” (Rupnow 2017, Zolberg
1987) and were pejoratively referred to as “guest workers”. After the recruit-
ment stopped in 1973, some returned, and some stayed. Through family reuni-
fication, the migration process continued, and a long and conflictual process
of mutual incorporation took place. However, since the failed coup d’état
in Turkey in 2016, the relations between the Turkish state and the European
Union hit rockbottom, increasing the pressure on migrants with multiple
belongings and leading to processes of re-​nationalisation and social rupture
(see among others Abadan-​Unat 2011, Palmberger 2019). Remittance flows
to Turkey increased after the beginning of emigration in the 1960s, reaching
a peak of 5,4 billion dollars in 1998, and thereafter steadily decreasing to less
than one billion dollars per year (Karamelikli and Bayar 2015, p. 33).
By following remittance actors and transfers in their everyday lives in
different social and geographical settings (Marcus 1995), this ethnographic
research comprises multi-​ layered and multi-​ placed data like field notes,
photographs, archival sources and interview manuscripts. In this chapter,
I aim to reflect on the impacts of remitting on the senders’ biographies and
 Beyond the meritocratic and discriminatory migration discourse 77

subject positions. Therefore, I embed the narrative interview with Ferit and
Şadiye into the collected ethnographic data and cross-​ border migration
discourses and analyse it with a detailed narrative analysis (Lucius-​Hoene and
Deppermann 2004).

Exploring remittances by applying narrative analysis

An interview is a communicative action in which the interviewer and inter-
viewee create social reality. In my analysis, I explore the content as well as
the structure of the narration (Mishler 1995), focusing on interactive, situ-
ational and performative aspects (Lucius-​Hoene and Deppermann 2004). In
the detailed analysis of key elements, I look at what is told and what is left out,
how certain events are displayed and why they are displayed in this way. Since
the selected interview was characterised by references to the discourse about
so-​called guest-​worker migration, the analysis looks for culturally established
narrative patterns and reveals the cross-​border forms of positioning: Who
or what drives the action in the narration? How does the narrator relate to
hegemonic historiography or counter-​narratives of both the places of destin-
ation and of origin (Bamberg and Andrews 2004)? In this context, I aim to
explore the various forms of positioning as they are linking the individuals
to social discourses and thus create and negotiate transnational belonging in
social interactions (Carling 2014, Deppermann 2015, Meyer 2017). To do so,
the interview situation and the decision to choose specific extracts for the ana-
lysis must be reflected.
After I met Ferit and Şadiye in the summer of 2017 during my ethno-
graphic research in Uşak, I visited them regularly. We hung out in their house
in Dağyenice and did garden work, walked through the market in the city
of Uşak, or met at weddings in the region of Stubai Valley (Austria), where
Şadiye’s family lives. The interview took place in the summer of 2018 in their
four-​storey house in the city of Uşak. I was interested in the couple’s migra-
tion biographies and how they are linked to remittance practices –​namely
sending money, presents and ideas to their relatives back home. The interview,
which was conducted in German and Turkish and later translated into English,
started on the balcony on the third floor with an open-​ended question about
their migration stories. The fact that the interview took place while switching
between the different floors and with repeated narratives about the meaning of
the building made it evident how the couple’s remittance practices materialise
in the very house in which the interview was conducted. After about fifteen
minutes, Ferit suggested to show me the apartment on the fourth floor, which
stands empty except for some rare visits by their daughter. Afterwards, we
returned to the third floor, where he showed me photos, souvenirs and interior
decoration reflecting their cross-​border biographies, for example food and fur-
niture from Germany and a photo album with pictures from Austria, Germany,
Istanbul, Uşak, and so forth. Parallel to this mobile form of the interview,
the couple was also several times talking via phone or video calls with their
78 Claudius Ströhle

relatives in Stubai Valley and Germany. Moreover, on this very evening, Ferit
and Şadiye were invited to the wedding of Ferit’s niece. However, Ferit and his
brother have been in a fight for a long time, as Şadiye told me, and eventually
they decided not to go. This conflict within the family is also present in the
narration of the interview.
During the analysis of the transcribed interview, the selected sequence
I used in this chapter turned out to be a key narration as it comprises thick
episodic descriptions and significant biographical experiences displayed in a
condensed form; we can recognise this by the high degree of narrative reso-
lution, increasing scrutiny and pointed mode of presentation (Lucius-​Hoene
and Deppermann 2004, p. 135). In this extract, Ferit re-​enacted dialogues with
his father and former bosses, used expressive metaphors (milker, carrier), and
actively involved me in the conversation. Undoubtedly, the extent to which
cross-​border migrants are constrained by dual expectations and loyalties has
already been comprehensively demonstrated (Waldinger 2015), as well as in the
context of the meritocratic guest-​worker regime (Alpagu 2019, Rupnow 2017).
In the following, I aim to analyse how these experiences are narrated by focusing
especially on the practices of remitting. Thereby, my chapter provides a meth-
odological contribution to remittances research, which remains dominated by
global macro analyses.

Analysis –​Migration and remittance narratives as ways of sense-​making in

the face of diverging cross-​border expectations
When speaking about the remittances he sent to his family in Uşak, Ferit uses
the metaphor of a milked cow. He depicts his family in Turkey as milkers, that
“always use, use, use you and at some point, when you don’t give anything
anymore […] they dump you.” In the same mode of diction, Ferit describes
how Europe neglected the crucial part the labour migrants have played in
the economic upswing after World War II: “They forget everything quickly,
good times (..) Use, use, use, use” and if a foreign worker was not needed any-
more, they say “Come on, next one!”, Ferit recapitulates. In the following,
I aim to identify the techniques of narrating this cross-​border dilemma, its
embeddedness in the public migration discourse and the functions the story-
telling fulfils in the transnational positioning. To this end, I want to show not
only how remittances mirror and control transnational social relationships
(Carling 2014), but rather how in interweaving them, remittance and migra-
tion narratives function as practices of sense-​making that put aside outline an
exit from diverging cross-​border expectations.

Techniques of migration and remittance narratives: Collectivity and reassurance

Through certain strategies and modalities of narrating such as re-​enacting

dialogues, using metaphors and involving the listener, Ferit makes his
experiences vivid. Also, it seems to remain difficult for him to talk about
 Beyond the meritocratic and discriminatory migration discourse 79

experiences as his own; that’s my interpretation of why he repeatedly embeds

them in a collective. Right at the beginning, Ferit depicts how he gave money
to his father (by using first person), but didn’t get it back (by using second
person). He relativises the depiction by using “For example”, “let’s say” and
through the consequent sentence: “It used to be a lot like that. Not with me,
with almost everyone it was like that.” After my question about whether Ferit
supported his family, he again uses the example of a hypothetical and classic
migrant family, of which one member goes abroad and sends money to Turkey
and, in the end, the ones who migrated “have nothing, and the others [who
stayed in Turkey] have a lot”. After that, he switches again to a collective level,
underlining that such conflicts happened a lot and to a lot of people, but not
to him. In this context, Ferit’s “small stories” of being abroad and being forced
to provide for the well-​being of the family at home undergird the “big story”
of the first generation of labour migrants from Turkey in Europe (Bamberg
and Georgakopoulou 2008). By displaying the story as an example of a hypo-
thetical family, underlining the omnipresence of these stories on a generational
level, Ferit can talk about his own experiences and make them bearable.
Moreover, he thus illustrates the double temporal dimension of experiencing,
remembering and narrating migration experiences: By differentiating between
the narrated self and the narrative self (Lucius-​Hoene and Deppermann 2004,
p. 24), he locates these experiences in the past while simultaneously uncoupling
himself from being a so-​called guest worker.
During the interview, Ferit constantly involved me in his narration, espe-
cially through practices of reassurance. The high amount of reassurances in
Ferit’s narration (“do you understand me?”, “believe me”, “eh”, “Was I right
earlier, what I told you?”) indicates that my interview partner was particularly
unsure whether I would understand him correctly and that he attaches great
importance to my approval (Lucius-​Hoene and Deppermann 2004, p. 260).
The linguistic reassurances were accompanied and reinforced by para-​linguistic
ones. When Ferit told me about an accident he had in the barracks in which he
stayed in the beginning of his migration with his father, he showed me the scar
on his arm. Moreover, when he showed me around in his flat, Ferit constantly
knocked on the walls, railings and furniture in order to prove their stability
and quality. I construe these linguistic and para-​linguistic acts of reassurance
as expressions of the hierarchical socio-​cultural divide between the inter-
viewer and interviewee that is here embedded in the global power relations
of the guest worker regime. Ferit challenges the master narrative of Europe’s
hegemony and upholding of human rights through his counter narratives
on the exploitation of foreign workers in the 1970s. His acts of reassurance
show that speaking against dominant discourses assigns him the position of
the marginalised who has to bring evidence; in contrast, I am assigned the
unmarked position of the member of the majority society, an inspector who
judges. Our relationship underlies powerful dichotomies of majority/​minority,
Turkey/​Europe and researcher/​researched, but also of contemporary witness/​
next generation. The fact that the interview took place in Turkey, and at least
80 Claudius Ströhle

partly in the first language of Ferit, namely Turkish, cannot resolve this imbal-
ance. Especially when researching migrant narratives, one must keep in mind
that the social disparity between interviewer and interviewee inevitably defines
the research relationship. It is rather about understanding the censorship that
causes certain things not to be said and the motivations for emphasising others
(Bourdieu 1999). By reassuring him that I got him right, Ferit reminds me
of the imbalances that constitute our relationship while, at the same time, he
strives for a mutual understanding.

Re-​enacting dialogues and the metaphor of the carrying migrant worker

The interactive construction of social reality performed in this interview

becomes evident in the episodic narrations of Ferit. Through his use of
techniques of re-​enacting dialogues and metaphors, these episodes function
as dramatic presentations of experiences, making the listener a witness to and
accomplice of the told (Lucius-​Hoene 2010). Most notably, dialogue renditions
have the function of characterising and grading persons. They are powerful
tools of narrative self-​ positioning (Lucius-​Hoene and Deppermann 2004,
p. 234). After I asked Ferit about his initial migration vision, he outlined his
movements, goals and planned duration as determined by his father. After his
father returned to Turkey in 1976, he made Ferit and Şadiye stay in Germany,
which Ferit narrates by rendering the words of his father. Therein, he makes
his voice louder and uses a harsh intonation, reinforced through knocking
on the table. The father’s decision seemed to be related to the fact that Ferit
and Şadiye now had to remit him part of their earnings from Germany. Ferit
enters the dialogue rendition with his father in 1981 by stating, “I don’t want to
give any more money”, which he also reinforces by knocking on the table. By
narrating this sequence in the form of a dialogue between him and his father,
he can tilt the experienced situation in his favour. In doing so, Ferit makes
his narration discursively connectable. Thus, the re-​enacted dialogue expresses
how Ferit accomplished a liberation of the family (in Turkey), and the very
house in which the interview took place is the materialisation of this liberation.
It was the first big investment the couple made for themselves and, from there
on, they could spend their yearly summer visits in their own house in the city of
Uşak and no longer in the house of Ferit’s father in the village of Dağyenice.
Notably, the couple’s collective remittances (Şadiye: “Until 81 we gave”) and
the collective investment in the house is depicted by Ferit as his own (“what
I earned, the little money I saved”). This correlates with the overall findings
of my ethnographic research, where the hardship and success of the migrant
experiences was dominantly told as a male agenda (Ströhle 2023). However,
1981 was a turning point in both Ferit and Şadiye biographies, which is also
demonstrated by the interim conclusion Ferit makes after narrating this epi-
sode, “That’s how it was”, followed by again framing his story as character-
istic for the generation of labour migrants from Turkey. Still, these stories are
sparse in remittances research, which mostly focuses on the motivations for
sending money or the impacts these transfers have on the regions of origin.
 Beyond the meritocratic and discriminatory migration discourse 81

The detailed analysis of Ferit and Şadiye’s story not only gives insights into the
inter-​familial pressure (Haagsman and Mazzucato 2020) and the hardships of
remitting, but also into how far remittance decay (Meyer 2020) is negotiated
within the family across borders and remembered as a significant act of
emancipation from cross-​border obligations, opening up new possibilities of
investments and lifestyles.
The second rendered dialogue in this extract is linked to the second exploit-
ative system Ferit and Şadiye were confronted with, namely the migration and
labour regime in the Germany of the 1970s. Herein, it is crucial to follow the
narration and its changes of the subject. After talking about the first television
Şadiye and Ferit brought from Germany to their home village of Dağyenice,
Ferit suddenly stops. After three seconds of pause, he switches topic by attrib-
uting to the Europeans a hegemonic and arrogant behaviour. This shift from
at-​the-​time-​modern electronic device to criticising global power relations can
only be understood when relating this extract to the broader findings of my
research. It was a significant finding of this ethnographic study that many
return migrants said that today they do not bring gifts or consumer goods
from Europe to Turkey anymore, as there is no need to. From the 1960s to
the end of the 1980s, gifts like technical devices, furniture and chocolate from
Europe were inevitable, due to the lack of these products in Turkey (see also
Mura 2016).
Against this backdrop, Ferit’s change of subject can be interpreted as
scrutiny of the dominant narrative of the developed Europe and the under-
developed Turkey, which is also mirrored through a one-​sided transfer of
remittances, namely money, know-​how and consumer goods like televisions.
This is reflected later on in the narration, when Şadiye and Ferit depict the
lousy housing conditions in the cramped accommodations in Neuss, Germany.
Then, he moves on to describing the unwanted work that was apportioned
to the foreign workers, most notably to the ones from Turkey. Criticising this
exploitative and discriminatory labour regime, Ferit presents a notional dia-
logue between me and him, mirroring the relations between a labour migrant
from Turkey and the guest worker regime in Europe: “if you, for example,
I carry you, eh? Let’s say about five hundred metres. I carried you, let’s say
about four hundred metres. And then I say (puffs) ‘oh, I’m tired. I can’t go on.’
What do you do? (.) ‘Oh hell, pfffff! Come on, next one!’ ” Ferit subsequently
elaborates on this metaphor, depicting the positions of the docile migrant
worker and the powerful (supra)nation that finds a use of the former only as
long he carries the latter; but not vice versa. The metaphor of the carrying
worker contains an obsequious element. Moreover, the German tragen (to
carry) is close to the verb ertragen (to bear), which also accurately describes
how Ferit narrated his experiences as a painter in Neuss. Finally, the image
of carrying also points to a burden that someone can carry for the other, for
example, to get them over a certain threshold. By using culturally established
narrative patterns like metaphors and verbal images, Ferit increases the cred-
ibility and meaning of his narration. By choosing this metaphor, he thus makes
an offer of interpretation, in which the linguistic form and the content merge
82 Claudius Ströhle

(Meyer 2017, p. 107). Focusing on the usage of metaphors is, in my view, a

key to understanding migrant narratives as polyphone voices embedded in the
power relations of transnational societies.

Being “a good person” as a way of sense-​making in the context of

cross-​border dilemmas
In the last sequence, Ferit and I follow live on television how Mesut Özil resigns
from the German National Football Team. When the breaking news appears,
Ferit translates Özil’s official statement, linguistically for me, but also bio-
graphically for himself. He modifies “I am German when we win, but I am an
immigrant when we lose” by using a more general, collective level rather than a
personal one (“you” instead of “I”). Moreover, he translates the Turkish word
göcmen (immigrant) with, in German, the more pejorative word Ausländer (for-
eigner). While sitting in Ferit and Şadiye’s house in Turkey, we witness another
significant act of censure in the German integration discourse, which was
already characterised by cultural-​religious racism and xenophobic movements
like Pegida,5 and tendencies of re-​nationalisation since the failed coup d’état
in Turkey in 2016. Özil, the former role model, who won the Germany-​widely
renowned Bambi award for integration,6 postulates that his social recognition
did not extend to the economic logic of success and failure: as soon as he couldn’t
“carry” anymore, as Ferit described it for himself earlier in the interview, or for
the first generation of labour migrants from Turkey, he was portrayed as the
immigrant, who is not wanted anymore. At this very moment, in the city of
Uşak, Ferit’s biographical key narration is conflated with the public discourse
on labour migration between Germany and Turkey.
In this public discourse, migrants are often perceived in terms of an
economistic yardstick, when actors from both Turkey and Germany demand
economic as well as emotional loyalty. Ferit outlines a way out of this cross-​
border dilemma, namely by being a “good person” regardless of national,
ethnic, and religious affiliations. Money and wealth do not count at doomsday,
but actions do, Ferit continues his narration. In this way, he defined a “good
action” in a religious sense comprehension of sacrificially helping others, no
matter what they need from you. This shows that Ferit and Şadiye’s remittances
to the family members in Turkey have to be obtained not only through familial
obligations, but also through religious ones: “if someone needs money, then
you can help”, is a remittance narrative that provides a polyphonic answer
to the question of why migrants send money to their families at home. These
voices need more emphasis in the remittance discourse that is based on develop-
mental outcomes, rather than on the multifaceted and conflating characteristics
these inter-​familiar private money transfers are based on (Carling 2014, Erdal
and Borchgrevink 2017). Moreover, in this way, Ferit narratively finds a way
to articulate his experiences of being used by a patriarchal father. It is a way
of sense-​making, certifying that all his devotion was not useless. Cross-​border
transactions between migrants and the families in the places of origin can
 Beyond the meritocratic and discriminatory migration discourse 83

therefore span not just the boundaries of nation states, but also the ones of this
world and the hereafter: in the narration, sending remittances is interpreted as
a decisive act for Ferit’s fate. Being a “good person” thus functions as a practice
of sense-​making within the divergent cross-​border expectations of being an
immigrant as well as being an emigrant. Even more, when Ferit switches at the
very end of the interview from Mesut Özil’s statement to the popular German
crime series Tatort, he demonstrates how mundanely and self-​evidently cross-​
border belonging can be performed in every-​day life, illustrating a vision for
a similarly self-​evident transnational position beyond a meritocratic and dis-
criminatory migration discourse.

Notes
1 Tatort is the most famous German crime series. Among other things, the series deals
with current and relevant socio-​political issues, such as: human trafficking, urban
poverty and social conflicts. It runs every Sunday at 8:15 p.m. and as it is followed
and debated by many at the same time, Tatort can be considered as an important phe-
nomenon of the national identity construction.
2 In the transcript, underlining indicates a special vocal emphasis, dots within round
brackets a pause (..) and square brackets mark omissions […].
3 Defying predictions, remittance flows have proved to be resilient during the COVID-​
19 pandemic. In 2020, remittance flows decreased by only 2.4 percent compared
to the numbers of 2019. However, it was the first time since the financial crisis in
2007–​2008 that the annual growth was temporarily halted. For more information, see
World Bank Group 2021.
4 My dissertation is embedded in the research project “Follow the Money. Remittances
as Social Practices” (funded by the Austrian Science Funds, P 28929), which examines
the effects, functions, and meanings of remittances in the context of labour migration
between Turkey and Austria from the 1960s until today.
5 Pegida (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the Occident) is an anti-​
Islam, far-​right political movement, which argues that Germany is being increasingly
Islamised.
6 The Bambi is an annual media and television prize awarded in Germany by Hubert
Burda Media. In 2010, Mesut Özil won the award in the “Integration” category.

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7 “None of these are jokes, it’s just
my life…”
Migrant narratives and female agency in
Shazia Mirza’s comedy

Ulla Ratheiser

Introduction
This chapter offers a reading of a TV interview with British comedian
Shazia Mirza as a migrant narrative. In her comedy routines Mirza habit-
ually draws on her stage persona’s experiences as a British Muslim woman of
Pakistani background. As such, she often references restrictions imposed on
Muslim women concerning clothing or relationships with men, stereotypical
perceptions of Muslim codes of conduct, as well as her parents’ preoccupa-
tion with her being unmarried. One underlying principle to these references
is the assumption that the cultural background of her family is inherently
different to what might generally be perceived as mainstream British society.
In her public appearances, Shazia Mirza exposes these fault lines inscribed
into contemporary Muslim experiences in Western societies and exploits them
for comic effect. The following discussion of the interview aims at tracing the
strategies Mirza employs to make these fault lines visible, such as combining
testimony and stand-​up to create a hybrid narrative genre, negotiating identity
positions, and employing comedy to challenge stereotypical representations
of Muslim identities in Britain. In so doing, she also proves the potential of
migrant narratives to challenge societal discourse and notions of victimhood
therein.

Narrative –​Interview with Shazia Mirza on the Jonathan Ross Show

This interview with Shazia Mirza was recorded during her appearance on the
Jonathan Ross Show in March 2016. There are also other guests present on the
show, Australian actor Hugh Jackman and Welsh actor Taron Egerton, who
get involved in the conversation, so that the attention occasionally shifts away
from Mirza. At the same time, the interview gathers considerable speed in this
multi-​directional discussion (as marked in the transcript).

Jonathan Ross (JR): I know you as a comedian. I know of your work as a

comedian. But it wasn’t your first choice, though? You
were a teacher for some while before, weren’t you?
DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-9
This chapter has been made available under a CC-BY-NC-ND license.
 Migrant narratives and female agency in Shazia Mirza’s comedy 87

Shazia Mirza (SM): Yes, I used to be a Science teacher. They hated me and
I hated them. I taught in a lot of rough schools. I used to
teach in Tower Hamlets in Dagenham.
JR: I believe one of your pupils went on to great fame him-
self. You taught the young Dizzee Rascal?
SM: That’s right, I did. Well, I tried to.
JR: He is a lovely… –​I find him to be charming company.
He is a very energetic young man. And I can imagine his
focus wasn’t always on the front of the classroom.
SM: That’s right, he was… –​actually, he loved music. He used
to run out of my lesson and go “I’m going to the music
room!” And I had to have to always drag him out of the
music room and go: “Get out of here. Put your banjo
down, you’re coming to my lesson”. And he’d go: “I hate
you lesson! I hate your lesson!” But he just loved music,
he was never about the fame –​or the money.
JR: If you’d bump into him, would he still think of you as his
teacher, d’you think?
SM: Well, I met him a couple of years ago. I went to a
screening of a film and I was walking up the red carpet
and all I heard behind me was this voice going: “Oi,
Miss! Miss!”. And I turned round and it was him and
I said: “You don’t have to call me Miss anymore, you
know, we’re not in school, and it sounds a bit sordid”.

At this point, the conversation shifts briefly to one of the other guests on
the show. In these first moments of the interview, Shazia Mirza is framed both
as a comedian and a qualified Science teacher with maybe surprising overlaps
between those professions. At the same time, her experiences working in less-​
privileged environments adds another dimension to her professional life.

Other guest: But surely, they thought you were funny. I’m certain they must
have thought you are funny.
SM: You know, they used to say to me: “This is so boring, Miss,
you’re not funny. Go home!”.
Other guest: Really?
SM: Do you know what I did? I used them as material! So, he is in my
act now. I’m making money out of him.
JR: One of the things I know, in your comedy you talk about your
upbringing, a fairly strict Muslim upbringing. Is that correct?
SM: My parents are both Muslim, they are both very religious. My
mother, she wears the burka –​mainly because she doesn’t want
to be seen with my dad. I don’t know what the big deal is; all
the women in my family, they all wear the burka and it’s great –​
because they all use the same bus pass.
88 Ulla Ratheiser

JR: That’s a real positive.

SM: That’s a positive! You know, I did have a very strict Muslim
upbringing. I was never allowed out of the house…
JR: So seriously, it was a strict time?
SM: Yeah, I wasn’t allowed to wear make-​up, I wasn’t allowed to have
the friends that I wanted, I wasn’t allowed to have boyfriends,
I wasn’t allowed to have sex. God, if only I had known at the time!
No big deal, nobody has sex these days anyway. You lot don’t
[addressing the audience], otherwise you wouldn’t be here tonight.
I mean, it’s been such a long time now, I don’t think about it any-
more. I think the only way I’m going to get it now is, if it snows
heavily and someone slips in. Don’t feel sorry for me. I’ve got a
couple of degrees and I’ve got a lot of reading done. [addressing the
other guests at the show, Hugh Jackman and Taron Egerton] That’s
the only reason I go skiing.

While there is no interruption in the conversation here, Mirza turns her

attention away from the show host to talk to the other two guests and also
the audience. She makes fun of her students, who did not find her funny as
a teacher, while also delineating how her strict Muslim family background
impacts her life to this day.

JR: You’re from Birmingham?

SM: Yes. Obviously, I don’t live there anymore, because I’m doing well.
JR: Your parents, though, they came up from Pakistan, I believe?
SM: They came from Pakistan to Birmingham, so not much difference –​
in the 1960s.
JR: So, it must have been quite a culture shock for them when they first
arrived here?
SM: You know what, they were desperate to be British. They were so…
they really wanted to be like the British. My dad is called Mohammed,
but he abbreviates it to Bob. I’d come home and there’d be calendars
of Samantha Fox on the kitchen wall, like naked pictures of women
in haystacks, and we’d say to him: “What are you doing?” and he’d
say [in Pakistani accent]: “Well, you know, John down the road, he’s
got one of these, so I had to get one. Because that’s what all the
British men are doing, you know?” He is Welsh.
JR: You used to holiday in Wales when you were young, did you?
SM: Well, the first holiday we ever went on was in a caravan in Cardigan
Bay because my dad went [in Pakistani accent], “You know, all the
British are staying in caravans, let’s go and do it”. And we got there
and he just… –​we had to come home after four days because he didn’t
like using the toilets. He was like [in Pakistani accent], “I’m all for the
British but this is too much!” […]* And they came from Pakistan!
 Migrant narratives and female agency in Shazia Mirza’s comedy 89

Before the other guests on the show briefly start talking about their know-
ledge of Wales and the Welsh language, Shazia Mirza sketches how different
cultural experiences, such as a Pakistani family background, everyday life in
Britain, including holidays in Wales, were negotiated in her family.

JR: So, your parents, though, they must be really proud of your success
now, they must look at you and see what you have achieved.
SM: They are actually in denial. Like people stop my dad in the streets
in Birmingham and they’ll go: “You know, we saw your daughter
on TV”. And then he’ll go [in Pakistani accent], “Yes, that is right.
But she really has a degree in biochemistry. The comedy, she’ll get
over it”.
JR: But, so, what about when you met the Queen? They must have
thought this is quite a milestone.
SM: They thought [in Pakistani accent], “Finally, we are British! Our
daughter has met the Queen! We are British!” –​Sure, I met the
Queen. I met the Queen three times. Last time I met her, the reason
I went to the palace, because the Indian Prime Minister was coming
to Britain. I’m not Indian. But the Queen thought, “I know, let’s
gather up some Indians and people who look Indian and get
them to the palace.” They asked me to bring two types of ID, like
a driver’s licence or a passport. I got so nervous, I knew I wasn’t
meant to be there, I took my gas bill, just in case. This perception
that the Queen talks like this [in a Queen-​like accent], “and it’s true,
she really does talk like this”. And I was standing in line to meet her
and I put my hand out to shake her hand and she went [in a Queen-​
like accent], “And what do you do?’ And I started talking like that
as well. She went [in a Queen-​like accent], ‘And what do you do?”
and I went [in a Queen-​like accent], “I’m a comedian”. And I felt
my Birmingham accent going up three social registers. And then
she said to me [in a Queen-​like accent], “Oh, and do you do any
TV?” and I said, “Yes, I do some”, and she said [in a Queen-​like
accent], “And do people recognise you? and I thought, “Obviously
not”. And then she said [in a Queen-​like accent], “The same thing
happens to me”.
JR: What? Hang on, people don’t recognise the Queen?
SM: She went [in a Queen-​like accent], “The same thing happens to me!
Sometimes I go shooting in the country and people look at me and
go: ‘I know you’ and I think, you don’t know me, where do you
know me from?” I wanted to say, “You’re the f* Queen!”

In the retelling of an episode that visibly entertains the audience as well as

the other guests on the show, Shazia Mirza brings together not only profes-
sional success, which is acknowledged through her meeting with the Queen,
90 Ulla Ratheiser

but also how she is confronted by persistent everyday-​racisms, in this case in

the orbit of the royal household.

JR: Let me ask you about shaving off bodily hair, Shazia. Because
Shazia made a documentary series for BBC3 back when it was on
TV, before it went online. Now what was the purpose behind this,
this was kind of embrace the idea of women not having to shave,
or what?
SM: Yeah, it was called from F*** Off, I’m a Hairy Woman, and it was
basically we feel, a lot of women feel, that men are prejudiced
towards hairy women. And, I mean, I’m very hairy –​Asian women
are very hairy, my mother’s very hairy, she’s got a beard and a
moustache; she started to bleach her facial hair. I told her to stop
that now because when she gets on a lift, under the light, she looks
like Father Christmas. It was all about how to… [in reaction to the
common laughter] … this is all true. None of these are jokes, it’s
just my life…
[…]*
SM: Cause, you know, women, they do a lot of shaving, plucking, lawn-​
mowing, all this kind of thing.
JR: They used to do more than now, I think.
SM: Oh my god, yeah. Now, women have these things called Brazilian,
I don’t know if you’ve heard of them.
[…]*
SM: The thing is, young women, you are right, they have these
Brazilian, they have everything off. I mean, I went for a Brazilian,
I had the Gaza strip. Very popular on the Edgware Road. I mean,
it’s all the rage now, but I think we should go back to letting it all
grow out.
JR: You can trim, right, you don’t have to take it all off ?
[…]1
SM: Well, I grew my body hair for seven months for the documentary.
It was really weird because people really reacted in a strange way.
I’d get on the tube and I had a lot of make-​up on, but I had hairy
legs. And this woman came up to me and she said, “Listen, love,
I know what you’re going through. I totally understand, here is
my number, if you ever wanna talk”. And she thought I was going
through a sex change operation. But it’s weird how people react to
hairy women.

As becomes visible by the ellipses in this last passage, Mirza’s description

of the documentary on female body hair prompts repeated responses from the
other guests and expands the interview into a broader discussion.
 Migrant narratives and female agency in Shazia Mirza’s comedy 91

Methodological reflections –​Ways of narrating the self

This text is transcribed from a TV interview with British comedian Shazia
Mirza, whose comedy routines habitually draw on her stage persona’s
experiences as a British Muslim woman of Pakistani background. The
following discussion will be mostly based on the interview, though occasion-
ally some of Mirza’s stand-​up material will be referenced to highlight overlaps
with her comedy. Since Mirza’s narrative can be situated at an intersection of
a variety of discourses, such as gender, ethnicity, religion and other fields of
identity politics, the methods for analysing her narrative will also have to be
diverse. I will offer a reading of her text that relies on a literary perspective on
narrative genre, on cultural studies to shine a light on identity construction,
and eventually linguistics and anthropology, for the role of comedy as a means
to subvert dominant stereotypes pertaining to all discourses at work in the
narrative and Mirza’s performance.
Central to the analysis will have to be the text genre itself, in that Mirza’s
narrative is unusual for a variety of reasons: She talks about her experiences on
television, on the popular Jonathan Ross Show (ITV).2 This programme expressly
aims to entertain, rather than inform, with its blurb reading: “Employing his
infectious wit and sense of fun, [Jonathan Ross] chats to some terrific celebrity
guests and asks the questions to which everyone wants to know the answers”
(The Jonathan Ross Show 2020). In line with this proposition, the other guests
present during Mirza’s interview are Australian Hollywood star Hugh Jackman
and Welsh actor Taron Egerton, both of whom not only freely react with the
laughter Mirza’s comedy aims for, but also repeatedly display expressions of
surprise and disbelief at her open challenging of societal discourses. Curiously
enough, Jackman as well as Egerton occasionally align themselves with Mirza’s
accounts of being the “other”. Thus, Jackman would recall meeting the Queen
as a somewhat inept “Aussie”, whereas Egerton exploits his knowledge of the
seemingly outlandish language of Welsh for entertainment.3
With its focus on “celebrity” and “fun”, this show creates a narrative envir-
onment that positions Mirza at once in a framework of (relative) fame and
glamour, while also demanding a light-​hearted account of things. As a con-
sequence, the comedian chooses to create a narrative that feeds off her stand-​
up sketches as much as her lived experiences. Owing to the fact that Mirza’s
comedy routine habitually draws on her life story, as is typical for stand-​up
comedy (Keisalo 2018, p. 551), the two narrative positions –​the fictionalised
and the testimonial4 –​become inextricably entangled. Thus, Mirza can make
use of the force of testimony to shine a light on “histories of harm” (Gilmore
2017, p. 307) while employing the quality of stand-​up comedy to subvert and
question social and cultural norms (Keisalo 2018, p. 550). Eventually, it will
be futile to try and peel the two strands apart. However, a discussion of the
narrative modes employed in this particular cross-​over of genre will allow us
to assess how Mirza uses the momentum created at the intersection between
92 Ulla Ratheiser

stand-​up comedy and testimonial to challenge calcified notions of migrant

experiences.
Theoretically, the interview situation would demand responses from the
interviewee somewhere on the testimonial spectrum; with testimony under-
stood here as life-​stories of previously marginalised voices shared with an audi-
ence (Woods 2021, p. 1), rather than public accounts by people who suffered
harm (Gilmore 2017, p. 307). However, Mirza’s answers are often almost
prefabricated, actual take-​outs from her comedy routines.5 Even though stand-​
up is predicated on the exposure of the self and making the personal avail-
able for public consumption, it is a “staged performance of self-​presentation”
(Lindfors 2019, p. 276). Thus, Mirza’s answers might very well be rooted
in personal experiences as she repeatedly ascertains, but they draw on the
fictionalised performance of these experiences. The communicative framework
on the show, however, is distinctly different from a comedy performance: The
conversation includes the show host, guests and audience in contrast to stand-​
up, where the comedian is mostly alone on stage and communicates with the
audience only (Keisalo 2018, p. 551). This framing accommodates ever such
minute shifts in Mirza’s narrative, though, adding a testimonial quality to her
comic material. As a consequence, exploring these shifts, and their effect on
Mirza’s narrative, will be the starting point for my analysis of the material.
Predicated on these narrative positions, Mirza seems to be going back and
forth between what could be assumed to be Shazia Mirza, the person, and
Shazia Mirza, the stage persona. The ambiguity created by the different char-
acter positions that Mirza assumes allows for a discussion of identity construc-
tion and narrative agency as inherently unstable and very much dependent on
context, which seems to be particularly acute in migrant experiences. As Stuart
Hall (1990, p. 222) delineates:

Practices of representation always implicate the positions from which we

speak or write –​the positions of enunciation. What recent theories of enun-
ciation suggest is that, though we speak, so to say “in our own name”, of
ourselves and from our own experience, nevertheless who speaks, and the
subject who is spoken of, are never identical, never exactly in the same place.

This inherent synchronicity of all identity positions that Hall asserts is thus
further complicated in Shazia Mirza’s account given on the Jonathan Ross
Show, as she introduces at least two perspectives: The comedian forged in stage
performances and the person who has a science degree and is the daughter
of Pakistani immigrants. Each of these identity positions informs the other,
each in itself negotiated in the process of presenting. A closer look into these
subjectivities and the processes involved in their construction will aid the
decoding of the narrative position and the agency it creates.
At the same time as Mirza’s various subject positions take shape in the
interview, laying bare their inherent instability and their dependency on con-
text, she also taps into a powerful resort that has long informed diasporic and
 Migrant narratives and female agency in Shazia Mirza’s comedy 93

post-​colonial struggles: A notion of belonging that relies on the idea of a col-

lective culture with “common historical experiences and shared cultural codes
which provide us, as ‘one people’, with stable, unchanging and continuous
frames of reference and meaning” (Hall 1990, p. 223). It is this view of iden-
tity that has encouraged previously marginalised groups to make their voices
heard, as they are sharing their stories and experiences from a point of enun-
ciation that has been resonating with people across the world ever since. As
the discussion will show, Mirza also relies on this perception –​partly to pitch
“British” against “Pakistani” heritage for comic effect, partly to refute stereo-
typical notions of non-​Muslim and Muslim identities.
Eventually, in line with the narrative situation (the entertainment format)
and the shifting narrative positions (the stand-​ up comedian and second-​
generation migrant), the dominant mode of the interview is comedic. In
this hybrid narrative constellation, Mirza employs comedy to challenge
preconceptions of contemporary Muslim life in western societies, but also to
create agency for her stage persona, and herself, as a Muslim woman from a
traditional Pakistani background. In so doing, she presents herself as actively
breaking taboos (for example by stating that she does not have sex, that she is
a hairy woman and that she is making money off her former students), and
thereby avowedly refutes any sense of victimisation. Comedy is her tool to
invert existing power structures. This can be linked to the superiority theory of
humour, already formulated by Plato and Aristotle, which focuses on the super-
iority that the person making the joke assumes over the one who is ridiculed
(Weaver et al. 2016, p. 228). Given how Shazia Mirza, person and persona, is
situated in various discourses of gender, ethnicity, religion and other fields of
identity politics, shining a light on her comedic techniques can help unravel
how she challenges the multiple hierarchies she finds herself inscribed in.

Analysis –​Comedy as strategy

In that Shazia Mirza’s narrative is situated at various intersecting discourses,
cultural practices and narrative genres, a combination of the approaches
sketched above will be employed to unravel the tactics she uses and to which
effect. First, I will look at the material from a literary angle, since the genre
itself, oscillating between comedy routine and testimonial, deserves further
attention. Additionally, the identity construction taking place within the
narrative will be investigated by relating it to the process of “storying the self ”
(Finnegan 1997, p. 65) against the backdrop of who gets to present the “other”
(Hall 1997). The mode of presentation, eventually, will form the last dimen-
sion to be explored here in that the comedy Mirza employs to tackle these –​at
times highly controversial –​issues seems the be-​all and end-​all to how effect-
ively she can deconstruct stereotypical representations of Muslims and non-​
Muslims alike.
The question of which narrative genre Mirza relies on informs the entire
conversation with Jonathan Ross, leading him to tentatively try and fix her
94 Ulla Ratheiser

in a specific narrative position. Thus, when the talk show host, the audience
and the other guests are –​once again –​roaring with laughter at an answer she
has just given, Shazia Mirza claims, deadpan, that “[n]‌one of these are jokes,
it’s just my life…”, which is at once hard to contest but also hard to take at
face value. That Jonathan Ross is at least partly aiming for a conversation that
would yield some results in terms of a testimony, is palpable in his questions.
He particularly tries to find out more about Mirza’s experience of growing up
as the daughter of Muslim Pakistani immigrants. When Ross attempts to tap
into a real-​life experience informing the comedy, this is met with a joke about
a burka and a shared bus pass, which happens to be material Mirza has been
using for quite a while, for example during her performance in Stockholm in
2009 (Stockholm Live 2009). The host’s reaction to this, “So seriously, it was
a strict time?” indicates that he is well aware of the fact he has been presented
with comedy material. But even though he is trying to trigger potentially more
serious answers, Mirza only partly does his bidding.
In that she chooses to answer the interview questions at her will with
either comedy material, which also has an indexical relationship to her
off-​stage self (Lindfors 2019, p. 277), and/​or testimonial narratives, Mirza
retains control of the conversation. As powerful and central as testimony is
to contemporary life (Gilmore 2017, p. 307), its status is also a fragile one.
Even though the “I” narrative of individual experiences provides agency to
its author (Woods 2021, p. 1), it is particularly in the mediation of testimony
that damage can be done, either to the one bearing testimony or to its cause
as Woods (2021, p. 2) delineates. Paul Gready (2008 cited in Woods 2021)
ties this back to “the lack of control over representation in truth commission
or human rights reports, the court room, the media or within cultural pro-
duction”, which “can mark a return to powerlessness”. Despite the fact that
Mirza’s narrative is framed in an entertainment format, it is clearly of vital
importance to her to evade any sense of powerlessness or identification as a
victim of some sort. Thus, sidestepping a format that is habitually “exposed
to doubt as a routine feature”, especially when employed by women (Gilmore
2017, p. 307), is thus one of Mirza’s strategies to ascertain her agency. In
the process, she also questions the perceived victimhood of other Muslim
women by turning her mother’s burka, habitually seen as a sign of female
suppression, into an asset that spares the mother the supposed embarrass-
ment of being seen with her husband. The shift between the two genres often
comes within one answer, as in the following response to Ross’s question
about her strict parents:

SM: Yeah, I wasn’t allowed to wear make-​up, I wasn’t allowed to have the
friends that I wanted, I wasn’t allowed to have boyfriends, I wasn’t allowed
to have sex. God, if only I had known at the time! No big deal, nobody has
sex these days anyway. You lot don’t [addressing the audience], otherwise
you wouldn’t be here tonight. I mean, it’s been such a long time now, I don’t
think about it anymore. I think the only way I’m going to get it now is, if
 Migrant narratives and female agency in Shazia Mirza’s comedy 95

it snows heavily and someone slips in. Don’t feel sorry for me. I’ve got a
couple of degrees and I’ve got a lot of reading done.

While the opening sentence about strict rules concerning make-​up, friends
and sex appears straightforward and ties in with common representations of
Muslim women in western countries (Donohoue Clyne 2003, p. 19), the end
of the passage, which has her wondering whether she will ever experience sex,
references stand-​up material (for example Syndicado TV 2017). Thus, Mirza
makes use of the agency that testimony bestows on her, but in combining it
with the subversive form of stand-​up comedy, she acquires greater control of
the situation and the narrative. It is worth noting that in this shift between
genres, timing is crucial: the moment the audience might pity Mirza for her
restrictive upbringing, she makes fun of them and their lack of alternatives to
attending the taping of a talk show. The immediacy of communication with
the audience and the comedian’s control over the conversation, which is so typ-
ical for this type of comedy, becomes manifest (Lindfors 2019, p. 279). Both
of these prove vital in Mirza’s narrative. By resorting to her comedy material,
she can transfer this control into the interview situation and, simultaneously,
gain –​unmediated –​support for this strategy by the audience’s approving
laughter. In so doing, she capitalises on a relationship that Lindfors (2019,
p. 277) describes as a co-​authoring in stand-​up, between the audience and the
comedian, which results in “ritualized collective laughter”. In its questioning
of where to draw the line between what is private and what is public (Keisalo
2018, p. 558), stand-​up comedy seems especially suited for Mirza’s mixing of
genres. Asked about how she experiences her supposedly strict Muslim parents,
Mirza can refer to a public version of her private life, already performed in her
comedy routines, and thus maintain control.
The second dimension to explore here is the performance of identities,
which is productively complicated by the different genres at play in Mirza’s
narrative, the stage persona doing comedy and the person giving testimony.
This instability of identity in the interview situation becomes indicative of how
identities are constructed and context-​dependent in more general terms. We
encounter Shazia Mirza as failing former teacher, as a comedian, as a TV pre-
senter (for the documentary F*** Off, I’m a Hairy Woman), as Muslim woman
(“You know, I did have a very strict Muslim upbringing”), as the daughter
of Pakistani immigrants. All of these facets come into existence through
the narrative itself in that “the self [is] essentially ‘storied’ –​formulated and
experienced through self-​narratives” (Finnegan 1997, p. 69). This is why, in
Buitelaar’s (2006, p. 262) view, life-​stories are so relevant when dealing with
“intersecting identifications”. They “point to the fact that identity is created
by organizing stories about multiple identifications into continually revised
biographical narratives that form answers to the question “ ‘Who am I?’ ”
(Buitelaar 2006, p. 262).
Mirza’s story of herself exposes the contrasts that are commonly assumed
to exist between her identities –​such as stand-​up comedian, who shares the
96 Ulla Ratheiser

most private aspects of her life, and Muslim woman, who is shielded from the
public (Ratheiser 2013, p. 307). Her supposedly more provocative statements
about sex or body hair can be allocated to her comedian persona, whereas the
references to her parents’ origin, complete with Pakistani accent, ascertain her
migratory background. The different narrative voices and genres she employs
simultaneously attest to these different identity positions –​and produce them.
“Identities are therefore constituted within, not outside representation”, as
Stuart Hall (2011, p. 3) observes, they are “not ‘who we are’ or ‘where we
came from’, so much as what we might become, how we have been represented
and how that bears on how we might represent ourselves” (Hall 2011, p. 3).
In narrating her different identities, Mirza speaks them into existence, while
questioning dominant stereotypes such as the silenced, submissive Muslim
woman (Buitelaar 2006, p. 265) –​her story and her appearance on the popular
TV programme make it very clear that she is anything but.
It is particularly when Mirza talks about her family background that
she explores cultural identity as being constructed through difference (Hall
2011, p. 4). In an exchange with the talk show host about her family hailing
from Pakistan, Mirza initially observes that coming to Birmingham was
not that big a change for her parents, alluding to the city’s large population
of Middle Eastern descent. When Ross implies a possible “culture shock”
as a consequence of their exposure to “British” life –​meaning white, non-​
Muslim, western life –​Mirza takes him up on this. She claims her parents
wanted to be British –​again affirming that being British is distinctly different
from being Pakistani –​but their mode of striving for Britishness exposes the
superficiality informing these often stereotypical and reductionist cultural
representations: Her father adopting the name of Bob and hanging up porno-
graphic calendars. This at once questions stereotypical notions of certain cul-
tural practices, i.e. being British means having pictures of half-​naked women
on the wall, while affirming the different identity positions involved. In Hall’s
(2011, p. 4) words, “it is only through the relation to the Other, the relation to
what it is not, to precisely what it lacks, to what has been called its constitutive
outside that the ‘positive’ meaning of any term –​and thus its ‘identity’ –​can
be constructed”. It seems that the identity positions Mirza invokes here, her
father’s Pakistani background and his attempt at “doing being British” would
through their supposed differences first bring about both identity constructs,
their “positive” meanings. At the same time these constructs would make way
for a performance of identity, specific to Mirza’s father, which could exploit
both individual constructs to create something new and situative.
Negotiating cultural identity along these lines of difference and (the dis-
mantling of) stereotypical notions lies also at the heart of the episode Mirza
tells about meeting the Queen, which throws identity dimensions of class, geo-
graphical background and ethnicity into sharp relief. She recalls how she is
invited for a visit of the Indian Prime Minister, despite the fact that she is
not Indian, but “the Queen thought, ‘I know, let’s gather up some Indians
and people who look Indian and get them to the palace’ ”. Mirza exposes the
 Migrant narratives and female agency in Shazia Mirza’s comedy 97

racism inherent in this presumed consideration of the monarch, which she

contrasts with the pride this invitation created in her parents: “They thought
[in Pakistani accent], ‘Finally, we are British! Our daughter has met the Queen!
We are British!’ ” By combining these two perspectives of the encounter, her
parents’ and the Queen’s, Mirza at once shows how deeply preconceptions run in
Britain’s multi-​ethnic society, while also asserting that Britain is in fact a multi-​
ethnic, multicultural society: Her parents’ claim to be British, Pakistani accent
and all, is validated in her narrative. This is underscored further by how Mirza
frames her own reaction to meeting the sovereign: “And I felt my Birmingham
accent going up three social registers”, indicating that hailing from the West
Midlands is just as much part of her cultural identity as the other markers
we have hitherto discussed, such as ethnicity, religious background and class.
The regional designation also comes with a linguistic one, her Birmingham
accent as much marked by its difference to her parents’ Pakistani accent as
to the Queen’s accent or as to Received Pronunciation (RP), the “norm” pro-
nunciation aimed for particularly in educated and/​or upper-​class environments
(Britain 2017, p. 291). In explicitly referencing this, Mirza asserts her position
as “Brummie” and deliberately distances herself from RP speaking elites, thus
making her non-​Pakistani accent another performance of yet another dimen-
sion of cultural identity.
The last facet of Mirza’s performance to be discussed here is that of comedy
and which functions it fulfils in her narrative. When she answers Jonathan
Ross’s questions, she has the audience as well as the other guests and her inter-
view partner in stitches. Clearly, large sections of her narrative resonate with
her audience, inviting them to partake in the communicative act, which is a
characteristic element of stand-​up comedy as Antti Lindfors (2019, p. 277)
observes: “Even at their seemingly most personal, that is, stand-​up comics tend
to assign their everyday lives with general social resonance, drawing on their
token experiences in the name of something typical or thematizing larger-​scale
causes or injustices […]”. This specific reaction –​laughter –​is tied to the mode
of her presentation –​a genre-​mix heavy on stand-​up comedy –​which becomes
a powerful tool for “thematizing larger-​scale causes or injustices”: Stereotypes
of Muslim and non-​Muslim representations in a western context, of migrant
experiences, and also of gender norms.
Comedy has long been an effective instrument to challenge power relations
in a variety of contexts and, as a consequence, to help the comedian assume
agency. Mirza’s narrative exemplifies this in many ways. When she tells the
story about a former student of hers, who told her that she was profoundly un-​
funny and boring, she retaliates by stating: “Do you know what I did? I used
them as material! So, he is in my act now. I’m making money out of him.” In so
doing, the comedian makes use of the subversive, disruptive nature of humour,
which often consists of placing the target of their jokes in an inferior position
(Weaver et al. 2016, p. 228). Shazia Mirza employs comedy, this “public use of
power” (Keisalo 2018, p. 550), as a formidable tool to challenge the multiple
hierarchies she finds herself inscribed in.
98 Ulla Ratheiser

Her strategy to construct agency within the narrative opens up in at least

three different directions. For one, in her routines but also in the interview
quoted from above, she uses her position of –​at least temporary –​superiority
to question stereotypes concerning contemporary Muslim life in a western
context. She invites the audience to laugh with her, for example, about one
form of representation of Muslim identity that has seemingly become meto-
nymical for all Muslim existence in the west, that of the veiled woman. In
her joke about the advantages that Muslim women have by covering their
faces with a burka, because it allows them to share a bus pass (and not to be
seen with their husbands), Mirza exploits the “essentialist discourse” in which
women wearing headscarves “function as symbols of the anti-​modernity of
Islam” (Buitelaar 2006, p. 260). By turning this essentialist assumption into
a joke, she recruits her audience’s laughter in dismantling the stereotype of
Muslim women as “oppressed, powerless and victimised” (Benn and Jawad
2003, p. xiv). Thus, the joke is on everybody who adheres to this clichéd per-
ception of Muslim women, and a specific female Muslim agency is established
in the process, which challenges ethnic and gender stereotypes alike. Mirza
follows this route also in her own performance which in itself is a forceful refu-
tation of this image.
Secondly, by enacting this position of superiority as a woman, Shazia Mirza
challenges prevalent gender roles –​not only from a Muslim perspective. The
production of humour has long been considered a male prerogative, as for
example Regina Barreca (1996, p. 1) writes in her collection of women’s humour.
Publicly making fun of something or someone is an act of aggression which,
for a long time, has been considered incompatible with female behaviour in
our hierarchic system of gender relations and has thus become part of a “trad-
itional performance of masculinity”, as Kotthoff (2006, p. 14) argues. While
this expression of masculinity through comedy has been a staple in popular
cultural productions, a similar path was largely closed off for women. Stand-​
up comedy is no exception in this. It developed in the US in the first half of
the twentieth century and, despite the fact that female comedians have “never
been absent”, it has always strongly relied on male performers (Keisalo 2018,
p. 550). Even though more and more female comedians have been entering
the scene over the last decade, they are still conspicuously underrepresented
(Keisalo 2018, p. 550). Simply by being a woman in the public arena of stand-​
up comedy can thus be considered a form of transgression that challenges
perceived notions of gender, and potentially even more so in the context of
how Muslim women are often perceived, as discussed above. Mirza herself
brings this to a head in a more specific Muslim context by remarking dryly,
“the thing is that Muslim men don’t want to marry me –​because I speak.”
(Stockholm Live 2009).
Eventually, Mirza employs a strategy frequently associated with female
comedy, namely self-​deprecating humour (Colleary 2015, p. 145). This becomes
particularly palpable in the passage where she talks about her TV programme
F*** Off, I’m a Hairy Woman:
 Migrant narratives and female agency in Shazia Mirza’s comedy 99

[…] it was basically, we feel, a lot of women feel, that men are prejudiced
towards hairy women. And, I mean, I’m very hairy –​Asian women are very
hairy, my mother’s very hairy, she’s got a beard and a moustache; she started
to bleach her facial hair. I told her to stop that now because when she gets
on a lift, under the light, she looks like Father Christmas.

Already the title of Mirza’s TV show makes clear that being seen as hairy is not
necessarily in line with mainstream perceptions of female beauty. In that she
positions herself (and her mother) explicitly outside this norm, Mirza makes
fun of herself –​but eventually also challenges beauty standards and (western)
forms of representation.
This type of humour functions in two ways throughout the narrative. For
one, it allows Mirza to “appear unthreatening” (Keisalo 2018, p. 557), which
is likely one of the reasons it is a particularly productive strategy in comedy
by women, given how interdependent aggressive humour and performances
of masculinity have long been. By being “threatening as well as mitigating
the threat” through self-​deprecation (Keisalo 2018, p. 557), the comedian can
establish a relationship with the audience, who very likely will see themselves
in some of the personal stories the comedian shares. The connection with the
audience, and the shared laughter about her persona, allow Mirza to retain
control of the narrative process and the direction of the humour, while laying
bare stereotypical notions of what it means to be a woman, a Muslim, a person
of Pakistani heritage in British society.
Shazia Mirza’s multi-​layered narrative, positioned at an intersection of
discourses on gender, ethnicity, religion and other fields of identity politics in
contemporary Britain, powerfully demonstrates how vital a chorus of different
voices can be to gain deeper insights in migrant experiences. Sometimes, as
in the interview at hand, the different voices can even come from the same
person, testifying not only to the narrative agency of the speaker, but also
to the multiplicity of strategies used to question stereotypes and re-​inscribe
dominant discourses. It is by combining testimony and stand-​up to create a
hybrid narrative genre, negotiating various identity positions and, eventually,
through her use of comedy that Shazia Mirza succeeds in dismantling preva-
lent preconceptions concerning experiences of a second-​generation migrant,
Muslim woman in Britain.

Notes
1 Other people on the show comment/talk.
2 Aired on 19 March 2016.
3 The mix of guests and their interactions could also be fruitfully read at the intersec-
tion of postcolonial and gender studies.
4 This is not to say that testimonial does not also –​at least in parts –​rely on storied and
thus fictionalised accounts of experiences. As will be seen in the following discussion
the lines are often blurry.
5 See, for example, Stockholm Live 2009 or Syndicado TV 2017.
100 Ulla Ratheiser

Bibliography
Barreca, R., 1996. The Penguin book of women’s humor. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Benn, T. and Jawad, H., 2003. Preface. Muslim women in the United Kingdom and
beyond: Setting the scene. In: H. Jawad and T. Benn, eds. Muslim women in the United
Kingdom and beyond. Experiences and images. Leiden: Brill, xiii–​xxv.
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and the dialectological gaze. Social Semiotics, 27 (3), 288–​ 298. doi: 10.1080/​
10350330.2017.1301794
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Netherlands. European Journal of Women’s Studies, 13 (3), 259–​276. doi: 10.1177/​
1350506806065756
Colleary, S., 2015. Performance and identity in Irish stand-​up comedy. The comic ‘I’.
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Donohoue, Clyne, I., 2003. Muslim women: Some western fictions. In: H. Jawad and T.
Benn, eds. Muslim women in the United Kingdom and beyond. Experiences and images.
Leiden: Brill, 19–​37.
Finnegan, R., 1997. ‘Storying the self’: Personal narratives and identity. In: H. Mackay,
ed. Consumption and everyday life. London: Sage, 65–​111.
Gilmore, L., 2017. Reframing discourses. Testimony. AutoBiography Studies, 32 (2),
307–​309. doi: 10.1080/​08989575.2017.1288957
Hall, S., 1990. Cultural identity and diaspora. In: J. Rutherford, ed. Identity: Community,
culture, difference. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 222–​237.
Hall, S., 1997. The spectacle of the ‘other’. In: S. Hall. ed. Representation: Cultural
representations and signifying practices. London: Sage, 225–​285.
Hall, S., 2011. Introduction. Who needs identity? In: S. Hall and P. du Gay, eds.
Questions of cultural identity. London: Sage, 1–​17.
Keisalo, M., 2018. The invention of gender in stand-​up comedy: transgression and
digression. Social Anthropology/​Anthropologie Sociale, 26 (4), 550–​563. doi: 10.1111/​
1469-​8676.12515
Kotthoff, H., 2006. Gender and humor: The state of the art. Journal of Pragmatics, 38,
4–​25. doi: 10.1016/​j.pragma.2005.06.003
Lindfors, A., 2019. Cultivating participation and the varieties of reflexivity in stand-​
up comedy. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 29 (3), 276–​ 293. doi: 10.1111/​
jola.12223
Ratheiser, U., 2013. Lifting the veil by donning hijab? Muslim counter-​discourse in con-
temporary British culture. In: T. Heimerdinger, E. Kistler and E. Hochhauser, eds.
Gegenkultur. Würzburg: Königshausen und Neumann, 299–​310.
Stockholm Live, 2009. Stockholm Live –​Shazia Mirza (S1E6) [online]. Available
from: www.yout​ube.com/​watch?v=​TGEY​8cZu​GF4 [Accessed 10 December 2020].
Syndicado TV, 2017. Shazia Mirza –​Winnipeg Comedy Festival [online]. Available
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2020].
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show/​2a1​166 [Accessed 19 November 2019].
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Weaver, S., Mora, R. A. and Morgan, K., 2016. Gender and humour: examining
discourses of hegemony and resistance. Social Semiotics, 26 (3), 227–​233. doi: 10.1080/​
10350330.2015.1134820
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14484528.2021.1873718
Part III

Silences and voids in

gendered narratives
What can and cannot be told
Anton Jakob Escher

“Storytelling is a frequent and essential form of human communication”

(Donahue and Green 2016, p. 208), because stories are a way of expressing and
constructing a self with its dimensions like identity, gender and sexuality. This
process is mostly fragmentary and broken, with interruptions and silences. In
this section, we draw attention to the silences and voids in gendered narratives.
What do the narratives tell us about migration discourse? What is utterable,
and what is not, and which hierarchies and power constellations are expressed
by voids?
Empirical research by Grysman et al. (2016, p. 856) has shown, “that females
expressed more affect, connection, and factual elaboration than males across
all narratives, and that feminine typicality predicted increased connectedness
in narratives. Masculine typicality predicted higher agency, lower connected-
ness, and lower affect, but only for some narratives and not others”. Another
gender-​related component is added to a narrative when it takes the form
of an autobiography. Grysman et al. (2016, p. 856) concisely circumscribes
this phenomenon: “These findings support an approach that views autobio-
graphical reminiscing as a feminine-​typed activity and that identifies gender
differences as being linked to categorical gender, but also to one’s feminine
gender typicality, whereas the influences of masculine gender typicality were
more context-​dependent”.
Furthermore, the following context should be considered when ana-
lysing narratives: “Narratives are made up of multiple, intersecting, overlap-
ping stories, some which are told, others are suppressed, or deliberately not
expressed” (Porter 2016, p. 48). This means that a story can never be told or
reproduced fully, comprehensively, or completely, which can be understood in
many ways. The missing passages might be interpreted as deliberate silences
or accidental blanks. Regarding the meaning of silence, a distinction must be
made between different causes and reasons. The significance of silence can be
related to “the silence of repression or shame, self-​chosen silence to retain one’s
sense of self-​respect, silence as a communal strategy of survival, and silence

DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-10
104 Anton Jakob Escher

as a reflective, deliberate act of agency” (Porter 2016, p. 48). Furthermore,

the categorical connection between the narrator and the listener, in this case
the researcher, must be taken into account for several reasons. First and fore-
most, it is a matter of understanding the narrated, as Baldini (2019, p. 144)
emphasises: “Being capable of listening not only means hearing the words that
are said, but actively participating in the understanding of the needs and goals
of the person you are speaking with”.
Additional aspects to be discussed are the social context and the political
setting of the narrative because they structure the narrative; it is the subject of
the narrative which provides the narrative with specific locations: “Reflecting
on the act of narrating while excluding that of listening limits our ability to
define the links between the personal story and how society functions overall”
(Baldini 2019, p. 144). This reflection should accompany the reproduction and
retelling of a story by the researcher, who interprets, enriches, or abbreviates
what has been told. In doing so, this produces further blanks, as the researcher
must package the story in a scholarly format suitable for a lecture or publica-
tion. This results in the birth of another, a new story. A story that the researcher
has methodically written and published in their own name.
The three chosen examples of the stories in this section are highly determined
by gender-​issues. They are a man-​to-​man story, a woman’s story and a letter
reconstruction story. The stories differ in their methodological approach and
also in relation to empirical variations. The story of “The Syrian taxi driver”
focuses on a long-​term friendship that developed through storytelling between
Anton Escher (4.1) and his taxi driver in Syria. The extracts presented from
Abu Khalil’s life story are compiled based on long interview sessions with the
author, as well as storytelling over the years while driving in the taxi, and,
spending leisurely time together in the free slots during Anton Escher’s field-
work. Abu Khalil, in this narrative, is a male migrant worker and entrepreneur
and somewhat of a larrikin. The life story that unfolds here is discussed as a
mélange of what Abu Khalil might have wanted to be re-​told, and, what the
author felt could be re-​told in accordance with the value systems that underly
these choices. What is presented is the result of successful editing that never-
theless presents, at its core, a compelling story that rings “true”.
The story of Maja (4.2) deals with a woman who grew up in the former
Yugoslavia and, as war broke out in 1992, was forced to flee with her family
to seek refuge in Sweden. Her story underlines the striking contrast between
life during her youth before the war, the horrors that followed with the nation-
alist fervour and military conflict, and the challenges of rebuilding life in a
new country. Here, the complexity of the analysis goes far beyond a binary
approach (Banwell 2010). Speaking of the harrowing experience of war and
loss, her story is interspersed with gaps and silences which gradually lets the
listener understand that there is an underlying, much more terrifying story not
being told. Marita Eastmond also highlights the different meanings of silence
in the story by representing both “the unspeakable” and “the unspoken”, and
 Silences and voids in gendered narratives 105

discussing the implications for analysis led by the following question: Can we
gain a deeper understanding beyond the spoken words?
Angela McCarty (4.3) uses extracts from the personal letters of James
Taylor, the “father of the Ceylon tea enterprise”, to explore issues of colonial
violence, perceptions of the “Other”, and emotions. Despite his achievements,
Taylor died in disgrace in May 1892. He had been dismissed by his employers,
allegedly for “apathy”, a claim his fellow planters disputed. Some friends testi-
fied that Taylor died of a broken heart, bereft at the thought of having to leave
his adopted land. The story of James Taylor portrays a migrant torn between
his Scottish homeland and his Ceylonese everyday life, as evidenced, not only
by the division of his legacy. Upon his death, funds were left to the mother of
his children in Ceylon as well as to relatives in Scotland.
Ultimately, as the examples show, anything can be pronounced, but whether
or not experiences and facts are spoken or unspoken depends on the frame-
work conditions, the audience or addressees and the media. Above all, possible
effects on hierarchies and power constellations in everyday life determine the
content and voids. The transformations of a narrative with all its silences and
voids, including the linguistic translations, point to the problem of authen-
ticity. The question of the extent to which a narrative is the intention of its
narrator must be left to the reader. The migrant discourse tells us about places
around the world, where to meet heroes, victims, survivors, and broken hearts.
It tells us about a life full of problems, a life full of dynamics and a life of lights
and shadows –​while the shadows often remain in the dark.

Bibliography
Baldini, S. B., 2019. Narrative capability: self-​ recognition and mutual recognition
in refugees’ storytelling. Journal of Information Policy, 9, 132–​147. doi: 10.5325/​
jinfopoli.9.2019.0132
Banwell, S., 2010. Gendered narratives: women’s subjective accounts of their use of
violence and alternative aggression(s) within their marital relationships. Feminist
Criminology, 5 (2), 116–​134. doi: 10.1177/​1557085110366223
Donahue, J. K. and Green, M. C., 2016. A good story: men’s storytelling ability
affects their attractiveness and perceived status. Personal Relationships, 23, 199–​213.
doi: 10.1111/​pere.12120
Grysman, A., et al., 2016. The influence of gender and gender typicality on autobio-
graphical memory across event types and age groups. Memory & Cognition, 44, 856–​
868. doi: 10.3758/​s13421-​016-​0610-​2
Källström, J., Peterson, E., and Wallenberg, R., 2017. Gendered storytelling –​A norma-
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telling [online]. Thesis (Degree of Bachelor). Jönköping University. International
Business School. Available from: www.diva-​por​tal.org/​smash/​get/​diva2:1105​969/​
FUL​LTEX​T01.pdf [Accessed 30 June 2021].
Porter, E., 2016. Gendered narratives: stories and silences in transitional justice. Human
Rights Review, 17, 35–​50. doi: 10.1007/​s12142-​015-​0389-​8
8 The Syrian taxi driver
Migrant narratives or narratives of a
researcher?

Anton Jakob Escher

Narrative –​The Syrian taxi driver

Later, Dr Anton Escher came; he wanted to do a study on the develop-
ment of the mountainous regions of Gabal Arab and Gabal Lattiyye and
Qalamon and needed a possible means of transportation. He needed a taxi
to go anywhere he wanted, someone to show him the country and to explain
everything. First, Abu Ibrahim came to me and asked me: ‘What do you
think, if Dr Anton Escher comes to Syria? He wants to do a study; will you
accompany him? Do you have time to travel with him?’. I told him that ‘of
course I have time. He can come whenever he wants. I’m here and avail-
able’. Then he gave me the specific date that Dr Anton Escher was coming
to Syria. He told me that he would come that day and call me, and then he
really did call me, and we met together at the Orient Hotel in Damascus.
I went to see him first, then I drove him to Gabal Arab. Yes, we went to
Gabal Arab first.

This first trip in 1986, if I remember right, was the beginning of a collabor-
ation that lasted many years with countless journeys through Syria and many
week-​long stays in a Syrian village. A close friendship evolved over the decades
from this cooperation, and I became an “associated” member of Abu Khalil’s
family. The relationship between me and Abu Khalil can be best characterised
with his following statement: “You pay me for my services as a driver, and I need
the money to support my family, but if I didn’t like you, I wouldn’t work for you”.
“My name is P. H., but people call me Abu Khalil”.
“I was born in 1941 in Malula. I am now 52 years old”. With these words,
Abu Khalil starts to tell me, the geographer from Germany, the story of his
life and anecdotes from his life. He tells his story in his family’s home, which is
located in the centre of the village, Malula, below the Church of St. Lavandius.
The house was built in front of a cave in the cliff and financed through his
income as a migrant worker in Saudi Arabia. Previously the cave was used as
a living space and is now used as a larder. Abu Khalil continues, talking about
his school days in Malula:

DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-11
108 Anton Jakob Escher

I studied with the nuns for three years in the monastery in Malula, because
there was no state school at that time. When the state school was founded in
Malula, I went to that school for a year. Then I stopped, because I did not
have the money to buy books for the school. Books cost two to three Syrian
lira a year.

Then he explains the living and work conditions in the village, when he was
a boy. He talks in detail about irrigation and farming below the village, where
the families owned fields and raised vegetables, potatoes, wheat, lentils, barley
and maize. There were also shrubs and trees, especially pomegranates, mul-
berries, apricots and poplars growing along the edges of the fields. In areas
without irrigation, sumac, grapes and figs were grown. With the exception of
sumac, sold as a tanning agent in the cities of Homs, Damascus and Aleppo,
all other products were used for self-​sufficiency. The grapes were used for
raisins, grape paste, wine and aniseed liqueur for household use. The villagers
also raised chickens, sheep and goats to ensure their self-​sufficiency. That
being said the families could not live on the income earned from agriculture
due to the unreliable and meagre rainfall and owning only small arable plots
with irrigation. If the physical existence of the family is threatened, however,
a member has to migrate in order to ensure the survival of the family by
working outside of the village. In this context, Abu Khalil explains that his
father could not leave the village: “My father could not leave his property in
Malula, he wanted to work in the Bustan (garden). He wanted to take care of
what he owned in Malula. We cannot leave our soil, our home, and our village!
That would not work”.
With the increasing problems in taking care of his own family, there was
rising social pressure personally for him to work outside of the village. There
was simply a need for a family member to look for work outside of the village.
Searching for work to ensure the family’s survival is the only reason accepted
by the village community to leave the village temporarily, and it goes without
saying that anyone born in the village is a potential migrant but will return to
the village. Abu Khalil continues: “One migrates and the others stay. The one
who does migrate helps the others who have stayed here; then everybody is able
to live their own way. Both have money and get along, that’s life”. He himself is
torn between existence in the village and living and working in the surrounding
countries. For P. H. the village remains the focal point, a cornerstone and point
of reference throughout his life.

The Damascus experience

One day, P. H. went to Damascus without telling his father and his mother
because it was forbidden for him to leave the village. He tricked his mother
into giving him fresh clothes and took the daily bus to Damascus. On the bus,
he looked for a place to hide, so that he would not get thrown off the bus
by the driver. He reached Damascus for the first time. At that time, he was
 The Syrian taxi driver 109

12 years old. In Damascus, he looked for his “brother”, who is not his bio-
logical sibling but a close acquaintance from the village, a man who would give
him the opportunity to work in a bakery. During that time, it was typical for
inhabitants of Malula to work as bakers when outside the village, especially in
Damascus and Beirut. Abu Khalil explained:

And I stayed with my brother at the bakery, and the next day, the owner
of the bakery came in the morning and he saw me. He asked me, do you
want to work here? I told him, yes. Moreover, I worked with him but here
it is necessary to say: All people who work in the bakery, have no room or
apartment. They usually work in the bakery in the morning and stay in
the bakery after work. They use a wooden board or sacks of flour to make
themselves a place to stay. And that is how I worked in this bakery, while
staying there as well.

The expression “working in the bakery” refers to the special building design of
bakeries, comparable to “being in a cave”. Working as a baker in Damascus is
very hard work because it is extremely hot and working hours are all day long.
Abu Khalil worked, lived and slept in the bakery, as this was the usual way for
migrant workers from Malula when working outside of their village. Everyday
life from six in the morning to six in the evening takes place solely in the bakery.
“Every day is like any other day”, Abu Khalil reported, “because you always
have the same routine at the oven”. Everyday life in Damascus was regulated by
norms and monitored as a result of the numerous relatives and acquaintances
from the village there. Bakers from the village occasionally visited their fam-
ilies in the village. However, in those days the trip from Damascus to Malula
was not as easy as it is today.

The Lebanon experience

“Years later, I worked this way in Lebanon for five, six years, until I turned twenty
years old. And of course, I came to Malula for a week or two every year; some-
times, I came twice a year to visit my parents in Malula. I gave them money and
brought them gifts, many things”. Abu Khalil describes his time in Beirut ini-
tially as a success story:

In Beirut, there were many bakeries of people from Malula. I made

arrangements with them, that I would sell them yeast and they agreed.
I bought an Italian motorbike and used it to distribute the yeast to the
bakery every day. Later, I expanded my business. I bought a car and sold
other things besides yeast, products that all bakers need, such as salt, sugar,
thyme, olive oil, plastic bags, sacks, paper, wrapping paper, etc. Everything
that bakers require. One baker told me that he needed a canister of oil, a
different one needed two kilograms of thyme, another needed half a box
of yeast, something else and salt, etc. If I did not have the things with me,
110 Anton Jakob Escher

they would order them, and the next day I would bring those things that the
bakers wanted from me.

Working as a merchant, even at the beginning of the Lebanese civil war,

brought Abu Khalil prosperity.
His life was to take on a new dimension in Lebanon though, as his mother
insisted on him marrying:

My mother wanted me to get married to Helene. Helene is the daughter

of her sister; this means, she is the daughter of my aunt. My mother told
me that Helene suits me well. She is a pretty girl. She is good, and she is
obedient. And I would like you to get engaged to her and then marry her.

Abu Khalil could not and would not contradict his mother, so he initially
agreed to the engagement: “I told my mother, OK. I bought two engagement
rings, and we made the engagement. And then I went back to Beirut, and Helene
worked in a sock factory in Damascus. So, she stayed in Damascus, and I was in
Beirut”. Abu Khalil’s further remarks show that he had no intention whatso-
ever of marrying his fiancée:

In the meantime, many people from Malula have come to Beirut and have
told Helene that her fiancée no longer wanted her, saying: ‘He does not have
an engagement ring on his hand and yet you still wear your engagement
ring. Why are you loyal to him when he does not want you?’. Practically,
I never wore the engagement ring on my finger. When we got engaged, I had
the engagement ring, and after one hour, I took it off because of work.
I told Helene that I drink a lot of araq, that I’m an alcoholic, play card
games, like women and have no money. Do you want to marry me the way
I am? She said: ‘Yes’. She said even if we only eat onions or just olives, it is
OK. I want to marry you.

Since he was not able to get his fiancée to break the engagement, he married
his cousin in spite of his reluctance and had four sons and three daughters with
her. In retrospect, the marriage was good; they were happy and satisfied, since
he was able to provide well for his family:

That way, my business was doing pretty well, and I made good money
too. Thank god, everything went very well. I was happy, my family was
happy. After work, I took my family, my wife and children to the sea
almost every day. We sat on the beach by the sea, talked, and often went
to the sea or the mountain. By tying a rope to a tree branch, I made
swings for the children under the trees. We cooked, made food and ate
there on the top of the mountain. We stayed for three, four or five hours,
and then we went back home. Our life was actually pretty good, and we
were happy, thank God.
 The Syrian taxi driver 111

On the other hand, Abu Khalil continued to yield to the “sweet temptations”
of life in Beirut, which he had enjoyed extensively prior to his marriage:

Maybe you have heard of this casino, it is called ‘Casino du Liban’. Maybe
there is no other casino like it in the Middle East, it’s quite famous. We
spent almost every night at this casino, playing roulette or blackjack. Some
days I won, some days I lost. In other words, you win sometimes and you
lose sometimes. The days after I won, I would go to the sea or the beach or
the cabaret, and by cabaret, I mean nightclub. And I lived a millionaire’s
life, enjoying luxury things just like a millionaire. Why? Because even
when I worked hard, I did not earn 2,000 liras in a whole month, but when
I won, I had 2,000 liras in one night. Only one night! That meant so much,
then I could go to a nightclub at night, leading a life of luxury. In addition,
there were many nightclubs in Lebanon, a lot of cabarets. For instance, there
were many dancers like belly dancers from Egypt. There were also many
artists, artists from Greece, Syria, Lebanon and other countries. There were
many things to do.

A life-​changing experience occurred in Beirut, changing the life of Abu

Khalil once more. At the end of the 1970s, in the beginning of the Lebanese
Civil War from 1975 until 1990, while he was working as a flour dealer, he
always had to cross lines of demarcation in order to bring supplies to bakeries
located in the different quarters of war militias. This was not a problem for him
as a Syrian who was not involved with the different war factions. However, one
day, he forgot to take his passport and his papers with him, and a war gang
captured him. They told him that they were going to kill him:

They came to me and told me that they were taking me to the boss. They
brought me to a room where the boss was sitting behind a table; I could not
see him, because I was blindfolded. They brought me a chair and told me to
sit down. I sat. The leader asked me, where are you from? I answered him,
from Syria, from Malula.

Abu Khalil told me this experience in a very nuanced way because he had the
feeling that he would be murdered in the next few seconds. He felt threatened
to death. Then the situation changed completely. The leader of the war gang
told him: “Hey, I know you and you are the person who has a bakery.” In add-
ition, whether true or not, the leader of the war gang continued to explain that
one time he was at Abu Khalil’s bakery and noticed that he had forgotten his
wallet when he had to pay for the bread and the things wanted. He added that
Abu Khalil said to him: “No problem, you can pay next time”. The leader then
continued: “You are a good guy; I will have a cup of coffee with you and it’s all
over”. From one second to the next, Abu Khalil went from worrying about
whether he would leave alive or not, to becoming a casual acquaintance with
his possible killer. This event was a very important experience for his future.
112 Anton Jakob Escher

From that moment on, he became a person who was always spending money.
After this traumatic experience, Abu Khalil and his family left Lebanon for-
ever; he only returned to Beirut occasionally for brief visits to see relatives and
friends, but no more for working.

The Saudi Arabia experience

At that time, Saudi Arabia was an El Dorado for migrant workers. It was not
a problem for Christians from Syrian villages to live and work there for a given
period. With a referral from a friend, Abu Khalil left for Saudi Arabia together
with his oldest son Khalil to work there as a baker:

We worked in a village, in a small village. And ‘Thank God’ we started

working and our business was going well. We earned very well; everything
went very well. We worked for five to six months, then my son Khalil said
to me: ‘Father, we should return to Malula now to at least visit my siblings
and mother and see my friends’. I also thought about the kids. So, I told
him: ‘OK’. We drove to Malula and visited for two to three months. We
brought with us about 50,000 to 60,000 Syrian liras, which we managed
to spend in two to three months. Since so many friends and villagers here
who knew us came to welcome and see us, we spent all of the money we
made. As a result, we returned to Saudi Arabia and went back to work, we
started back at zero. Yes, after all, we worked and made some money. We
saved a bit of the money, which we put into this house to keep it in shape.
We renovated it, rebuilding clay with iron, cement, sand and stone, and we
added the upper room, but this room was not yet there then.

An incident occurred in Saudi Arabia, which would further change and

darken Abu Khalil’s life:

My son Khalil took my car once; I had a car in Saudi Arabia. He drove the
car far away from where we lived, about 200 kilometres away, and then he
wanted to turn back. The car stopped in the desert, in the sand. The car
could not go any further. Khalil got out of the car and looked for someone
to help him. He did not find anyone. Therefore, he walked to the next village,
which meant that he had to walk about 5 km away from the car on foot.
While walking, he met Egyptian migrant workers. He told them that his car
was stuck in the sand and that he needed their help to get the car out of the
sand. They told him, ‘OK’. However, they would not help him. Instead, they
took him to the police station. The police asked him for his passport and resi-
dence permit. He had nothing though. He told them about what happened
with the car and so on. They searched for the car and could not find it. It was
dark and Khalil could not tell them where the car was. They then thought
that he was lying and maybe they beat him, they wanted to know the truth.
They thought that he might be lying, they hit him and hit him.
 The Syrian taxi driver 113

The experience traumatised his son Khalil for the rest of his life. After this inci-
dent, Abu Khalil quit working abroad.

The experience back home

Back in Malula, I bought a microbus and worked the route from Malula
to Damascus. I worked for about a year doing this, and then I realized that
it did not bring any benefit. After a year and a half, I sold the microbus,
bought a taxi, and worked as a taxi driver in Damascus. Driving a taxi was
much better than driving the microbus, because when you work as a taxi
driver, you have at most one, two, or three people as passengers and you
can communicate with people very easily. Yes, you can make a living from
working as a taxi driver, you can’t save or earn a lot of money, but you can
live off it.

The money that was earned daily was only partially enough to feed the family.
His son Khalil started to work again as a day labourer in the village in order
to contribute to the family’s income. He ploughed the fields of other villagers
who did not want to give up their lands but were busy working in Damascus.
Two of his daughters were married at that time, one daughter worked as cham-
bermaid in the village hotel, one son served in the military, another son was in
the process of becoming a monk and the youngest son was still at home. Abu
Khalil was also happy to take on additional jobs, like helping out in a bakery in
Damascus, or driving a borrowed bus to take school kids on excursions. Hence,
the taxi driver was interested whenever there was a new task.

Epilogue

On 28 August 2002, I, the narrator of these fragments of Abu Khalil’s or

our story, received an e-​mail in French: “Hey, Tony, how are you doing? It’s
been a long time since we have heard anything from you. Everyone here says
hello to you. Dear Tony, I wanted you to know that your friend Abu Khalil died
yesterday from a heart attack. I hope to see you in Malula again… See you
soon. M.B.”.

Methodological reflections –​A male friendship and a migrant’s life story

As long as I knew Abu Khalil, I have never selected Abu Khalil, the taxi
driver (but also the baker, the bus driver, my friend, my companion and my
older “brother”) as a subject for research. The scientific-​methodological con-
struction of the fragmented story of Abu Khalil told here relates to our pre-
ceding relationship in the period from 1986 to 1993. My everyday knowledge
of Abu Khalil’s views and attempts were completed by methodical interviews
and structured narratives, which I recorded on tape at his request during the
years 1991 and 1993. These recordings form the core of my narrative about
114 Anton Jakob Escher

the Syrian taxi driver Abu Khalil. Needless to say, I already knew all the
recorded stories and remarks before recording the discussions from our time
together. It is important to point out that the story of the Syrian taxi driver
Abu Khalil emerges from an initially unplanned methodical procedure, i.e.,
our common experiences in Syria, later told by himself and recorded by
myself.
In 1986, I started my empirical work as a research assistant at the Institute
of Geography of Friedrich-​Alexander-​University of Erlangen-​Nürnberg with
a study on the social and economic development in the mountain regions of
Syria, later published in book and article form (Escher 1990, 1991, 1993). In
the 1980s, it was not possible to rent a car in the Arab Republic of Syria. That
said, I was dependent on an individual means of transport to get to know the
country and its people from a geographic perspective. As a result, I was looking
for a reliable taxi driver. In Damascus, I met the taxi driver Abu Khalil from
the Syrian village of Malula (Escher and Pfaffenbach 2002). His services were
recommended to me by my friend Prof. Werner Arnold, who had been living
in Malula, located to the north of Damascus, with his family for several years
to study the Aramaic language (Arnold 2006). Each year, from 1986 to 1991,
I spent almost five months together with Abu Khalil (from March to October).
In the first year we travelled all over the state of Syria, and from 1988 onwards
we chose to stay in my field-​working areas, which were: (1) in the coastal moun-
tains Gabal Lattiyye between Lebanon in the south and Turkey in the north;
(2) in the Qalamon, the mountains north of Damascus, and, (3) in the Gabal
Arab, the mountains of the Druze in the south of Syria. During these travels,
we rented rooms in cheap hotels or stayed in private “furnished rooms”, espe-
cially in the coastal mountains that are mainly offered to tourists from urban
areas during summer. Within the framework of my scientific studies, we kept
visiting countless settlements, to talk to village leaders and numerous other
people (farmers, nomads, migrants, innkeepers, etc.) in every single village in
these three mountain areas. After those weekly stays, we returned to Malula so
that I could evaluate the data we had collected and meet official appointments
in Damascus. For Abu Khalil it was important to see his family again. In add-
ition, festivities and picnics were held with relatives and friends, not only on
religious occasions.
Our first journeys, and, especially sharing a room for overnight stays was
stressful for me, in multiple ways. In many respects we had opposing habits
and different everyday techniques. However, in the course of time, we began to
bond through countless conversations held in rudimentary Damascene Arabic
dialect. Abu Khalil’s long experience as a migrant worker in Lebanon had
familiarised him to deal with “foreigners”. From stay to stay, our relationship
became closer, my spoken Arabic got better, and our conversations more pri-
vate. In the evenings, after dinner, while drinking “araq” and smoking water
pipes, we played chess and talked about the problems of the world. After the
observations and interviews, we told each other the problems of our everyday
lives, the stories we had experienced, our inexplicable dreams and unsatisfied
 The Syrian taxi driver 115

needs. We talked about our families, our wishes for the future, our worries
about our children, the adventures we had, the women we had lost and many
inexpressible experiences. During these conversations, which lasted hours and
hours, we discussed and talked about everything, every possible and imagin-
able topic, ranging, e.g., from politics, faith and work to everyday life. That
even included our most personal experiences, regardless of their quality, merit
and righteousness. During my stays in Syria, I wrote down countless everyday
conversations and talks.
Over time, I had become a de facto member of the P. H. family in Malula
and all the inhabitants of the village who knew me, simply called me Tony
H. I stayed in the family home and took part in the everyday life of the
family. That offered me an opportunity to advance my knowledge of everyday
Arabic. This time with the family had the effect of a secondary socialisation,
a Christian Syrian socialisation. Initially, being part of the family was very
exciting for me, but it became increasingly difficult and depressing, as all the
rules and restrictions, as well as, all the tasks and duties, started to weigh on me
more and more. These tasks and duties involved almost all elements of daily
life. This included, above all, the financing of everyday life. When paying Abu
Khalil, I initially orientated myself on the hourly wage in Syria and on the daily
rates of taxi drivers in Damascus. Later, after one or two years, when I moved
into Abu Khalil’s house in the middle of Malula and had my own room there,
we no longer talked about money. I always gave him the money I had with
me, or as much as he asked for. I don’t remember that we ever had arguments
about money. For Abu Khalil, it was important to have money at his disposal,
but not to save cash or keep capital in any other form. Still, I always took over
all the costs of festivities and celebrations without being asked, because I had
learned that in a family the person who has money always pays. And that was
mostly me! Although I paid for the trips, it was Abu Khalil who, as the driver
of the car, had the power over the car. He usually carried out my instructions
and requests, sometimes taking roads that were impassable, or driving for more
than twelve hours to reach certain destinations. In return, however, when he
wanted to show me that he too had interests, we would visit one of his friends,
although this had nothing to do with my work or my desired specifications.
I had quickly learned that I had to accept these “private excursions” so that
we could have a good interaction, and he could accept my specifications and
requests in connection to my work. By then, I had realised that his excursions
created the balance of power between us.
The experiences during our trips together through the Syrian landscapes in
the taxi, a Peugeot 504, with passengers, as well as with German geography
students in a bus, or while taking a “hop-​hop” (as the large buses were collo-
quially referred to due to their special non-​existent suspension system) brought
us closer together. How Abu Khalil behaved and acted during events, festiv-
ities and celebrations in his village and in Damascus, as well as in many other
locations in Syria with relatives, friends, acquaintances and strangers provided
insight into different aspects of his personality.
116 Anton Jakob Escher

Moreover, information, rumours and images, as well as statements about

Abu Khalil, conversations and discussions with relatives, friends, family
members and acquaintances of Abu Khalil contributed to my image of
him. The migrant Abu Khalil was well known by all public figures as well as
village inhabitants and return migrants. There was also a lot of talk about his
experiences and escapades in Lebanon. This could be attributed to his work as
a microbus driver commuting between Malula and Damascus, as well as his
previous employment as a taxi driver in Damascus. In addition to that, there
were numerous emigrants, or visitors from Damascus returning to their annual
summer retreat who told me stories about Abu Khalil.
After many years, Abu Khalil asked me to record the story of his life,
which took him from Malula to Damascus, Lebanon and Saudi Arabia. To
be precise, Abu Khalil asked me to record and publish his story, just like
the linguist Prof. Arnold did with the stories he recorded for his research
on the Aramaic language. Based on this knowledge, it was the wish of Abu
Khalil who had already told fairy tales on tape for the linguistic analysis
of my friend and colleague (Arnold 1991a, 1991b, Arnold 1994, Arnold
et al. 2004), to have his life story also recorded. As I was already familiar
with the stories, I easily could ask for more details and get him to expand
on aspects with other stories. Stories from Abu Khalil were recorded in his
home, in the narrator’s room in 1991 and 1993. The multiple hour-​long
storytelling, which was conducted in Syrian Arabic, were translated by
Prof. Xaver Yussef into German on tape, transcribed and then translated
freely into English. These tape recordings form the basis of my narration
“The Syrian Taxi Driver”.

Analysis –​A geographic life story of a migrant hero?

The narrative, a biographic migrant’s story

The narrative deals with the apparently unique life story of a simple man
whose entire life took place between his birthplace, the family’s village, and
his places of work in Damascus/​Syria, Beirut/​Lebanon and a village in Saudi
Arabia. P. H. called Abu Khalil, in this narrative, is a male migrant worker and
entrepreneur and somewhat of a larrakin. Abu Khalil was a villager, traveller,
migrant, visitor, re-​migrant and so much more, but he was the taxi driver and
the friend of the narrator of his story, a German researcher in Syria.
Landmarks, directions and turning points in the presented biography are
stories that include both positive and negative experiences and events that
ultimately shaped the migrant’s life and became points of reference for who he
was. The retold experiences of his migration and mobility provide the reader
with insights into the needs for self-​actualisation, the varying social constraints,
as well as the expectations prevailing in different areas or regions. The story
suggests some biographical frictions, sacrifices, compromises, tragic events and
disappointments for Abu Khalil like his childhood, his marriage, the gambling,
 The Syrian taxi driver 117

the double life as bachelor and husband, and the tragic end of his time in Saudi
Arabia including the torture of his son.
Although the story of the taxi driver is formulated as a homogeneous text,
it only consists of individual clusters with breaks and contradictions. It is ques-
tionable, however, whether the reproduction of these stories is “authentic” or,
to be more precise, a narrative of the academic researcher who appears in the
taxi driver’s stories. The re-​narrated life story must be discussed as a mélange
of what Abu Khalil might have wanted to be re-​told, what the author felt could
be re-​told, and what value systems are underlying these choices. For these
reasons, it needs to be clarified to what extent the gender-​specific narrative of
man-​to-​man shapes the narrative. Furthermore, the interests of the storyteller
P. H. and the scientific post-​narrator Anton Escher, who shape the narrative in
their respective functions is examined.

Gendered storytelling

Firstly, it is important to highlight the importance and role of a male-​to-​male

gendered way of telling this migrant story. The story is told between men.
From numerous analyses of such narratives, it is known that a male audience
creates a story that includes a character that is distinctly portrayed as a hero,
information is mostly told clearly and directly, there is a clear identification
of the mission, and the status of the characters are emphasised (Källström
et al. 2017). What can be deduced from this is that biographical migration
narratives can preferably be interpreted as a hero’s journey (Campbell 2008).
This perspective makes almost all narrated sequences appear as adventures
with heroic winners. In addition, normative social border crossings are woven
into all adventures. Emotional components and aesthetic finishes are usually
neglected. Most of the experiences are passed with appropriate bruises and the
storyteller emerges stronger from the difficulties. All the aspects mentioned are
found in the fragments of the story “The Syrian Taxi Driver”.

What the storyteller Abu Khalil wanted to be remembered

What choices might Abu Khalil have made when he told his stories to his
German professor friend? He had an interest in presenting his biography in a
certain way to leave it for posterity. The individual narrative sequences always
consisted of experiences in particular places. In this way, he had predetermined
the structure of the narrative. Abu Khalil presented himself as a kind of man
who exemplifies a good, entertaining and dramatic character. He also offered
information on what it means to be a resourceful male actor in a world of
limited, but still rich choices for work migration. Although his fates are chan-
ging, his driving force is a fierce determination to tell the story as he would
like it to be heard: To foreground his ability to support his family, his enduring
hardship and his striving to maintain familial and social relationships at home
in the village.
118 Anton Jakob Escher

What the researcher Anton Escher intended to re-​tell?

What decisions, in turn, did the author have to maintain a balance between
friendship, trust and the academic task at hand? Aware of writing for a sci-
entific audience, the author is guided by the interrelationships between action
and structure as discussed, for example, in Giddens’ (1975) “Theory of struc-
turation”. Along with this and other ethnographic principles, the narrator
presented an edited narrative along the cornerstones of the life story and
the underlying guiding principles for a male migrant story in specific places.
These include: the ability to earn money, to support parents and later his own
family as well as the extended kin. The narrative strategies of the scholarly
narrator become apparent when the smoothed content and clearly structured
form come to light while reading. Segments dealing with the transgressions of
boundaries towards the family and towards individual persons are left out or
only hinted at. To preserve the privacy of the taxi driver, only the initials of his
name were used in the retelling.
The wealth of subjective information, stories, attitudes, blunders and qual-
ities of, and about, Abu Khalil can only be summarised and outlined to a
limited extent in a meaningful way. For the same reason, it is not possible for
the researcher to recount some of his deeds: Of course, he could do so, but he
simply does not want to, since Abu Khalil might be seen in a way by others that
he does not see, or does not want to see, himself. Perhaps, the words here are
already too much and possibly distortionary since the researcher is not able to
speak about Abu Khalil in a reconstructive way from a methodological point
of view, but rather retell his story with him through his eyes.
The common experiences of the two, such as multiple arrests by the police
and secret service, common celebrations in the village and numerous carousals
on the trips are not reported, because the aim was to re-​tell the story of Abu
Khali first and foremost. But during the process of writing, it became clear
to the researcher that the full story of Abu Khalil can only be told by the
researcher, by me, as the story of the “Syrian taxi driver and his German pas-
senger” or as “The Syrian taxi driver and the German geographer”.

Résumé between silences and voids, a story that could be true?

The narrator is part of the problematic situation that arises for almost all field
researchers when recounting stories about people. The only possibility is to
take refuge in the form of a narrative, that is, to renounce rational reconstruc-
tion and scientific portrayal and to switch to the form of a novel or essay. It
must be noted, however, that every story may already have the character of a
novel, since every story, report and essay already bear a certain level of fiction.
The goals of the storyteller, the intentions of the scientific post-​narrator,
as well as basic elements of male gender dominance and a normative geo-
graphically scientific narrative claim coincide in the narration’s place-​based
nature. Therefore, it is not surprising that all the dimensions mentioned are
 The Syrian taxi driver 119

male-​dominated. Overall, it is not just the story of the taxi driver, but also the
story of the observer and the narrator. Ultimately, the taxi driver’s story must
be interpreted as a reflection of the narrator’s own story. The narrator is a
migrant too, who specifically recalls and refers to the elements of the narrative
that he is caught up in, that are interesting from his point of view.
When re-​telling migrant narratives derived from such intimate relationships,
it is vital to reflect on the researcher-​informant relationship, and on the editing
choices that must be made, or are made. On the one hand, these narrative
choices were supported by the researcher, but were, on the other hand, also
subtly altered to hint at silences and voids in the narrative. The actual and
potential transgressions and violations of Abu Khalil towards the family,
towards authorities and towards everyday norms of the places are hinted at,
but not expressed. The storyteller, the post-​narrator and the recipient, know
more than is presented here. What is presented is the result of successful editing
that nevertheless presents at its core, a captivating story that rings “true”.

Epilogue of the epilogue

For the reasons mentioned, I am convinced that it is useful to re-​tell his story
and make it public. I am also confident that I am able to tell the story in his
style and almost with his spirit. At least this is my claim for the future, because
the story of the Syrian taxi driver is not yet finished with the fragments that can
be read here. Needless to say, the foregoing passages are just a small fraction
of the whole, and the true story of “The Syrian Taxi Driver and the German
Geographer”.

Bibliography
Arnold, W., Escher, A., and Pfaffenbach, C., 2004. Malula und M’allōy. Erzählungen
aus einem syrischen Dorf. Würzburg: Ergon.
Arnold, W., 1991a. Das Neuwestaramäische. III. Volkskundliche Texte aus Maʿlūla.
Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.
Arnold, W., 1991b. Das Neuwestaramäische. IV. Orale Literatur aus Maʿlūla.
Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.
Arnold, W., 1994. Aramäische Märchen. München: Diederichs.
Arnold, W., 2006. Lehrbuch des Neuwestaramäischen. 2nd ed. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.
Campbell, J., 2008. The hero with a thousand faces. 3rd ed. Novato: New World Library.
Escher, A. and Pfaffenbach, C., 2002. Malula/​ Syrien –​vom Bauerndorf zur
Sommerfrische. Geographische Rundschau 54 (2), 36–​42.
Escher, A., 1990. Die Fernfahrer-​Dörfer im Qalamun/​Syrien. Erdkunde 44 (2), 111–​123.
doi: 10.3112/​erdkunde.1990.02.03
Escher, A., 1991. Sozialgeographische Aspekte raumprägender Entwicklungsprozesse in
Bergregionen der Arabischen Republik Syrien. Erlangen: Palm & Enke.
Escher, A., 1993. Der Qalamun. Sozial-​und wirtschaftsgeographische Skizze eines
Berggebietes der Arabschen Republik Syrien. In: W. Arnold and P. Behnstedt,
eds. Arabisch-​aramäische Sprachbeziehungen im Qalamun (Syrien). Eine
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dialektgeographische Untersuchung mit einer wirtschafts-​und sozialgeographischen

Einführung von Anton Escher. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, XIII–​XLV.
Giddens, A., 1975. Die Konstitution der Gesellschaft. Grundzüge einer Theorie der
Strukturierung. Frankfurt: Campus.
Källström, J., Peterson, E. and Wallenberg, R., 2017. Gendered storytelling –​A norma-
tive evaluation of gender differences in terms of decoding a message or theme in story-
telling [online]. Thesis (Degree of Bachelor). Jönköping University. International
Business School. Available from: www.diva-​por​tal.org/​smash/​get/​diva2:1105​969/​
FUL​LTEX​T01.pdf [Accessed 30 June 2021].
9 Reluctant stories
Silences in women’s narratives of war
and exile

Marita Eastmond

Narrative –​A woman’s narrative of war and exile

War and flight

I was born in 1963 and grew up in the city of Banja Luka, in what was then
Yugoslavia. As a child, in Yugoslavia, I played with all kinds of children.
Nobody spoke about politics in my home or among friends and neighbours.
I got a degree in engineering, I got married and had three children in a short
time. My husband and I both had good jobs; we were happy, felt safe, with
many relatives in different parts of the country; everything was cosy, really.
The Communist system had its faults perhaps, but one did feel safe. Only now,
years later, have I realised that national distinctions still existed; older people
remembered them, from long ago, before Tito and Yugoslavia, and the idea of
Brotherhood and Unity. However, the nationalist ideas were brought back and
they fuelled the war. Terrible things happened that […] (takes a deep breath).
But perhaps it was not like that in all families? How else could we suddenly
have so many enemies? My parents had long-​standing close relationships with
Serb families in the area […], but suddenly they were no longer allowed to
socialise with us Croats; they were threatened if they did, and our contact was
broken […] They also pressured my mum, then widowed, to leave her house.
“Why should I?” she said, incredulous. One day, as she was out in her field
to pick flowers, a man came to scare her, threatening to kill her with his axe.
“That’s it!” she cried out, she no longer dared to stay. Then, Serbs set fire to
our Church, burning alive the priest and a nun. We then found mum a safe
place to live elsewhere. My sister was suddenly threatened at work by her Serb
colleagues and left […], she didn’t feel safe.
Our men were threatened for refusing to take up arms. My husband was
sacked because he would not join the war, and then hid in the forest. None of
his brothers took up arms either; the Serb army caught one of them, detained
and abused him for months in one of their centres. Another of my sisters was
married to a Serb –​mixed marriages were common then –​but she left him.
There was so much hatred among people, she became afraid of him, there
was nothing but talk of war all the time. In wars, people on both sides die,
DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-12
122 Marita Eastmond

creating nothing but hatred and fear, eating its way into one’s own family. At
that particular time, there was only war and violence, people dying every day,
houses blowing up […]. The fear made everyone just talk and think in terms of
“enemies” or “friends”, re-​creating nothing but hatred. I had a Serb girlfriend
whom I was so fond of […] unbelievable […] (falls silent, looks out the window)
how close friends could just turn their backs on one another like that.
We could not just flee across to Croatia. We did not know any Serbs in
Croatia with whom we could swap houses, as many others did at the time.
Nevertheless, in our area the Serbs had power, they had arms. There was chaos,
military movements everywhere, people leaving. Where could we go? Somebody
suggested Sweden: “We hear they are receiving refugees too”. “Sweden? What
kind of country is that?” We made sure that our elderly parents were to be
cared for by relatives, and then we took off […].
First, to get to Croatia from where we lived, we had to pay substantial sums
of money. There was an exchange of people at the border, with a barge taking
people across the river: Serbs coming in, Croats going out. We had to wait for
days for our turn to cross over. It was cold, lots of snow and weapons every-
where. I had a small infant and they had us wait on the outside. A kind Muslim
family took us in for a few nights and heated up their house for us. Still, we had
to return to Banja Luka, to try again later. At the next attempt, armed mili-
tary had me wait all day out in the cold to cross […]. No wonder the baby was
taken ill. But we did not want to stay in Croatia. My husband refused to fight
for any army, we just wanted out. His brother had already been captured and
killed […] what would we have done then, me and my sister-​in-​law, left alone
with six small children?
Those were very hard times for us. The photos of how we looked as we
arrived in Sweden tell their own story. Nobody had thought that this could
happen in Bosnia!

Rebuilding life in a new country

We arrived at the southern border of Sweden, after travelling across Europe by

bus. We had never been that far north […], we knew nothing about Sweden. As
asylum-​seekers they dispersed us across the country; it did not matter where,
we felt free and alive. We felt saved: “We have our children”, we thought, “they
will live in peace, no weapons, no danger!” Even so, we did spend all our money
on telephoning all our relatives left down there –​the anxiety! They had fled
to Croatia, after my parents’ house had been totally demolished and looted.
Serbs occupied it, you see, and when they moved out, they took everything
with them, they even ripped out the fittings […]. The same happened to the
house of my husband’s parents, where we had lived.
I felt such relief at being safe […] but my worst challenge was this fear that
I continued to live with […] (looking harrowed, falls silent).
Another thing was that I had lost so many of my memories. I did not bring
any photos of my children. I often think about this, what a bad mum I was.
 Reluctant stories 123

Here in Sweden, everyone has saved things from when their children were
small, and mothers remember things their small children have said. I did none
of this, I even forgot the first words that my children uttered […] (tears in her
eyes, sobbing). I did not […] feel that I was […] alive then, I almost died. I lost
[…] all the nice things; I only remember the terrible things, but not the beau-
tiful ones!! (sobbing): “I remember nothing.”
Marita Eastmond (M): Well you brought them here to safety, like a respon-
sible mum –​that is no small thing!
The only thing on my mind back then was to survive […] everyday, survival.
Every morning, waking up, I was glad to be alive. Life stopped then, during
the war […] At first I hated […] later, I realised that I was only hurting myself
by all this hatred.
After the war, I can actually tell from someone’s face if he is a Serb or a
Croat. I am sure that they can do the same, if they look at me. At least that is
the feeling I have.
Perhaps I will never feel safe, anywhere, no matter how many years that pass.

Being a refugee in Sweden

When I first met Serbs here, I could not even look at them […] then I realised
that it only made me feel bad. “They are only human beings and are sure to
have some good in their hearts”, I told myself. They weren’t born with this
[hatred] –​That is how I began to think; that I would not hate anyone […]
However, even after so many years now, this fear still remains inside of me and
comes alive when I visit my home town […] I return every summer to see my
mother; but life down there is not like it was before […] there. Our home area
is now called the “Serb Republic”; the house is not our own […] all this […] it
is the fear; one just cannot live there.
The first year was very negative but it changed as we were resettled in a small
town where we had friends (light, happy voice). The next best thing was that
they placed us in Swedish language classes right away. We still live there […]
and that is where I feel at home.
As we settled, my husband found work in his technical profession. However,
as a building engineer with little work experience, I needed to know English.
My focus was on learning Swedish and with three small children and a new
country I did not have the strength […] I took temporary assignments at
different schools and began teaching computer skills for children. After a year,
I was asked to work with children with special needs as a permanent position
opened up at one of these schools. I was appreciated, felt secure there, and
wanted so much to work, I loved my job. I felt so appreciated by everybody,
students and colleagues alike.
However, with organisational changes and a new management, my situ-
ation changed. I was excluded from staff participation and work planning.
I was excluded from contacts with parents and course planning with other
staff. I was very hurt but stayed on and did not tell anyone how I felt. So long
124 Marita Eastmond

ago now, but I won’t forget […] [weeps]. I focused on the children for another
year, but then I could not do it any more […] Then everything came back to me,
that which I had kept inside, that which happened to me during the war. I felt
harassed and excluded. I have been on sick leave for over a year now.
Marita Eastmond (M): Do you meet with other Croats here?
Many Croats here came during the war, like us […]. But one can be affected
by too much talk about the war. It is better to integrate, meeting Swedes is
important to me! Right now I don’t want anyone to see how I feel. I meet
Croats at Church but I won’t tell anyone about me […] this is my problem […]
I have my family.
(M): What is the worst thing that happened to you in the war? And what is the
best thing that has happened to you since the war?
I have always felt, conservatively, that we Croats are the best, that Croatia is
the best place. Earlier when I saw a dark-​skinned person downtown I felt: “My
God, I could never socialise with someone like that!” But, here in Sweden,
through my work at the school, I met many children from many different
places. And I liked that! Now I feel that it does not matter from where you
come! Had I remained in Croatia, and there had been peace, I would never
have changed in this respect. This is definitely the best thing that has happened
to me and it would never have happened if it hadn’t been for the war […] I have
even changed my mind about Serbs through those I have met here.
(M): Tell me more about this change, please?
This fear I had –​many people died in the war, you know not only that it made
me afraid when I heard what they did to other people but also […]
(She lowers her voice, then pauses. After a long silence, looking distant and sad,
she continues): This experience I had affected my whole life. It was as if the
sun was taken out and I was thrown into a big, dark hole. All my feelings, the
joy of life that I had had before, it disappeared. Since that time, I have always
carried a sorrow in my heart, felt anxious […] But I must be there for my chil-
dren […].
(M): Are you still married to the same man?
(She nods)
(M): What you experienced must have been tough for the marriage?
(Maja sighs and remains silent. She then returns to the importance of paying
attention to the silent children at school): There are many silent children at
school who suffer but nobody notices; abused girls who are not seen or heard
because they are silent and well-​behaved. One should take note and refer these
[…], this was an idea I had –​if I could save one child –​this was what I was
working for –​until everything was changed […].
 Reluctant stories 125

(M): Speaking of silent children, what about women who have remained silent,
from the war?
One thing I can tell you for sure is this: Seeing a psychologist means that one
is not mentally well […]. In addition, the women may have experienced things
that nobody in the family knows about but would consider shameful […].
(M): Like being raped?
Yes –​and the wife does not want her husband to know. Women may have men
at home who are injured by the war as well, but the women don’t want or dare to
divorce them. Feeling fearful at home, they daren’t say anything because –​who
knows what might happen then? I myself did not want this assistance when I first
arrived in this country. “No, this is a private experience”, I thought. (Lowering
her voice): During all these years I felt that if I don’t tell anyone, or draw attention
to it, I will feel better myself. Last year, as I began speaking about this for the
very first time in my life [in therapy], I started crying –​I had not cried once in all
these years […]. Because remembering hurt so much. “If I do not speak about
it, I will forget”, that is how I thought. My sister has also been very quiet about
what has happened to her […] perhaps we are not used to revealing such personal
experiences […] have learnt that these are things that nobody else should know.
(M): What about your husband?
We don’t speak about such matters.
(M): So, have things happened to you that you cannot tell him about?
Yes […]. (Long silence, tears filling her eyes)
(M): You don’t have to say anymore if you don’t want to […].
(Long silence, looking distraught) No.
(M): Shall we end here, you think?
Yes.

Epilogue

We sit in silence for a few minutes, letting emotions calm down. I thank Maja
for her important contribution and offer her to read a draft in the Swedish
report later, but she says that it won’t be necessary. As she prepares to leave,
she stops, looks at me, and says: “At first, I wanted to call up this morning and
cancel my therapy […] but then I remembered that I was going to meet with
you […]. I don’t know if I have been of any help […]”. I replied: “You have
indeed. It has been very important to hear your story. Together with the stories
of other women we have spoken to, it will be very helpful in finding ways of
caring for those with similar experiences.
(She smiles cautiously). We hug in silence and say good-​bye.”
126 Marita Eastmond

Methodological reflections –​Eliciting reluctant stories

The story is part of a series of interviews made within a specialised health
care project to assist women refugees from the Bosnian war. The purpose
was to make the general health services more aware of patients with a back-
ground of war-​related trauma. It focused on women who had presented with
various somatic complaints to their general practitioners over the years, but
who had not wanted to divulge their experience of sexualised violence that
continued to trouble them long after the event. For many of these victims,
like Maja, silence had long been a rational means of keeping their bearings; at
first, in the war and later, in new and uncertain circumstances. However, after
many years and with presumably more secure lives, what made many survivors
maintain their silence about experiences that continued to plague them? I had
served as advisor to the clinic as the first Bosnian refugees arrived, providing
ethnographic knowledge on issues such as family structure and gender roles,
to assist teams seeing those traumatised by the war. However, women victims
were slow to seek this help at that time, keeping their problems secret. Two
decades after their arrival in Sweden, after having been frequent patients in the
somatic health care services but without really recovering, women were finally
beginning to be referred to specialised trauma treatment. Over the years, they
had all sought help for aches and other physical ailments, while their traumatic
experiences had gone undetected.
Trust in her therapist, a sense of purpose and absolute confidentiality were
vital components in motivating women to participate in the study. The ther-
apist informed her client about the purpose of the study and its importance
for assisting other refugee women in the future. Not least, it was hoped to
enable the health services to identify, at an early stage, women who, as victims
of extreme violence, would not easily reveal such experiences and thus remain
unaided when turning to the health services for assistance.
In interviewing these women, I used the life story approach (e. g. Bruner
1986, Behar 1990) as my preferred format, one that I have used before in my
ethnographic work (Eastmond 1996, 2007). This approach, somewhat adjusted,
I felt, would better capture the depth of the individual’s experience in a way the
medical report could not. My aim was to provide a broader socio-​cultural con-
text for the experience of the violent events of the war, and how the individual’s
own memory and the social stigma attached to some of these experiences might
continue to play out in her everyday life. My previous research with different
generations of Bosnians in Sweden and in post-​war Bosnia-​Herzegovina (BiH)
helped me unfold the contrast between life as lived and experienced in what
had been Yugoslavia, and women’s lives in today’s BiH.
In a semi-​structured interview, Maja was asked to narrate her lived experi-
ence within very broad themes, relating her own biography to the history of
BiH. The interview was carried out in Swedish and was later translated by me.
In seeking to capture the emotional quality of Maja’s narration, I also told her
about the value of her contribution to the health services in their attempt to
 Reluctant stories 127

identify the need of other refugee women with regard to the treatment that she
was receiving. Importantly, she was told that she could pause or end the inter-
view at any point if it made her too uncomfortable. Telling her about my pre-
vious research in BiH and with Bosnian refugees, I also explained how I would
make sure that she, like others interviewed in the study, would not be identifi-
able in my report. I offered to let her read it before being printed, and to have
me change, or, delete details at her wish but she never took me up on that offer.
Maja’s story spans her early life in former Yugoslavia, and the onset of war
in 1992, her experiences of flight and subsequent settlement and integration
into Swedish society. In this, Maja would choose what to reveal and what to
keep to herself. A few issues were followed up by a question or two from me,
but if not responded to, I would not pursue them. Strong emotions were given
time, and so were the many stops and silences in telling her story. This was a bit
of a balancing act, at once seeking to promote the concern for the respondent
to come forward, while maintaining a respectful distance, in which she would
feel that she had a say in what themes were touched upon, and deciding what
degree of openness she was comfortable with, in revealing her experiences and
thoughts.
Rebuilding one’s life and family in a new and foreign country without any
means is a long and arduous process, not easily captured in a few hours’ inter-
view. The many years of silence that had characterised the lives of Maja, and
other women victims of sexualised violence in the Bosnian war, presented a
challenge to the Swedish health care services. It similarly did so to the researcher.
In my anthropological practice in other contexts, I would interact in the
everyday life of my informants in their own settings, and where the collection
and analysis of narratives were based on familiarity and trust established over
a long time. There was also the challenge of interpretation; this was a mental
health context in which I was no expert and needed to tread carefully, taking
even more of a listener approach than that of a caring therapist engaged in a
process of healing. In doing so, I relied on my long experience of postwar BiH,
including my familiarity of sensitive issues such as sexualised violence relating
to the war, in BiH, as well as in Bosnian exile communities. Moreover, the
many similar interviews I made for this particular mental health service project
was a cumulative learning experience.
Eliciting Maja’s life story as part of an anthropological inquiry thus
contrasted with the therapeutic interventions. Therapy focused on her lived
experience in order to understand her mental health problems and to promote
awareness and healing. The anthropologist did not seek to promote change, but
to capture her lived experience –​as a woman, grown up in former Yugoslavia
and shaped by the social and political processes of which she had formed a
part. In eliciting her experience of violence, the anthropologist’s question was
more focused on how notions of family and the gender order had shaped her
view of her predicament and what, in her socio-​cultural environment, were
seen as appropriate responses. Previous interviews had suggested that survivors
were easily shamed and became socially withdrawn (Eastmond 2017). Aware
128 Marita Eastmond

of my role as anthropologist, and not a therapist, I was careful to safeguard

Maja’s integrity, and cautious not to ask her for detailed accounts about what
I assumed were very painful and so far secretly guarded memories. My ethno-
graphic experience of Bosnian communities aided my analysis of the discourse
about the war, as well as the sensitive issue of sexualised violence. For instance,
attending gatherings at the local Bosnian association, I noted that men’s war
experiences could be raised and discussed while women were reluctant to do so.
Working with the stories of Maja and other survivors of the Bosnian war
nevertheless involved me, not only as a listener and anthropologist, but also as
a human being. These stories of violence and suffering, not least the silenced
parts that leave much to one’s imagination, later took their toll on my own
wellbeing. Memories of vulnerability from long ago in my own life began to
haunt me and required me to seek a therapeutic intervention of my own.
The trust needed for Maja to contribute to this enquiry was mainly grounded
in the relationship between her and the therapist. Her therapist had informed
her, as did I, about the purpose of the study and its importance in enabling the
health services to identify and provide care, at an early stage, to other women
like herself who had survived extreme violence, but who would not themselves
want to, or know how to seek assistance. I also told her about my long-​term
research with Bosnian refugees in Sweden, my many visits to BiH after the war,
and my awareness of the crimes committed against women in her area. The
ethical issues were underlined by me as important, ensuring anonymity, and
giving her the option to withdraw at any point during the interview. Trust and
a sense of purpose was vital to motivate all participants in the study. Maja’s
question to me after the interview reflects this concern, expressing her hope
that her participation would be useful in helping other women.

Analysis –​Silences and voids

Maja’s story reflects the vital tension common to all life stories between life
as lived, experienced and told (Eastmond 2007). The objective facts of our
lives, what we remember of our lived experience and wish to tell a particular
listener, become a story that is crafted in the telling, in the particular context
in which it is told. Telling forms part of reflecting on one’s life as lived and is a
dynamic process in which the narrator assesses the past in the light of the pre-
sent, and often also in relation to future prospects. Sudden and violent social
and ideological changes can make earlier memories not only seem unreliable
when being recalled years later, but they may also be painful; other mem-
ories make more sense only with the distance of time. For some narrators,
like Maja, there is also the tension between wanting to share one’s story and
keeping silent, perhaps lacking the words, fearing being overwhelmed, and
doubting the ability of the listener to comprehend and not to judge. Maja
was struggling with the sense of humiliation and shame that characterised the
response of other women victims as well. Not telling the full story made the
atrocities less real.
 Reluctant stories 129

In telling her story, Maja reflects on, and tries to make sense of, the nation-
alist and violent war in Bosnia-​Herzegovina (BiH) in the early 1990s and
its ideological reconstructions of nation and gender; it was contrary to the
Yugoslav motto of “Brotherhood and Unity”, until then the prevailing ideo-
logical framework for the co-​existence of its constituent national groups. For
Maja, as for most people in BiH at the time, ethnicity had had little relevance
in most settings of everyday social life. Since the war, however, she had been
struggling to make sense of her happy memories of social life in what had
been Yugoslavia, and, the rapid shift into violent conflict between emerging
and competing nationalisms (Bougarel et al. 2007). Reflecting on her lived
experience, she gives voice to her doubts and tests her re-​interpretation of pre-​
war society: “Perhaps national allegiances did exist at that time, too, but were
being silenced? How else could we suddenly have so many enemies?” It is telling
that, on a recent visit to her old home town, she notes that: “Nowadays I can
tell a Croat from a Serb; this was impossible in the past”. She thus illustrates
how violent nationalist politics and the war in 1993–​1995 had shattered and
re-​shaped the imagined community of Yugoslavs into new and nationally
defined distinctions between Self and Other. At the same time, Maja repeat-
edly remarks on how much she has learnt through her experience of flight and
migration. Her new life and work in Sweden: “is definitely the best thing that
has happened to me, and it would never have happened if it hadn’t been for the
war. I have even changed my mind about Serbs through those I have met here.”

The silences of war and victimhood

In all societies, there are experiences that require or are dealt with, by silence.
As an analytical category, silence is broad and has a wide range of social
meanings and effects. In Maja’s storying of her life since the war, silence takes
on particular significance. Her story clearly demonstrates that silence does not
preclude agency but may, in some circumstances, actually promote it (Achino-​
Loeb 2006, Connerton 1989, Eastmond 2017, Ochs and Capps 1996).
A narrator, like Maja, may indicate that something vital is there in the story
being told, but she may lack the words, the mental strength, or, the sufficient
trust to convey it (cf. Seljamaa and Siim 2016). A central but silenced part in
Maja’s experience, not easily storied and told, has to do with her encounter
with extreme violence in the war. The assault on her person is not explicitly
brought up as she tells her story, but the memory assumes a presence in other
ways. The long silences, her flat tone, her body posture and the context of the
trauma centre provide clues to the violence she has suffered, and, why she finds
it difficult to articulate her experience (cf. Kirmeyer 1996, Močnik 2019). At
one point she explains, choking: “I thought they were going to kill me.” Apart
from the life-​threatening violence experienced at the time, there is subsequently
the social shaming of the victim. As we speak, she does not find the words and
deliberately edits painful parts of her war story, perhaps also feeling uncertain
of the listener’s ability to understand, or not to judge. Kirmayer (1996, p. 174)
130 Marita Eastmond

discussing the representation of trauma, draws attention to the ways in which

terror and loss are often presented, not in explicit narrative but in the gaps,
in the “frailty and impersistence of memory”. I often had to rely on Maja’s
body language to understand when issues, and the memories associated with
them, were experienced as intrusive and painful. Analytical clues were bodily
reactions to a particular memory, such as tear-​filled eyes and shaking hands,
which appeared to reveal and communicate her response to details which she
could not, or would not, articulate or develop further.
Maja’s silences also need to be understood in terms of the symbolic
connotations of mass rapes in the Balkan War, as well as of their silent after-
math, nationally as well as internationally. The nationalisms emerging at the
time when Yugoslavia was breaking up, symbolically reconstrued women as
reflecting the nation’s purity and honour. Mass rapes, thus, was a strategy in
the nationalist war, mainly by the Serb army, to violate those qualities. These
assaults built on the complex relationship between nationalism, gender, sex
and moral purity, in which nations and territories were symbolically feminised
(Helms 2013). As inscribed in the powerful nationalist ideology, the shaming of
the women thus extended, ideologically, to the shaming of their nation and to
the men for not being able to protect the women. Sexualised violence was also
closely related to collective ascriptions of moral righteousness. Moral status, in
nationalist imaginaries, thus demanded the depiction of absolute innocence in
victimhood (Helms 2013, p. 614ff), or easily invited questions about women’s
moral integrity (ibid., pp. 198–​201).
Like that of many other women survivors in the war, Maja’s tacit approach
echoes the long silence of her society on mass rapes. Given the reproach of
women victims, “silence” had both repressive and protective effects. Of the
many dramatic experiences suffered in the war in Bosnia, rape was the crime
which could not easily be divulged, neither by society nor by those victimised.
For the many thousands of victims, sexualised violence was encapsulated as
something frightening, potentially polluting and shameful, not only to them-
selves and to their families but also to the nation. Thus, silencing was the
means by which victims avoided doubts about their moral integrity; very few
of the many thousands of women victims of rape came forward after the war.
Also post-​war society has been notoriously silent about these crimes, and, with
some exceptions, so has the international community (Helms 2010, Mertus
2004, McEvoy and McConnahie 2013).
For women like Maja who escaped the Bosnian War and integrated into
other countries, there were few opportunities to collectively break their silence
and find local forms of support. Many feared the social shame and the distan-
cing responses of their own community, perhaps even their own family, and
continued to rely on silence (Eastmond 2017). Maja did so in her marriage
as well, or perhaps there was a tacit understanding, as in some other fam-
ilies, thus avoiding open marital discord and possibly divorce. The new life in a
different society made this past easier to conceal, if not shed. Thus, relying on
silence, while demanding careful social navigation, also provided new sources
 Reluctant stories 131

of agency. Years later, Maja had built a safe economic base and found a new
source of self-​esteem; working with disadvantaged school-​children. She felt
content with her work and also proud of her achievement. “If I could save one
child […]” was how she summed up her commitment, thus constituting her
sense of agency relating to work. However, without consulting Maja, a new
management decided to transfer her to a different and less qualified position,
with less rewarding tasks. She had taken her assignment with the children very
seriously, and the forced change left her feeling excluded and devalued, robbed
of voice and agency. The experience re-​activated her traumatic memories of
violation and forced her into an extended sick leave.

Restorative silence: From victim to survivor

Some things are left untold, because they are unmarked in memory or unim-
portant in the crafting of one’s story. In Maja’s storying of exit and flight,
she remembers in detail the chaotic and dangerous first phase of flight out of
the war-​zone, but sums up the long and uncertain journey to secure asylum
in Sweden as being “[…] just one long sigh of relief ”. In contrast, Maja’s
silences about the violence she suffered in the war are different and complex.
Some relate to the shame of her experience and the fear of being identified
and shunned as a victim of rape, in a war where “[…] there was little moral
worth in victimhood” (Golubović 2019). Being accepted as a refugee in Sweden
had offered an opportunity to leave those experiences behind and start a new
life. Reflecting what Connerton (1989) refers to as restorative silence, Maja’s
muting of her violent and shameful experiences in the war formed part of
building a life in a new country. In this endeavour, she strove to reaffirm not
only herself and her family, but also to shield them all from the potential social
stigma of their own community.
Maja repeatedly remarks how she has changed through her flight from
the war and in re-​building her life in Sweden, also having become more tol-
erant of differences as a result. In an auto-​epistemic process of inner growth,
she has allowed her new life there to enlarge her horizon and made her more
open-​minded and appreciative of ethnic diversity. Having struggled to make
sense of the war in her home country, she declares that she is now “even
including Serbs” in her social environment, thus transcending the category fal-
lacy inspired by the nationalist war. In many ways, Maja approaches her bad
experiences as a source of agency. Not being able to pursue her technical career
in Sweden, she nevertheless finds professional fulfilment and commitment in
her work with disadvantaged children. “If I could save one child […]!” sums
up her active position with respect to her contribution, and, reflects its import-
ance in her striving to re-​constitute her agency after the war. In this process,
Maja had relied on silence in different ways and for different purposes. She
has remained silent about her traumatic experiences in the war, experiences
that were neither easy nor socially safe to reveal, not even to her spouse. As
suggested by other stories of flight from a violent war, silence may also be
132 Marita Eastmond

a way of shielding a survivor from the authenticity of the experience itself

(Seljamaa and Siim 2016).
Once settled in Sweden, Maja had taken an active role in rebuilding her life,
thus seeking to leave the war and violence behind. Refuting the image of herself
as a victim she relied on the protective potential of silence to help her navigate in
new circumstances. Perhaps she was also protecting the listener from knowing,
uncertain of her ability to comprehend and not to judge. Maja’s caution about
revealing her war experiences nevertheless restricted close social relationships,
also within her own family and marriage. Given the stigma of her community
and the shaming often suffered by victims of sexualised violence, reticence was
her way to protect not only herself, but also her loved ones (Močnik 2019).
Maja’s caution also extended to her own family and kin, not taking anyone
into her confidence. Perhaps, given the absence of close relationships, she had
valued the affection she had received from the children she had been teaching,
relying on the inherent ambiguity of silence in these endeavours and given her
strong will to live and build a new life, Maja refuted the image of herself as a
victim and embraced the one of survivor. As her story demonstrates: silence
does not preclude agency but may, in certain circumstances, actually promote
it. Taking a broader perspective on silence, as agential and not one limited
to trauma and disability, opens for an understanding of the wide range of
responses and tactics with which newcomers like Maja seek to navigate in a
new and uncertain terrain.

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10 Planting the colonial narrative
The migrant letters of James Taylor in
Ceylon1

Angela McCarthy

Introduction: Brief historical note

James Taylor (Figure 10.1) was born in 1835 at Auchenblae in northeast
Scotland. After initially studying to be a pupil-​ teacher, he decided to
leave his homeland and in 1852, at age 16, arrived in Ceylon (known as
Sri Lanka since 1972). Working first as an assistant, then overseer, on the
Loolecondera coffee and tea plantation, Taylor stayed in Ceylon for four
decades until his death in 1892, with only one trip taken to India during this
time. Taylor’s successful efforts at commercially cultivating fine-​tasting tea
led to his renown as “the father of the Ceylon tea enterprise”, an acclaim
still celebrated to this day. Despite his achievements, including receiving
money and a silver tea service from his fellow planters in recognition of
his efforts, Taylor died in disgrace in May 1892. He had been dismissed by
his employers, allegedly for “apathy”, a claim his fellow planters disputed.
Some friends testified that Taylor died of a broken heart, bereft at the
thought of having to leave his adopted land. Upon his death, funds were
left to the mother of his children in Ceylon as well as to relatives in Scotland
(McCarthy and Devine 2017).
This chapter begins by charting James Taylor’s account of the Indian rebel-
lion of 1857, drawing on extracts from his personal letters. These extracts are
graphic and presented verbatim so some of the language included might cause
distress to particular audiences. The extracts are also reproduced exactly as
they appear in the original with only minor editorial intervention to ensure
readability and provide clarification.2 The chapter then positions the study of
Taylor’s views towards “others” within the “biographical turn” and provides
a succinct summary of key methodological concerns for the historical use of
migrant letters. Finally, the chapter analyses the opening narrative to reflect
on issues of colonial violence, perceptions of the “other”, and emotions. The
chapter argues for the need to situate extracts from narrative accounts within
broader temporal and contextual frameworks, and to consider alternative ways
of reading such narratives, focusing in this case on the interdisciplinary study
of emotions.

DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-13
 Planting the colonial narrative 135

Figure 10.1 James Taylor (in white suit) and friend, Ceylon, c. 1863. Courtesy of Tom
Barron.

Narrative –​James Taylor’s impressions of the Indian rebellion, 1857

In May 1857, the Indian “Mutiny” broke out when sepoys (Indian soldiers)
in the East India Company’s Bengal army in north India rose in rebellion
against their European officers, murdering them and British civilians. Two
months later, on 24 July 1857, James Taylor wrote a lengthy letter to his father
in Scotland dreading the impact of the rebellion on Ceylon:

[E]‌very thing is so quiet kept that we are only told some things and them in
the most favourable light. Aye even false reports are raised and spread in the
papers to frighten the people and keep us from showing any symptoms of
apprehension. A neighbour of mine lately down at Colombo just returned
last night and tells me that 150 of our native regiment struck at Colombo
a few days ago and were immediately disarmed and the arms brought into
the fort at Colombo in two carts. They did no damage but struck work and
would not obey orders of course so we may be on the eve of an outbreak
here for ought [all] we know and if it does take place we are in a worse state
than any part of India for we may say we have no European troops in the
136 Angela McCarthy

country at all and I have seen it stated that the proportion of Europeans to
natives is less in Ceylon than in any other part of our dominions and we are
far more spread and defenceless. In fact nothing would be easier than to kill
every European in the Island in one night if they made their plans as well as
they have done in India.3

This situation was of particular concern in Ceylon, since all the European
troops had relocated to India. Instead, the Ceylon regiment comprised “Native
Malays chiefly and Mahommedans”. Malays, or Javanese, who were Muslims,
came from Indonesia and Malaya, and many had been recruited to Ceylon as
soldiers during the periods of Dutch and British rule. While Taylor was alert to
the ethnic distinctions of the assorted population groups in Ceylon, he did not
look favourably upon them, especially in light of a repressed mutiny in Ceylon:

The papers make no mention of the Mutiny in Colombo so you may see
how much we are at the mercy of these Malays and a more brave and blood
thirsty race does not exist nor a more revengeful so we dont know what the
disarming of the rebellious part of them may do … The Cingalese are one
of the cruelest races in existence and if we fell into their hands we should
be treated quite as ill if they have ingenuity enough as the poor unfortunate
creatures in south India. However they are a cowardly pack.

Quite apart from expressing his impressions towards the Ceylonese, and his
fear that the insurrection in India would spill over into Ceylon, Taylor wrote
graphically of the atrocities taking place in India:

Our soldiers are now finding fragments of European bodies and dresses
in the villages finding arms and feet with shoes on and so forth. It may be
immoral to hint even at things done but let it be known so that our ven-
geance may be fairly aroused and give a lesson sufficient to prevent such
things in future. They have taken our women even quite young girls and
kept them for prostitution among them and put them in close carriages
and driven them through the streets for the same and to all who choose and
after abusing them in that sort of way till nearly dead or mad they have cut
them open alive or burnt them alive killed them by degrees of cutting off
their breasts etc and filling _​_​with bits of broken bottles etc etc etc not in a
few cases but in hundreds. Women with child they have cut open and taken
the child out and burnt them. Ladies and children who have fled and are
trying to escape are caught brought to villages or sent naked to towns to the
mutineers and treated just to the extent of cruelty that their imaginations
can invent. They have nothing that restrains them from doing the worst they
can. Children are thrown up in the air and caught on the points of bayonets
or swords, burnt alive, or their limbs, feet, legs and arms cut off. Men are
treated similarly their private parts cut off etc etc. One photographer they
caught and thought he made his pictures by what they called a second sight
 Planting the colonial narrative 137

so proposed to give him a third sight. They put out his eyes cut off his
testicles and put them into the sockets of the eyes. Now will you speak of
our harsh treatment of the poor natives? Can any treatment be harsh for
them? They are ruled by people from home with these feelings of pity for
them who never after coming here learn more of them but keep away from
any intercourse with them and never know their disposition.

Two months later, on 17 September 1857, James Taylor continued his account
of the reported excesses of the violence in India, as it transitioned into a civil
uprising beyond the army:

The Mutiny still spreads and is now spreading in the Bombay army and
a little in the Madrass army [… ] Think of over 600 Europeans murdered
in Cawnpor[e]. Great part of them fell in the defence of the place and
more were perhaps shot or drowned in the boats on the river but think
[?even] of the remainder cruelly murdered after being taken […]. Some have
passed Ceylon homeward horribly mutilated. Ladies with their noses and
ears off and terribly disfigured and men slashed and cut but the worst of
their mutilations are on parts concealed from sight and of which decency
keeps much from being said about. Scarcely a female older than a mere
infant that has fallen into their hands but has been violated and prostituted
to whole regiments of them. You will think that should not be spoken
about but we are obliged to speak about it and have got so accustomed
to hear of such things that we in talking on the subject here have quite
forgot our usual purity of language and speak as freely on such subjects
as the most abandoned prostitutes and we regret that the same effect has
seized the ladies so that they have lost a great charm, purity of thought
and speech and we must proclaim it or ought to do so in order to procure
due punishment to the perpetrators of such horrid deeds. The Ladies after
having been prostituted and abused in all sorts of ways often before their
husband’s’ eyes tied to a post and ravished by dozens of them and shame-
fully abused have been then cut open alive or skinned alive and burned
alive and tortured with hot irons in the most cruel and indecent ways. Their
breasts cut off and every one of them subjected to the most horrid cruelties
till they were not exactly killed but tortured to death. Tortured slowly till
they died from pain without being directly killed and then their husbands’
and fathers’ eyes put out his testicles cut off and put into the sockets and
he also subjected to all sorts of torture and indignity. Children are put into
boxes and burned alive have their hands and feet cut off an[d] cut open and
left to die.

Taylor’s earlier letter of July 1857 to his father extended to attempting to

explain the violence. He claimed that the British officers “are afraid of their
brahmin soldiers” who show disrespect towards them, and, that the British
officers and rulers
138 Angela McCarthy

have been pitying and tolerating such insolence for ten or twelve years and
putting increased power into the hands of these people and our rulers and
you at home reprimand us for not giving way to their predjudices and for
doing anything or counterancing any effort to turn them from such a reli-
gion as they have. I am sure that is not the way to make them respect us or
our religion.

The news from India served to harden Taylor’s thinking on the non-​European
population of Ceylon:

People here have not the feeling of gratitude so we ought never to do a

favour to them as such. They will feel the advantages of it but never thank
you but think you are afraid of them and wish to gain favours from them
and so raise their opinion of themselves and their contempt of you.

He elaborated with reflections on his own workforce, whom he concluded

“dont seem to fear death as we do”, and that whenever they fall ill and become
“troublesome to others in the house” they are kicked out where, even though
lying in the doorway, the friends of the sick “wont let him in nor even give him
a drink or a bit of anything to eat so he dies of course”. Even though Taylor
claimed to try and assist by giving the unwell worker fire and food and paying
a friend to care for them, he concluded: “They dont seem to like it. They would
as soon be at the roadside and cry if I force them to take medicine sometimes
thinking I am poisoning them”. Despite having both Indian Tamil and local
Sinhalese Hindus working on his estate, Taylor claimed,

I dont see any differences in their feelings or thought […]. They have no edu-
cation and so every one’s mind is as like anothers as ones two hands […] so
we need seldom in any general affair like the present feel afraid of punishing
innocent with guilty all an[d]‌alike guilty that have had anything to do in the
matter at all.

For James Taylor, there was only one way to deal with the horror of events
in India: retribution.

I hope you at home will send us out lots of soldiers for I assure you we want
them all and that after we get the upper hand in India again you will not
utter the word mercy till every mutineer has been killed all their villages
burnt and all their temples and idols profaned and destroyed. The atrocities
they have committed are inconceivable. I suppose your home papers will
improve on the morality of ours and tell you simply of horrid murders and
massacres of outrages on women etc etc but our private accounts by letters
to friends here and people come over for safety are some thing sickening.
Such things were never heard of since the world began. Oh God may the ret-
ribution be awful was the prayer of a lady who escaped from Delhi and let
 Planting the colonial narrative 139

every individual in Britain pray the same […] Oh if we would kill every rebel
without mercy burn every train and every place and every village where
Europeans have been killed and hang the head men of the places and above
all now down with brahminical temples and show them that so far from
being afraid of them we trusted them because we believed them unfit to be
so treacherous as they have shown themselves.

Methodological reflections –​The use of migrant correspondence

James Taylor’s original letters were sent to Scotland between 1852 and 1891,
and, together with two of his photograph albums, are now held at the National
Library of Scotland.4 I first came across the letters when exploring a possible
research project on the Scots in Ceylon. Such was the scale and importance
of Taylor’s personal correspondence (my transcript of them comprises 83,000
words), as well as his seminal contribution to Ceylon’s economy, that my
research began to focus solely on him. This research into Taylor’s life culminated
in a jointly authored book with T.M. Devine, Tea and Empire: James Taylor in
Victorian Ceylon, published in 2017, the 150th anniversary of the Ceylon tea
industry. As the tea broker Denys Forrest (1967, p. 63) had earlier observed,
Taylor’s letters constitute “perhaps the most complete account in existence of
a young planter’s experiences and feelings”.
As well as Taylor’s voluminous correspondence to his relatives in Scotland,
Tea and Empire drew upon other sources: Taylor’s letters published in the press
and in the published Proceedings of the Planters Association; the correspond-
ence of other planters; information from the monthly Tropical Agriculturalist
magazine; and tea records in the UK and Sri Lanka. Fieldwork in Scotland
and Sri Lanka facilitated interviews with descendants, tea planters, and
local historians. This range of evidence proved important since a particular
challenge of James Taylor’s personal correspondence is that almost a complete
decade –​the 1860s –​is missing. The surviving evidence also raised challenges
as to how Taylor presented himself and how his memories of the developments
of Ceylon’s tea enterprise fed into the overarching narrative that emerged, a
narrative in which he is hailed as the “father of Ceylon tea” resulting in the
creation of monuments in Sri Lanka in his memory. Such tributes include a 13
foot high monument and a Scottish baronial tea castle in the countryside at the
Mlesna Tea Castle at Talawakelle (Figure 10.2).
Some historians have used migrant letters to construct overarching inter-
pretations of specific migrant groups, including Kerby Miller’s (1985) depic-
tion of the Irish in America as exiles. Drawing on copious correspondence
from many migrants, accounts like Miller’s, based on selective extracts with
minimal biographical contextualisation, can lead to skewed interpretations.
An alternative methodology can be found in works such as David Fitzpatrick’s
Oceans of Consolation: Personal Accounts of Irish Migration to Australia which
reproduced letters to and from Irish migrant correspondents in full, accom-
panied by profiles of the letter writers, recipients, and their social milieu, along
140 Angela McCarthy

Figure 10.2 Bust of James Taylor at the Mlesna Tea Castle at Talawakelle, Sri Lanka.
Copyright Angela McCarthy.

with thematic analysis. Such letters, Fitzpatrick argued (1995, p. 23), were con-
solatory, manipulative, and functional.
Migrant correspondence and narratives have also been key sources for
historians writing individual and collective biographies. The narrative of
Taylor’s life found in Tea and Empire fits within the recent “biographical turn”,
a transition that stresses the importance of examining individuals with little
political and economic power or social status, as evident in Clare Anderson’s
(2012) exploration of subalterns in the Indian Ocean World. A settler, rather
than sojourner, in the tropics, James Taylor was from a rural Scottish artisan
background and never accumulated vast wealth. As he put it in 1874, “Some
how or other I was born apparently to do good for others without much bene-
fitting myself ”.5 Taylor therefore differs from studies of privileged migrants
foregrounded in works by Emma Rothschild (2011) and David Lambert and
Alan Lester’s (2006) edited collection on imperial careering. Unlike conven-
tional historical –​and migrant –​biographies, however, Tea and Empire takes
a thematic rather than chronological approach, traversing key themes and
questions in imperial, Asian, diaspora, and Scottish history such as colonisa-
tion, cross-​cultural contact, identities, global trade, and transnational ties to
 Planting the colonial narrative 141

home. Further, it sets Taylor’s character, behaviour, aspirations, and emotions

within the context of the social, economic, political, religious, and cultural
history of his times. All this provides scope for analytical depth and breadth,
rather than providing a simple chronological narrative of the life of one
individual.
Historical approaches to the study of migrant narratives are typically alert
to the importance of context, time, and periodisation. An historical perspec-
tive can also contribute to other interdisciplinary fields such as the study of
emotions, a perspective used in Tea and Empire. Despite migration often being
an emotional undertaking, framed by exile, loneliness, and loss, or adventure
and excitement, many historians prioritise economic motivations as shaping
the thoughts and behaviour of migrants. As Hasia Diner (1998, p. 199) has put
it, migration historians “have shied away from the realm of the emotional and
have hesitated to explore the feelings immigrants endured and the meanings
they invested in their experiences. The grand narrative of emigration and immi-
gration has been told primarily from a structural, economically driven perspec-
tive”. Few can doubt that demographic, economic, and political approaches
to the history of migration have long been dominant. But an explicit focus on
the emotional content suffusing migrant narratives helps bring inner lives to
the fore.
Tea and Empire reveals that Taylor’s emotions were most clearly apparent in
two spheres: his ties to home; and his cross-​cultural contact with other peoples.
With Taylor’s ties to home, his emotions acted initially as a strategic device to
help suppress the pain of separation. Thereafter, he used emotional language
for practical purposes, including cajoling his family to write to him, discussing
health and wellbeing, and traversing financial matters. By expressing pleasure,
disappointment, and impatience, Taylor’s feelings were often strategically
deployed to ensure that reciprocal action was taken by his correspondents
to maintain the close family bonds which he valued so much. He also would
modify his writing style to suit his recipients and particular issues. This meant
he could be both deferential and strong-​minded with his father, and playful
and parental with his siblings. Taylor’s emotions were therefore not static
but occurred in the context of specific relationships and events over time, a
further important perspective that historians can bring to interdisciplinary
interrogations of migrant narratives. Indeed, putting sentiment at the heart of
migration not only exposes “intention, motivation, and values” (Matt 2011,
p. 118), but reveals whether these sentiments changed over time, and why.
In our contemporary times with such concerns surrounding “fake news”,
we should also be cognisant that professional historians can interrogate and
call for caution over unsubstantiated claims made by political actors and
others who manipulate evidence to advance competing agendas. Historians
typically interrogate issues of selection among available sources and adjudi-
cate whether some evidence is more, or less, reliable than others, or has been
taken out of context. As such, the historian’s craft is to consult a wide array of
evidence, assess its reliability, and check its claims. Rigorous engagement with
142 Angela McCarthy

methodological issues of evidence selection, representativeness, authenticity,

and trustworthiness (of transcripts and content), enables historians to try to
reach an informed interpretation of the past.
The authenticity of Taylor’s personal letters is not in doubt. Descendants
of his sister deposited his letters, photograph albums, and tea set with national
repositories in Edinburgh. Further, while his letters are not representative of
other planters in Ceylon (due to their scale and extent covering four decades
of his life), consultation of the testimony of other planters writing during a
similar timeframe as Taylor reveals that they traversed similar themes. Taylor
was also typical of most planters in Ceylon in being male, single, and young.
As for the selection of evidence, key themes from Taylor’s letters were identi-
fied for examination and placed within the broader context of his entire cor-
respondence, as well as in relation to other sources relating to his life and that
of the planting community in Ceylon. This contextualisation helps alleviate
concerns surrounding the selective use of evidence. The trustworthiness of the
content of Taylor’s letters is, however, more circumspect since migrants, as well
as individuals more generally, purposefully select facts and sentiments to influ-
ence and manipulate recipients. Despite this, the private nature of correspond-
ence makes such accounts more reliable than propaganda and public discourse
(Fitzpatrick 1995, pp. 24–​25). In light of these methodological concerns, how
might we therefore “read” the opening section of this chapter?

Analysis –​The Indian rebellion and emotions

Whether through the press, photographs, or correspondence, Europe’s
encounters with the non-​Western world has generated the compilation and
dissemination of information about other peoples, often stereotyped. Notions
of the “other” as backward, primitive, and violent pervade accounts such as
Taylor’s and helped to justify colonial rule. Narratives of the 1857 “Mutiny”
in India from European migrants like Taylor became important in heightening
preoccupations with differences between “other” peoples, and deepening hos-
tility in such representations. Scholars have also used such reports of the rebel-
lion to highlight European perceptions of India “as a mysterious, barbaric
land inhabited by fanatical religious devotees” (Merritt 2013, p. 3). But some
argue that the more extreme depictions of violence against British women and
children were groundless, and that afterwards British magistrates found women
and children had not been subjected to mutilation and torture, but rather
wounded by bullets or had fallen victims of disease (Sharpe 1991, pp. 31–​32).
Yet Taylor’s lurid writings, inflated or otherwise, are in stark contrast with these
modern interpretations which dismiss personal accounts from the time as fic-
titious due to the absence of “elaborate details concerning the torture of men
and certainly no mention of the male sexual organ being removed” (Sharpe
1991, p. 34). Whatever the revisionism of today’s scholarship, Taylor and the
British community in Ceylon clearly believed that gross atrocities had indeed
taken place on a large scale, and the most extreme penalties should therefore
 Planting the colonial narrative 143

be exacted in response to the outrages. That said, it is important to note that

Taylor’s narrative emphasises the indiscriminate violence of the mutineers and
his desired vengeance on South Asians, without any discussion of the British
actions that sparked Indian hostilities, or British reprisals on both the Indian
rebels and civilians.
There are, however, problems that emerge when reproducing such testimony
without contextualising them. Taylor, for instance, likely held notions of other
peoples even before moving to Ceylon. He would almost certainly have known
about the characteristics of different “races” in the East from neighbours and
relatives at home who already had personal experience there. The efforts of
officials in Ceylon to identify and calculate the population through various
census returns would likewise have amplified Taylor’s awareness of ethnic
difference. Such categorisation of other peoples was widespread throughout
the British Empire as officials tried to order and control hugely diverse
populations. Many of the ideas about racial differences and inferiorities also
developed out of Britain’s central engagement with slavery and the slave trade.
Recent research has shown the very significant extent to which Scots were
involved in the slave economies of the American and Caribbean colonies in
the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries (Devine 2015). Judgements of
other peoples in the Victorian empire can also be attributed to racial theories,
which ranked human beings in hierarchies of value and worth, ranging from
the primitive to the civilised. Such scientific racism had both a biological and
cultural focus. These attitudes were commonplace in Britain and its empire,
and mainly derived from the stadial theories of civilisation emanating from the
eighteenth-​century Scottish Enlightenment (Broadie 2012, pp. 370–​385).
As well as Taylor’s claims to have heard first-​hand accounts from India, his
letters to his family in Scotland about the uprising were also likely shaped by
newspaper articles and published official reports of what had taken place. His
depictions of the treatment of children and women, for instance, echo accounts
in the press. In 1857 the Ceylon Times (cited Putnis 2013, p. 6) had described
“Children shut up in a box and burnt alive”, while the Bombay Times (cited
Putnis 2013, p. 5) had noted: “they murdered ladies in the most brutal manner,
burning them half and then cutting them up, and stripping them naked”. The
news from India served to harden Taylor’s thinking, not only on the mutineers,
but on the non-​European population of Ceylon. Yet, his graphic account
of the Indian rebellion, and hostility towards a range of ethnicities at that
time, should not be taken as indicative of his perceptions of all non-​European
peoples over the course of his life. As revealed in Tea and Empire, his attitudes
were much more complex.
An important factor to consider in James Taylor’s impressions of other
peoples is his intimate relationships. On the one hand, as Ronald Hyam (1990,
p. 202) suggests, white men were more sympathetic to a community if they
found its women attractive. Certainly in Asia, cross-​cultural liaisons took place
and could lead to transculturation. But such relationships also created anxie-
ties, and did not necessarily extend to sympathy towards the wider community
144 Angela McCarthy

(Ghosh 2006, Dalrymple 2003). Taylor, for instance, was adamant in 1857
that: “I’ll never marry a black and am not sure if a white would suit and half
and half is worse than either”.6 This statement was made at the time of the
Indian “Mutiny”. But British men like Taylor frequently kept their intimate
liaisons with local women a secret, despite the frequency of such cross-​cultural
relationships. While James Taylor did not have a formal marital bond as
recognised in British law, his will and his photograph albums suggest he was
not lacking in female companionship. The photograph albums, for instance,
contain several images of a young Tamil girl on the plantation, pictured ini-
tially in a sari. Two later photographs show her outfitted in what appears to be
a crinoline, suggestive of a European connection.7 We do not know if Taylor
sustained this relationship but when he died in 1892, his Sinhalese housekeeper
emerged from “the bungalow crying and waving her arms and would have gone
to the funeral, but Mr Gordon prevented her” (Forrest 1967, p. 57). Whether
this was a traditional Sinhalese expression of grief or an expression of more
tender ties to Taylor is unknown. However, we do know from details of his will
and codicil published in the press that he had children and a native partner.8
Taylor’s views towards other peoples softened over time, and might perhaps be
attributable to such intimacy.
How, though, might we use theories of emotions to interrogate the opening
extracts of this chapter? Several emotions suffuse Taylor’s narrative, including
his own and that of others, in both India and Ceylon. He mentioned claims
of receiving “sickening” accounts from India and his compatriots being
frightened and apprehensive of the rebellion spilling over into Ceylon. His
narrative also referred to East Indian Company officials feeling “pity” towards
Indians, despite seemingly never having been in contact with them. British
army officers were said to fear their Indian soldiers while native soldiers in
Ceylon were reckoned to be “revengeful”, cruel, and “cowardly”. Taylor also
concluded that alleged British fear explained Ceylonese contempt towards
them. He elaborated further by stating that the Ceylonese lacked “the feeling
of gratitude” and “dont seem to fear death as we do”. Of his estate Hindus
he claimed not to “see any differences in their feelings or thought from the
tamals”. If a sense of fear permeates Taylor’s narrative, so too does a sense
of vengeance and rage. He called for revenge “without mercy” in order to
show no fear of the south Asian population, even advocating that the British
should not “feel afraid of punishing innocent with guilty”. In all this, Taylor
presents a narrative of anger shaped by an effort to represent himself as a
strong, fearless man.
Taylor’s narrative, however, centres around cognitive expressions of feeling;
in other words, his judgements and perceptions. While Taylor may have had
a physiological emotional reaction to the Indian “Mutiny”, we do not know
from his writings whether his muscles tensed, his jaw clenched, and his brow
furrowed when penning his graphic testimony. Nor do we know whether tears
fell down his cheeks when leaving his family at 16 years of age, or if his heart
beat fast with his intimate encounters. We can, however, accept that “emotions
 Planting the colonial narrative 145

are not simply biological reactions but also involve an interplay between body
and mind” (Stearns and Stearns 1985, p. 834). Yet if, as social constructionists
argue, emotions are constructed and shaped by the society in which they
operate, how do we assess Taylor in this light? His background was Scottish
and his letters were sent to his family in Scotland so, presumably, he would
continue to replicate his home society’s rules for feeling and behaviour and
convey emotions that his family would understand. But did being exposed to a
different culture in Ceylon, particularly that of his Tamil workers, but also local
Sinhalese, generate an alternative emotional life for Taylor? Such questions
connect to interdisciplinary debates as to whether emotions are universally
the same in every culture over time, or whether they are culturally specific,
reflecting the society in which they exist. In other words, do particular social,
political and cultural contexts shape the expression of emotions? Perhaps the
best response at this stage is to acknowledge that cultures might experience
similar feelings, but express them differently.

Conclusion
In conclusion, there are three key methodological points that I want to
make. First, if we focus solely on James Taylor’s account of the Indian rebel-
lion without considering the influences on him, and his impressions of other
peoples at that period in time, then we gain a skewed portrait of him. Further,
if Taylor’s extracts that began this chapter were used uncritically without
consulting the remainder of his 40-​year correspondence, we would be left with
a sense in which he provided completely derogatory statements about the native
peoples that he encountered in South Asia. An interrogation of the full extent
of his personal correspondence reveals, instead, that his impressions varied
over time and included positive and negative content. In part, his attitudes
were indeed shaped by the legacy of the Indian rebellion, but they were also
influenced by other factors. An historical approach to migrant letters which
concerns itself with temporality, the key thrust of the discipline, is therefore an
important disciplinary agenda to signal here.
Second, an historical approach, with its ability to contextualise narratives
and situate them in a temporal framework, has broader resonance to twenty-​
first century concerns such as the Black Lives Matter movement, calls to bring
down historical statues, and assessment of the role of individuals in the past,
as opposed to wider structural forces. Taylor’s account of the Indian uprising
also throws light on the scapegoating of other peoples during times of violent
rebellion or moral panic, a continuity that we see today. His narrative of the
Indian rebellion also shows the influence of the print media on his mindset.
Finally, historians can also benefit from interdisciplinary pursuits. For
instance, incorporating the study of emotions into an historical analysis of
migrant narratives helps provide an important corrective, and a degree of
balance to the current dominance of important strands in “economic ration-
alist” (Boccagni and Baldassar 2015, p. 2) approaches to the study of human
146 Angela McCarthy

mobility. While some scholars might argue that interrogating emotions through
the prism of one person is less satisfying than that of several voices, the dur-
ation of Taylor’s correspondence offers valuable insights which can helpfully be
compared with research on groups of individuals (Rosenwein 2010, pp. 12, 21).
The James Taylor story likewise provides a valuable perspective from beyond
the middle and upper classes who, thus far, have attracted most attention in
studies of the history of emotions (Matt 2011, p. 122).

Notes
1 This chapter draws on some material in McCarthy and Devine 2017.
2 Reproduction of the spelling and grammar contained in the original letters remains
unaltered. Minor editorial excisions include italics to clarify words or suggest what
Taylor meant, while suggestions for illegible words are made in parentheses with a
question mark.
3 James Taylor (Loolecondera) to his father Michael Taylor (Mosspark), 24 July 1857,
Papers of James Taylor, planter in Ceylon, MS 15908, National Library of Scotland
(NLS). All extracts from Taylor are from his correspondence held at the NLS.
4 A further Taylor photograph album is held at National Museums Scotland, together
with the silver tea service presented to him in 1891.
5 James Taylor (Loolecondera) to his father Michael Taylor (Mosspark), 25 January
1873. The only proprietary interest in land that James Taylor ever had was in Lover’s
Leap, Nuwara Eliya, which he opened as a cinchona plantation before it was taken
over by mortgagees; see “Pioneers of the Planting Enterprise in Ceylon”, Tropical
Agriculturalist, 2 July 1894, p. 4.
6 Taylor letters, 3 December 1857.
7 These two photographs appear in the albums held with his letters in Papers of James
Taylor, NLS, MS 15908.
8 Taylor’s original will has not been located. For further discussion, see McCarthy and
Devine 2017, Chapter 8.

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3: Global perspectives. New Delhi: SAGE, 1–​17.
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Part IV

Collective narratives
Stories as a way of doing
community
Marie Johanna Karner

The following section will focus on analysing collective narratives to under-

stand the cultural codes, shared identity and beliefs that bind members of
diasporic communities or migrant groups. In social science and community
psychology literature, the term “collective narrative” or “community (setting)
narrative” (Rappaport 2000, p. 4) is used in two different ways. It can refer
to single stories that recall specific events, relate them in the same order and
present the same ending (see 5.1). Constructing a collective or ethnic iden-
tity: “involves, among other things, a gradual layering on and connecting of
events and meanings, the construction of a collective narrative” (Cornell 2000,
p. 42 f.). In contrast, a more popular understanding of “community narrative”
relates to the idea that group members who talk about a common theme in
their lives, speak not just of themselves, but of, and for others with the same
fate: “The individual tale becomes a collective tale: the one voice may be the
voice of many” (Plummer 2001, p. 31). This consolidation of diverse stories
into a multifaceted story happens through communication and social inter-
action with both its members and non-​members (Vargas et al. 2020, p. 979).
According to these two notions, collective narratives can be identified at least
in two ways: From the interviewing process, by asking members about the
personal or historical narratives of their particular community, or, from the
analysis and coding of themes that emerge across personal stories expressed by
community members (Olson et al. 2016, p. 44).
Both understandings correspond with the premise that: “[t]‌hese narratives
tell members important things about themselves. […] A community cannot be
a community without a shared narrative” (Rappaport 2000, p. 4, 6). Members
hold common stories about who they are, where they come from, and what
they aspire to in the future. Collective narratives are shared through social
interaction, pictures, texts, rituals and performances. They are either direct, or
coded as visual images, symbols and ritualised behaviour. Thus, members might
be unaware of the narratives they implicitly accept, enact and use to create their
life stories. Moreover, these narratives circulate across boundaries. Facilitated

DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-14
150 Marie Johanna Karner

by digital communication, a social group with a shared narrative may consti-

tute a community, independent of its physical location. Community narratives
are to be distinguished from “personal stories” unique to an individual and
from “dominant cultural narratives”. The latter are communicated through
mass media, or, other large cultural and social institutions and networks. These
three types of narratives, indeed, influence and relate to each other: Individual
identities are shaped by the community narratives they receive. Likewise, indi-
viduals shape and recreate collective narratives by appropriating them into
their own personal life stories (Rappaport 2000, p. 4, 6, 7). A presence of col-
lective narratives in individuals’ self-​accounts indicates shared experiences and
a shared collective identity (Salzer 1998, p. 570). They express culture and con-
text of a community, and, allow members to build social relationships with
each other.
Over time, community narratives can grow in number and volume. They
have the potential to counter popularly held dominant cultural narratives, and,
associated stereotyped images that determine policies relevant for migrants.
This is because they provide ways to create “alternative narratives”, “defending
narratives” and “group-​enhancement narratives” (Salzer 1998, p. 577, 579). The
latter deal with mutual caring, community projects and good times that oppose
dominant discourses in society. Which stories capture the mind of a commu-
nity depends on those privileged to tell them, and, whether a story reinforces
self-​interests and resonates with the communities’ culture and collective action.
From an analytical perspective, collective narratives express shared
diasporic identities, the communities’ history, its organisation, characteristics,
priorities, and self-​understanding, as well as the group awareness and expected
behaviour among its members (Vargas et al. 2020, p. 979). Narrative analysis
is considered as the starting point to understand the “culture” of a group;
that means its belief systems, social norms, values, primary interests, practices
and problems. To privilege the perspective of members, social scientists apply
different qualitative research tools. They analyse archival, interview and obser-
vational or ethnographic data to detect community narratives, their meaning
and societal impact. The construction of a collective narrative by a scholar
usually rests on a diverse range of perspectives within the collective narrative
depending on the role of members.
A guiding concept for many community scholars is that of empowering
research. Within a collaborative approach, they involve a broad set of co-​
participants who face a lack of social, political and economic power. To work
for social change, community scholars discover and build on the group’s
strength, support members to better articulate their aspirations and enhance
their openness to new ideas and opportunities. They try to discover, create
and disseminate “alternative narratives” or “group-​enhancement narratives”
(Salzer 1998, p. 577) to amplify voices and counter stereotyped images. As a
result, the increasing attention of “voices from below” (Plummer 2001, p. 96)
at the beginning of the twenty-​first century marks a shift from dominant cul-
tural narratives to a language of resistance and difference.
 Collective narratives 151

Building on this knowledge about “collective narratives”, the two chapters

in this section illustrate the community bonding effects of collective narratives,
and, how they are produced and reproduced by particular speakers. Each chapter
reflects on one of the two mentioned understandings of collective narratives to
shed light on the following questions: Who composes community narratives
and with what intention? What do the stories express about the group? And
how do they function as cohesive glue or as a form of empowerment?
The contribution by Marie Johanna Karner (5.1) about the “Titanic Legacy”
examines why single stories about certain incidents are resources for diasporic
communities. The story is constructed by retelling different versions of the story
to highlight the multiplicity of voices, as well as the strategic use of digital com-
munication tools and channels. This allows the crucial elements of collective
narratives to be grasped, as well as, why they have effects on their members
individual lives to be understood and by whom they are (re-​)produced. Based
on a multi-​method approach that combines qualitative interviews, participant
observation as well as an analysis of media content, it becomes clear that a few
members are extremely committed to preserving the communities’ collective
identity, group consciousness and sense of responsibility. They not only frame
the narratives plausibly in time and space to enhance credibility, but also por-
tray some ancestors as heroes to enhance identification. The mediated expected
behaviour provides orientation for old and new members, thus ensuring the
continuation of the community and its adaptation to surrounding and group
internal changes. As such, collective narratives convey implicit imperatives to
socialise individuals independent of their actual descent and migration experi-
ence into the group, and to be assured of the community’s aspired unity and
solidarity.
The contribution by Mita Banerjee (5.2) analyses a series of YouTube
videos named “GermanLifeStyle” as a form of migrant autoethnography.
In line with the above mentioned, more widely used, understanding of col-
lective narratives, Banerjee understands the voices of Abdul Abbasi and
Allaa Faham as the voices of Syrian refugees. The author argues that the two
Syrian bloggers try to sabotage stereotypes of the German mainstream public.
Rather than focusing on stories of victimisation, they make use of self-​irony
and mockery of the “German lifestyle” from the perspective of migrants. By
disseminating the videos on a broadly accessible online platform, the scripted
and staged performances of the YouTubers also engage in community building
among Syrian refugees and migrants. As the videos combine the genres of
migrant documentary, slapstick comedy and advice literature, they not only
translate bizarre German cultural codes for Syrian refugees, but also explain
Syrian cultural habits to Germans. In these clips, the migrant becomes the
ethnographer who presents its multiple audiences a ‘thick description’ of
German culture, and, uses humour as a key means to defuse xenophobia. In
this manner, “GermanLifeStyle” also interferes with the codes of ethnography
and confounds the power hierarchy between the ‘native’ or immigrant and the
culture of the ethnographer.
152 Marie Johanna Karner

Bibliography
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eds. We are a People. Narrative and multiplicity in constructing ethnic identity.
Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 41–​53.
Olson, B. D., et al., 2016. Community narratives. In: L. A. Jason and D. S. Glenwick, eds.
Handbook of methodological approaches to community-​based research. Qualitative,
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Community Psychology, 28 (1), 1–​24. doi: 10.1023/​A:1005161528817
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10.1002/​(SICI)1520-​6629(199811)26:6<569::AID-​JCOP4>3.0.CO;2-​Z.
Vargas, M. C., Garabiles, M. R., and Hall, B. J., 2020. Narrative identities of overseas
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Psychology, 48, 977–​993. doi: 10.1002/​jcop.22318
11 The “Titanic legacy”
Collective narratives as resources of
diasporic communities

Marie Johanna Karner

Narrative –​Did you know about the link between Kfarsghab and the Titanic?
“This group was in Marseille, ready to embark on the Titanic and continue
their journey to the USA when one of them, Betros Ibrahim Kassis became
ill. Instead of continuing their trip, the group decided to remain with him.
This expression of affection for each other was in fact providential, because,
as it turned out, the Titanic hit an iceberg and sank in the Atlantic” (AKLA
1971, p. 10). In the early 1970s, these anecdotal lines about supposedly 26
people, were circulated in a community magazine as part of the reconstructed
migration history of a Lebanese village called Kfarsghab. In 1998 the same
magazine recounted the story for a second time, followed by a list of 33
names: “The ill health of Mr Boutros Kassis prevented the whole group from
taking the mighty ship to New York, due to the affinity that members of the
Kfarsghab Community have towards each other” (AKLA 1998, p. 15). The
Maronite village Kfarsghab is located in the Wadi Qadisha (Holy Valley) in
North Lebanon. Today, about 90 percent of “Kfarsghabis”, as people from
the village of Kfarsghab like to call themselves, live in Australia, the USA
and several other countries due to a long migration history (estimated 16,000
to 20,000 individuals).
In the 1990s, two newspaper articles also reported the story in the Lebanese
press based on information from Kfarsghabis who had spoken to contem-
porary witnesses. With reference to one of these articles in Beirut’s Al-​Anwar
Newspaper from 1994, the “tale” is also recounted in a monograph about the
Titanic’s Arab-​speaking passengers and provides information on the reactions
in Kfarsghab:

There is also the story of a group of 35 whose safety came about due to an
ironic twist of fate and as a result of the illness of one person. […] The group
reached Marseilles and readied themselves for Cherbourg where they would
board the Titanic. However, in Marseilles, one member of the Kafar Sghāb
group, Butrus al-​Qassīs […] took ill. […] Since the villagers had made a pact
to travel in one group, on news that one of their party would not be able to
continue, they decided to cancel their plans. […] In the meantime, news of
DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-15
154 Marie Johanna Karner

the Titanic’s sinking reached the village of Kafar Sghāb. Church bells rang
out in mourning bidding the deceased their last honors. Grief was so intense
that people, friends and family alike, filled the streets agonizing over the
loss of their fellow villagers. […] Finally, when a telegram arrived informing
the village that the group of friends and relatives were safe in Marseilles,
mourning turned to celebration. Kafar Sghāb learned that plans for travel
were to be made on another ship and it appears from Manifest records,
specifically that of La Bretagne sailing from Le Havre to Ellis Island, that a
number of this group arrived on the 18th of April, others later.
(Elias 2011, p. 35ff., italics in the original)

As proof, the author presents a detailed list of 35 names compiled by

Kfarsghabis. She compares these names with ship manifest records, specific-
ally arrivals in Ellis Island on the “La Bretagne” from Le Havre.
At an exhibition in Sydney in 2012 which commemorated 125 years of
migration from Kfarsghab to Australia, curators of the Australian Kfarsghab
Association (AKA) highlighted the “Sinking of The Titanic” story. On the
exhibition’s display board, they emphasise the group’s solidarity:

Members of the Kfarsghabi community had planned to migrate to the

USA on the Titanic. However, one day before departure, Boutros Abraham
Kassis became ill and the other members of the party decided not to go
without him. The mutual love and bond between the members of the com-
munity was ultimately responsible in saving the lives of all those listed below
[40 names listed].

Three years later, the news website AL-​Mohajer (which is Arabic for “The
Emigrant”) reported about “the miracle” in 2015, which “saved 33 men from
the Titanic Tragedy”. In contrast to previous versions, this narrative locates
the group in England, but also presents details about communal mourning
back home:

Father Boutros got sick and was taken to a hospital in London. Then the
group decided to postpone their trip to wait for Father Boutros’s recovery.
News about the sinking of the giant Titanic were aired on radios […].
[V]‌illagers of Kferzghob went to the houses whose kids were supposedly
on the Titanic, to present their condolences and sympathies, thinking that
Kferzghob is the village which suffered the most, not knowing that the mir-
acle happened, because of the sudden sickness of the ‘Abouna’ [Arabic for
priest] before the Titanic took off from Southampton port in Great Britain.
(Nader 2015)

With reference to this online source, the story was posted four months later
in the largest Facebook group of the Kfarsghabi community comprising 1690
members (as of 12 November 2020) in English and Arabic:
 The “Titanic legacy” 155

Did you know [about] the link between Kfarsghab and the Titanic? Thirty-​
three Lebanese from Kfarsghab had tickets to migrate to America on the
famous Titanic. They were saved miraculously from boarding the Titanic!
How? Father Boutros Alkhassis, the group coordinator, got sick and was
taken to a London hospital. Thus, the entire group decided to postpone
their trip and wait for his recovery. Later the news reached about the sinking
of Titanic, and condolences were given to the relatives since nobody had
known that the miracle happened. Tell us… what do you think the lesson is
from this story? We think that this demonstrates that love and unity should
always be our common objectives.
(Khoury and Stephan 2015)

To date, the post has received 60 “Likes” and comments like: “All for one… and
one for all. Support and care for your loved ones.”; “we hope to see this pure
love again”; “Currently… we are not united enough and we don’t demonstrate
enough solidarity. I hope we wake up and change our habits”; “[Name] used
to tell us this story, I’m glad to hear it really happened!!”; “I love this story.
My Giddy [Arabic for grandpa] tells me this all the time. The lesson learnt
is never leave a man or woman behind” (7/​8 May 2015). One post included a
screenshot of a scene from the epic disaster movie Titanic (1997) directed by
James Cameron with the remark: “This guy was not from Kfarsghab”. The
screenshot shows Rose’s (Kate Winslet) rich and arrogant fiancé Caldon (Billy
Zane) when he tries to garner a seat on a rescue boat by carrying an unknown
helpless child (Figure 11.1).
When a Lebanese genealogist who visited all the Lebanese villages claiming
Titanic victims came to Kfarsghab in 2017, he received information incon-
sistent with his sources stating that 24 Kfarsghabis (Karam 1998) were about
to board the Titanic. Therefore, he characterised the story he was told by
residents as “legacy” in the following Facebook post in which further meanings
are revealed:

The legacy mentioned this incident differently by stating that this Group
was 36 […] and they were already on board of the Titanic, but one of them
was so ill which made the crew confirm that if this man died, then he will
be thrown into the sea so not to infect other passengers. The Group started
praying to St. Awtel to help them. Later they arrived at a port where the
crew wanted to bring the ill man down; however, his entire friends came
down with him. Their prayers accordingly have saved them all and St. Awtel
was the one to help about that.
(Badawi 2017)

An album encompassing 161 pictures of the village taken by the genealogist

accompanied the post. It was shared 227 times, received 553 likes as well as 45
comments (as of 17 January 2021) appreciating his work: “Thank you from
the bottom of my heart [name]!!!”. The genealogist answers as follows: “My
156 Marie Johanna Karner

Figure 11.1 Facebook comment by a Kfarsghabi with reference to the Hollywood

movie Titanic (8 May 2015). Courtesy of George Daniel.

pleasure:) I loved your village Dr. and it was a true pleasure of mine being
there and exploring its beauty”. He is then asked the following question in
the comments: “[Name] are you sure you are not an honorary Kfarsghabi??”;
“Who knows [name]”.
Community members overseas narrate this story with different framings
and references. In Easton, Pennsylvania, where many Kfarsghabis reside today,
the story is usually linked to their migration history to the USA (Karam 1998):

1912, before the war, another group, they were coming on the Titanic. […]
One of the guys got sick. As we are from the mountains of Lebanon: We
know each other, we love each other, we all relate… We make decisions. The
guys –​they didn’t wanna leave the sick man alone. They stayed with him in
Marseille. Five, six days later, the boat blew up, I mean, people in Lebanon,
in Kfarsghab, when they heard about the Titanic, they held funerals, all
the families, they thought the boys were gone. And little by little, couple of
days later, they got the news they were not in the boat. They were supposed
to be on the Titanic, but Mr. Kassis got sick. They stayed with him. They
survived. They all visited Sayet el Hosn, Our Lady at the top of Ehden to
thank her. She saved the boys. Nobody got hurt… .
(Interview in Easton, 28 July 2015)
 The “Titanic legacy” 157

In Sydney, the president of the AKA emphasises that he supports the story,
be it true or not, in a conversation with his father: Son: “I’ve heard the story
many times. And I often wonder how true it is that they were on the Titanic, and
then got off because one of them got sick. So, they all got off.”; Father: “Yeah,
that’s right.”; Son: “Yeah, it needs a bit of fact in there to prove the story. But
it’s a good story if it’s true. It’s a good story even though it may not be true,
I don’t know.”; Father: “No, it’s true.”; Son: “Yeah, I know.”; Father: “One
of our cousins was there.”; Son: “Yeah?”; Father: “Yeah!”; Son: “Well, there
you go.”; Father: “I heard it from his mates. […] He’s their first cousin. […]
They stopped in Marseille, I think. Yeah.”; […] Son: “They must have been
on another journey, because it went from England to New York when it sank.
Didn’t it?”; Father: “No, they were going to pick it up over there.”; Son: “Oh,
they were going to go on the Titanic?”; Father: “[…] Yeah! And one of them
got sick.”; Son: “So, they didn’t end up going” (Conversation in Sydney, 10
December 2014). To better understand the family’s kinship links to members
concerned, father and son subsequently consulted the hand-​drawn historical
family tree which is prominently hanging in their hallway at home.
In addition, the story is also recounted on websites of Kfarsghabi institutions
in Sydney and Easton:

Rather than leave him behind by himself, the rest of the group decided to
stay with him until he was fit to travel. The ship sailed without the Kfarsghab
group and subsequently crashed into an ice-​berg. The illness of Ibrahim
Kassis and the brotherly feelings shown to him by the rest of the group
saved the lives of 33 Kfarsghabi persons. There are still five people alive
from that group.
(AKA 2020; similar at Karam 1998)

The same text was posted by a member residing in Lebanon on Instagram with
the following introductory words: “This post is a special one. My favourite
immigration story from our village. The story of how community saved 33
lives” (22 August 2020) (Figure 11.2).
Thanks to such channels of dissemination, the story is also known to
non-​Kfarsghabis. A resident of Bane, Lebanon, highlights the gravity of the
assumed loss for the local community. In a mocking way, he links the story to
the apparently excessive support system that Kfarsghabis seemingly maintain
overseas:

They back each other up and they stick to each other. They are not very
open to other communities, but they have relationships, you know social
relationships with other communities, but they stick together and they are
the wealthiest. […] There is real honest solidarity between Kfarsghabiyye.
[…] I want you to laugh about the Kfarsghabiyye. There were those 40 guys
on board the Titanic and one of them got sick in Marseille and he had to
158 Marie Johanna Karner

Figure 11.2 Instagram post by a Kfarsghabi using a historical photograph of RMS

Titanic (22 August 2020). Courtesy of Courtney Abood.

stay there, he was sick… they couldn’t get him on board the ship, not any-
more, it was the responsibility. And the rest of them go: ‘Well, if he doesn’t
go up the ship, we don’t go up the ship’ and they stayed there. And the
Titanic sank. That was back in 19 something, very early in the 20th century,
there was no really good communication, so the town didn’t know, they
only knew that the Titanic sank. And they started crying and tearing out
their hair, and you know the woman all wear black and stuff and the town
was mourning for like 30, 40 days. They had lost so many young people. It
was a disaster, real national disaster for Kfarsghabiyye. And then one day,
after like a month and a half, they came back and they find their town in
shambles, you know, everyone is broken hearted, and everybody is crying
and then they see that they are all alive and they come back [loud laughter].
This is a historic truth. […] They did funerals, they did everything, but there
were no bodies, you know, because they sunk in the sea so [loud laughter] it
was funny. Happy ending! […] 30 or 40 people, a huge number for a village,
a huge number of their youth.
(Interview in Bane, 15 August 2014)

Methodological reflections –​Narrative repertoires of “communities of

practice”
Within the framework of a research project on “Lebanese Global Villages”,
I studied the Kfarsghabi community. The overall aim was to gain a better
understanding of the continuing cohesiveness of diasporic communities in
the twenty-​first century. Their members “ever-​increasing use of transnational
digital communication technologies has become central in supporting,
 The “Titanic legacy” 159

organizing, and disseminating shared narratives, memories, and experi-

ence” (Tsagarousianou and Retis 2019, p. 6). This is one of the reasons why
diasporic communities do not dissolve although individualisation and integra-
tion dynamics continue. In line with such findings of transnational migration
studies, the Kfarsghabi case study stands as an example “that in times of social
dispersion community is no longer a question of territorial fixedness but of
constant interaction” (Greschke and Ott 2000, p. 138).
Contrary to romanticised notions of community (Brint 2001, pp. 3–​7),
this chapter examines sustained social obligations that potentially change
through narratives which transcend national borders. Accordingly, I concep-
tualise diasporic groups as “communities of practice” (Wenger 1998, p. 83)
whose members produce or adopt, among other things, stories as part of their
“shared repertoire”. From a narrative perspective, practitioners’ stories are
seen as central to meaning-​making by re-​interpreting certain events, the rela-
tionship among actors and surrounding contexts:

[A]‌community can strengthen the identity of participation of its members

in two related ways: [firstly,] by incorporating its members’ pasts into its his-
tory –​that is, by letting what they have been, what they have done, and what
they know contribute to the constitution of its practice [and secondly,] by
opening trajectories of participation that place engagement in its practice in
the context of a valued future.
(Wenger 1998, p. 215)

In accordance with both ways as indicated by Wenger, I collected stories linked

to past experiences of members to identify those narratives that inform about
aspirations and expectations towards members. Why and how narratives like
the “Titanic legacy” are (re)produced as a “powerful resource” (Rappaport
1998, p. 229) will be analysed in the third part of this chapter.
I started my empirical work in Lebanon in the summer of 2014. Repeated
stays in Kfarsghab established a basis of trust which had a positive impact
on my empirical work in other places where members predominantly reside.
While following a multi-​sited approach, I qualitatively interviewed a total of 55
Kfarsghabis as well as 17 individuals who do not consider themselves members
of the community, but have an insider-​outsider perspective on the commu-
nity like priests and consuls. I conducted the interviews in Kfarsghab (2014–​
2017), Sydney/​Australia (2014 and 2016), Easton/​Pennsylvania/​USA (2015),
Providence/​Rhode Island/​USA (2018) and Dubai (UAE) (2014 and 2015) in
English, which is the everyday language of most of the members. With a few
exceptions, most interview partners agreed to digital recordings. It is important
to highlight here that I never explicitly asked the people with whom I conversed
to tell community narratives like the “Titanic legacy”. On the contrary, they
often told such tales once the recording device had been switched off, in the
car, on the way to community gatherings, or during informal group discussions
at the more than 80 events that I observed as a participant. Village festivals,
160 Marie Johanna Karner

board meetings, religious ceremonies and family gatherings provided numerous

contexts for informal exchange about such anecdotes. This demonstrates that it
takes time to build trust and familiarity with a community to capture disparate
voices.
Narratives like the “Titanic legacy” are not only circulated orally, but also in
written form. They are illustrated with the help of visual material and since the
mid-​1990s are increasingly shared online. In the course of my empirical work,
interview partners provided historical documents (e.g. newspaper clippings,
photographs), jubilee and memorial booklets, digital copies of exhibition
posters, as well as, issues of the AKLA News (Australian Kfarsghab Lebanese
Association News) that were published between 1968 and 2000. Out of 49
issues of this community magazine, I compiled 43, which I searched for stories
recounting the “Titanic legacy”. In addition, community researchers granted
access to private Facebook groups and genealogical databases. Besides the
analogue and digital material provided by Kfarsghabis, I used online search
engines to explore blog posts, online articles and websites about the “Lebanese
on the Titanic”. Facebook and Instagram also proved to be useful search tools
for keyword searches on the topic.
To present the “Titanic legacy”, I have chosen to retell different versions of
the story separately, and in a roughly chronological order of their appearance
starting from the 1970s through 2020. Highlighting this multiplicity of
voices allows us to analyse not only the differences in detail (e.g., number of
Kfarsghabis, names mentioned, places where the events occurred); but also
the use and trustworthiness of different tools and channels over time. I delib-
erately chose not to construct one consistent story out of the versions of mul-
tiple co-​tellers, because the inconsistencies and deviations in particular allow
conclusions to be drawn about how credibility and identification is enhanced.
It must be noted here that the reproduced sources contain grammatical and
spelling corrections to facilitate better readability. However, different spellings
of names and places were not unified. Moreover, I added direct quotes from
interviews to provide insight into the conveyed moral lesson.
To draw conclusions about the significance of collective narratives for the
enduring cohesion of diasporic communities in the next section, I used mul-
tiple methods and analysed the following diverse data packages based on
an interdisciplinary approach: (a) Conversations with community members
are fundamental to identify narratives like the “Titanic legacy” and gain
insight into different meanings. (b) The analysis of the dissemination of such
narratives in analogue (e.g. community newspapers) and digital (e.g. social
media platforms) ways shows best how accentuations vary to enhance identi-
fication. The comment section of online posts helps to assess prevailing inter-
pretations. (c) Interviews with practitioners who dedicate themselves to collect
stories and circulate their “findings” within the community, reveal motives for
the dissemination of certain narratives. They also provide information about
power relations within communal knowledge production. (d) Moreover, his-
torical sources and media productions dealing with the respective incident (e.g.
 The “Titanic legacy” 161

sinking of the RMS Titanic) must be included. However, the analysis will not
focus on whether the narrative is “true” or “false”, but rather how historical
“facts” are used to corroborate the plausibility of a story. (e) Data gathered
through participant observation helps to assess the significance of circulated
implicit imperatives on everyday practices of community members. In add-
ition, documentation and retelling practices can be observed.
The successive qualitative content analysis thus involved interview transcripts,
my personal notes as well as analogue and digital material. Based on an inductive
approach, I generated categories with the help of MAXQDA that deal with
elements, effects and the (re)production of collective narratives. The interplay of
these categories illustrates how certain practitioners reinforce collective identity
and translocal solidarity through myths like the “Titanic legacy”.

Analysis –​Elements, effects and (re)production of collective narratives

Single stories told by group members that relate certain events in an equivalent
order and end in the same way can be regarded as collective narratives (Prins
et al. 2013, p. 84). They can become important in meaning-​making processes
as individuals can learn a concrete lesson, or even, gain a deep insight about
life through such stories (McAdams and McLean 2013, p. 234). More broadly,
the texts and subtexts of the various communities to which individuals belong
are resources with powerful effects on their members’ lives. Thus, stories create
memory, meaning, emotion and identity by giving direction and meaning
(Rappaport 1998, p. 227, 238).
However, not all incidents count as highly tellable events to be recounted in
a compelling manner by multiple co-​tellers. Depending on personal and com-
munity evaluative frameworks, high tellability often applies to incidents that
involve a violation of moral standards (Ochs 2004, p. 284) or –​in the case of
the “Titanic legacy” –​on approbation for those who adhere to them. Hence,
collective narratives encode and affirm shared moral stances and beliefs, from
which members derive coherence and group cohesiveness (Nelson 2003, p. 127):

A sine qua non of membership in a community is recognition and respect of

moral standards of right and wrong. Every community holds members mor-
ally accountable for their actions, thoughts, and feelings. They are treated as
moral agents and expected to do what is good for particular situations, roles
relationships, institutions, and society […].
(Ochs and Capps 2001, p. 102)

Collective narratives are part of the communicative repertoire dedicated to

maintaining morality. Apart from these findings, it remains unclear in current
literature how collective narratives of diasporic communities are framed and
endowed with meaning, why they affect the life of members, and by whom they
are (re)produced. By taking the “Titanic legacy” as an example, this chapter’s
analytical contribution is to firstly reveal crucial elements of collective
162 Marie Johanna Karner

narratives of diasporic groups and explain variations in detail. Secondly,

I elaborate on the effects of collective narratives as a sense-​making resource
for the community. Finally, I disclose how these narratives are collaboratively
(re)produced among different practitioners.

Crucial elements of collective narratives: Temporal/​Spatial

framing, role models and implicit imperatives
Collective narratives are framed in time and space to enhance embeddedness
(Ochs 2004, p. 283) and credibility. Accordingly, the presented story is closely
linked to the RMS Titanic, which sank after striking an iceberg in 1912. The
actual event is regarded as the “first collective nightmare” of the twentieth
century (Heyer 1995, p. ix) especially because RMS Titanic was considered the
ultimate passenger liner, incomparable in luxury, size, technology and security.
By referring to the RMS Titanic, the “Titanic legacy of the Kfarsghabis”
expresses that the villagers were already connected to the world over a hundred
years ago. The claimed plan to carry out their migration project on an ocean
liner thought unsinkable, which symbolises modernity, control of nature, pro-
gress and “cultural extravagance” (Heyer 1995, p. 103), makes Kfarsghabis
appear as progressive people who meet Western cultural history on equal
terms. Similarly, this is also expressed by the assertion that news stories of the
event reached residents in Kfarsghab promptly.
Storytellers name specific places to lend authenticity to the narrative. Besides
Southampton (England) and Cherbourg (France) –​the first two ports of call
of the RMS Titanic, London (England) and Marseille (France) are mentioned
depending on the memories, experiences and imaginations of narrators. The
latter was the Mediterranean port where many migrants from the Middle
East arrived before they travelled to Paris to take the “Train Transatlantique”
to Cherbourg (Abisaab 2015, p. 9). Such divergent information on the place
where one Kfarsghabi allegedly fell ill do not raise any questions from the audi-
ence, because the information seems plausible with the known RMS Titanic’s
ports of departure. Even incorrect information, e.g. that the Titanic exploded,
are often not challenged by listeners.
Embellishing references to certain characters strengthen the listeners’ ability
to identify with the story. To increase identification, listeners are confronted
with the names of their closest relatives who allegedly survived the tragedy,
which is why different names are mentioned depending on the group addressed.
This contributes to the construction of role models, i.e. legendary community
members whose solidarity-​oriented behaviour is considered exemplary:

Hero[e]‌s are important for members of any community, despite, or perhaps

because, they become mythological in the sense of larger (better) than life.
They often illustrate for us what we can aspire to. This is one way a commu-
nity defines itself and makes available to its members new possible selves.
(Rappaport 2000, p. 2)
 The “Titanic legacy” 163

The heroisation also applies to other passengers from Lebanon aboard the Titanic.
They are acknowledged for their “hardship, resilience, courage and determination”
(ILTC 2012) by community researchers who give public talks about their fates as
known from Vancouver (Abisaab 2015) in 2015 and Halifax in 2014 where more
than a hundred Titanic victims are buried. Simultaneously, Kfarsghabis distance
themselves from protagonists in the movie Titanic who behave in an antisocial
manner, as the Facebook comment about Rose’s fiancé reveals.
Likewise, written retellings of the “Titanic legacy” usually contain a list
naming those involved. Although the names and numbers in the different
sources do not correspond, such listings enhance credibility. One example is
the aforementioned book written by an a non-​Kfarsghabi. It refers to mani-
fest records of ships which sailed to Ellis Island after the disaster happened
on 15 April 1912 to verify the members of the “Titanic group”. This recon-
struction based on manifest records contradicts other versions that describe
the group’s alleged return to Kfarsghab. Such inconsistencies, however, have
no influence on the popularity of the story. Many listeners do not question,
or, dwell on contradictions as genealogist and historians tend to do. According
to their studies, the stated numbers for Lebanese on board the Titanic vary
between 100 and 174 due to anglicised or misspelled names, and, the fact
that Lebanese immigrants were classified as Syrians, Turkish, Ottoman and
Assyrian (Abisaab 2015).
Building on plausibility and identification, collective narratives can provide
guidance for everyday life by conveying implicit imperatives. For Kfarsghabis,
the moral lesson of their Titanic story is to always stick together, even if the
purpose is not yet apparent at the moment of decision. Even though the
Titanic promised a way to obtain the American dream, Kfarsghabis stayed
ashore when one of them became ill. Here it is noteworthy that only in a few
versions of the story this member is supposedly the priest. Very likely, such
versions are told by members of the clergy who want to emphasise the uncon-
ditional orientation towards the priest. In the rural Maronite communities of
what is now Lebanon, priests were not only religious leaders, but also social
leaders, who served the interest of their community thanks to resources and
power. To this day, Maronite priests in Lebanon and in the diaspora take on
leadership roles, but they can lose influence and increasingly compete with
other members who are committed to the community in social, economic and
cultural fields. Therefore, the imperative to follow the priest is no longer preva-
lent today, as shown in the example of the Facebook post from 2015. Although
the sick person is referred to as “father”, community members summarise the
meaning of the story with the phrase: “All for one, and one for all”. This inter-
textual reference to the historical adventure novel “The Three Musketeers” by
Dumas ([1844] 1893) emphasises solidarity with each other at eye level. In a
figurative sense, Kfarsghabis today will only be resilient if they support each
other without being asked. This variation shows that associated imperatives
depend on the perspective of the narrator, and, on the interpretation of the
listener with the potential to change over time.
164 Marie Johanna Karner

Some versions of the story also assert that Kfarsghabis prayed and
turned to the patron saint of their village who miraculously saved them
according to their belief. Metaphorically speaking, the saint’s protection
is a reward for having respected the norms and values of the Christian
community. Read in this way, the imperative of cohesion is religiously
legitimised. In addition, several stories refer to the traumatic moments of
those left behind in the village, who thought that a remarkable number of
their relatives had died. However, they were not left alone with their grief,
but received support from other villagers. Correspondingly, they celebrated
together when they realised that their relatives had survived the disaster.
This illustrates to members that emotional support is something to strive
for in good, as well as, hard times.

Community-​building effects of the “Titanic legacy”: Solidarity

linked to an imagined ethnicity

Collective narratives can be described as myth if the incidents referred to

“represent more than the ‘facts’ of history […] [and] embody or explain a wider
set of values, beliefs, and aspirations” (Heyer 1995, p. 154). References to fac-
tual or fictitious past events provide clues to the current self-​image of the groups
in question, collective needs and desires (Assmann 2007, p. 52, p. 76ff.). Myths
convey the self-​perception of the group and can be conceptualised as part of
“ancestral diasporic community knowledge” (Urrieta and Martínez 2011).
This includes everyday practices, spiritual rituals (e.g., dances, processions,
cooking) as well as familiarity with collective narratives which serve as the
“cohesive glue of cultural groups” (Nelson 2003, p. 127) and influence the
everyday life of members.
The “Titanic legacy of the Kfarsghabis” is a myth, as it is linked to the his-
torical reality of the disaster of RMS Titanic and provides indications for the
current self-​image and future goals of community members. Their discussions
about the story indicate that it has a foundational or counter-​presentational
function (Assmann 2007, 76ff.). On the one hand, it expresses the collective
desire that the Kfarsghabi spirit will survive if members support each other.
On the other hand, appeals like: “We can accomplish a lot when united, but
zero can be done when working separately” (7 May 2015) call for increasing
unity and adhering to solidarity.
The conveyed shared hopes and implicit imperatives to hold on to soli-
darity, unity and harmony are in opposition to current societal developments.
In comparison to the “Titanic legacy of the Kfarsghabis”, other early famous
disaster narratives about the RMS Titanic metaphorically reflected societal
tensions (Rösler 2013, pp. 52–​115) and experiences of uncertainty (Seeba 1981,
p. 283). The successful Hollywood movie Titanic (1997) pursues a frame shift
from relying on technology and science to believing in the support of inter-
personal commitment (Blothner 2001, p. 2). The enduring love of Rose and
 The “Titanic legacy” 165

Jack (Leonardo DiCaprio) embodies a transcendent connection beyond his

death (Blothner 1999, p. 233). These two aspects of progressiveness and sta-
bilisation through interpersonal support affirmed in the Hollywood movie are
mentioned here, because they may have contributed to the rising popularity of
the “Titanic legacy of the Kfarsghabis”. Their narrative expresses the desire
that members should always stand together to overcome the unknown of the
migration experience and, nowadays, all the difficulties of everyday life. The
key message of the “Titanic legacy” is that choosing community results in pro-
tection and individual benefit over the long term. This nucleus of Kfarsghabi
group identity creates feelings of belonging, protection and guidance in post-
modern times of uncertainty and disorientation.
By implicitly mediating norms, values and imperatives, such myths influ-
ence emotional day-​to-​day practices. They codify practices like visiting the
sick and expressing sympathy as social duties, and thus, ensure the main-
tenance of translocal communities. Mutual sympathy and shared pleasure
trigger the following effects: “Joy shared is joy multiplied. Grief shared is
grief divided” (Interview in Kfarsghab, 21 August 2015). Collective narratives
reflect the desire to preserve spiritual commonalities associated with notions
of transcending bonds among members. The imagination that their cohesion
goes beyond death, leads Kfarsghabis to even bury their deceased in proximity
(e.g., in sections named after Maronite Saints at the Rookwood Cemetery in
Sydney).
The “Titanic legacy” also serves as a reminder of an assumed common origin
from the same place. Kfarsghab is described as a village connected to the world
and emotionally linked to the fate of its migrants. The place is remembered
as a sacred location, where solidarity is a priority. Therefore, the Christian
village symbolises the community bond in terms of spirituality, shared norms
and values. These identity elements manifest themselves in the constructed
Kfarsghabi heroes who survived the disaster because of their solidary behav-
iour that is expected among members. Thus, the “Titanic legacy” illustrates not
only that “collective identities are talked into existence” (Hunt and Benford
2004, p. 445), but also that imagined ethnicity is an artifact of communication
(Fuhse 2008, p. 28).
That said, myths like the “Titanic legacy” contribute to maintaining the
groups’ identity and, simultaneously, provide adolescents and newcomers to
learn about the associated norms and values. The empirical findings indi-
cate that outsiders who have experienced a different socialisation can become
members of diasporic communities regardless of their actual descent.
Therefore, the bond is not only based on imagined kinship, but also, on shared
understandings, mutual interests and adopted supportive, as well as emo-
tional practices. Collective narratives convey implicit imperatives to socialise
individuals (e.g. children, politicians, entrepreneurs) with and without migra-
tion experience to participate in the community, and to be assured of the
community’s aspired unity and solidarity (Karner 2021, pp. 369–​373).
166 Marie Johanna Karner

The dynamic (re)production of the “Titanic legacy”: Storytelling by

committed community librarians and other practitioners

The (re)production of myths of diasporic communities involves not only oral

communication. Some practitioners are extremely committed to preserving the
communities’ collective identity and the groups’ shared values with the following
motivation: “It’s who we are, it’s our roots. And if you don’t write it down, it’s
gone. And it’s gone forever” (Interview in Easton, 28 July 2015). Inspired by
the concept “communities of practice” (Wenger 1998), these storytellers can
be called “community librarians” because they collect, digitalise and archive
data from several sources (e.g. oral histories, databases). Their presentation of
stories takes place on different online and offline platforms (e.g. social media,
exhibitions, panel discussions) by using different communication channels
(e.g., face-​to-​face, digital). To raise identification and credibility, they adapt
the information to the interests and knowledge of their addressees, sometimes
consciously, but often unconsciously. Various self-​produced diasporic media
(e.g., family trees, magazines) come into use to raise the plausibility of a story
(Figure 11.3).
Reactions to versions of the “Titanic legacy” published online and in ana-
logue form show that readers give them particular credibility when compared
to oral sources. However, stories are often (re)produced by members, regard-
less of empirically verifiable facts and contradictions: “Where collaborative
sense-​making […] is the business at hand, narrators may dialogically probe
alternate, sometimes conflicting, versions of what (could have) transpired, and
attempt to piece together moral perspectives on events” (Ochs and Capps 2001,
p. 61). Not the absence of contradictions, but the message of a story is of cen-
tral importance as the cited statement proves: “It’s a good story even though
it may not be true”.
Community librarians provide not only access to knowledge, but collaborate
also with external researchers and journalists who prepare information for a
wider, or scientific, audience. When they recommend people for interviews and
coordinate meetings, they act as gatekeepers. It is not unlikely that they also per-
form as social reporters who document community incidents and interactions
between members. In many cases, the same practitioner undertakes several of
the described roles at the same time, thereby increasing the individual power
on the conservation of memories and (re)production of myths (Figure 11.3).
The popularity of a collective narrative depends, not only on the message
and individual perspective, but also on social discourses and medial influences.
Media reports, art, drama, books, poetry, exhibitions and disaster movies, e.g.,
about the deadliest peacetime sinking of the RMS Titanic (Foster 1997) con-
tinuously revitalised the “Titanic legacy” among the Kfarsghabis. This is clearly
visible in the example of Cameron’s movie Titanic (1997) as it is considered one
of the most successful and emotionally moving productions. Authors of the
AKLA News mention that it motivated them to retell the story in 1998 (AKA
1998, p. 15). Almost 20 years later, a screenshot of the movie posted with a
 The “Titanic legacy” 167

Figure 11.3 The (re)production of diasporic communities through collective narratives.

Copyright Marie Karner.

comment on Facebook attests to its ongoing impact on the imagination of

Kfarsghabis.
As long as storytellers, community librarians, journalists and researchers
(re)produce the “Titanic legacy”, old and new members worldwide will
learn that the cohesion of Kfarsghabis is based on mutual support. Future
modifications of the moral lesson are possible and will be largely determined
by the decisions of community librarians. By retelling narratives in ways that
168 Marie Johanna Karner

offer identification and plausibility, they might shift the associated imperatives
consciously, or, unconsciously. In doing so, they continuously contribute to
the community’s adaptability to new framework conditions and group internal
changes (e.g., power relations, membership), thus ensuring its continuation.

Acknowledgements
I would like to thank the German Research Foundation for financing the pro-
ject “Lebanese Global Villages: Practices of Reproduction and Constitution
of Global Communities”. My sincere gratitude goes to my interview partners
who provided access to documents and the social media platforms of their
communities.

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12 Migrant ethnography on YouTube
“GermanLifeStyle” and the German
“refugee crisis”

Mita Banerjee

Narrative –​Writing Syrian lives: From xenophobia to conversation

Scene 1: A young Syrian man in his twenties, Allaa Faham, is moving around
his apartment. He is handsome and well-​dressed in an ironed shirt and dress
pants. The apartment is well furnished and functional; it looks like an average
German middle-​class home, not like a student’s apartment. Having made him-
self a cup of tea, the young man is about to throw away the teabag. On the
floor, there are two garbage cans. The one on the right is wrapped in a bin liner,
with a face painted on it. This way, the garbage is able to show its emotions.
The young man lovingly looks at it and throws his teabag inside. Immediately,
the garbage can starts frowning. Realizing his mistake, he takes the teabag
back out and removes the metal staple and paper tag. It is only then that the
garbage can starts smiling again. At dinner, the garbage can is sitting across
from the young man at the dinner table, happy and content. He lovingly feeds
it bits from his own plate (5 Sachen die ich in Deutschland liebe 2017).

Scene 2: Allaa Faham is about to enter the bedroom of his apartment. He is

all dressed up, apparently about to go on a date. He is carrying a bunch of
flowers, still wrapped in plastic. He looks excited and a little nervous. When he
opens the door, to his dismay, he finds his roommate Abdul Abbasi in bed with
another person, whose face we cannot see. Glued on top of this person’s face,
there is a picture of Björn Höcke, a leading politician of the German right-​wing
party, AfD. Looking at Allaa Faham, who is still standing in the doorway, we
realise that it was with Björn Höcke that he wanted to go on a date and that
apparently, Höcke has left him for his roommate. Even as Abdul gestures to
him that things are not what they seem, Allaa Faham turns around and leaves,
throwing away the flowers (5 Sachen die ich in Deutschland liebe 2017).

Scene 3: Abdul is sitting on his sofa, lovingly staring at the screen of his laptop,
which he has placed next to him on the sofa. He is watching a soundless video
of Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor. While he is watching Merkel
speak, he is simultaneously texting on his cell phone: “Hi Mrs. Merkel. You
are online. Please reply me”. Abdul turns and exits into the backyard where he
DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-16
172 Mita Banerjee

starts dancing, waltzing around and around to a romantic tune which can be
heard in the background. He is lovingly looking at his dance partner: Angela
Merkel (Syrian Stereotypes in Deutschland 2016).

Scene 4: Allaa Faham is sitting on a bench, alone in the woods. He is looking

straight into the camera. His face seems serious, strained. This expression is
supported by the music, which seems to evoke a tragic or at least pensive mode.
Allaa Faham seems to be looking directly at the viewer, his face entreating,
almost pleading. He starts telling a story: his story. Allaa Faham tells the
audience that he wants the German public to overcome their fears of Syrian
refugees. He assures them that he and his fellow refugees came to Germany not
for economic or personal reasons, but because they were trying to escape from
war, from uncertainty and insecurity. If this were possible, he tells his audience,
they would return to their home country immediately, since everyone yearns
for the country they grew up in. He pleads with the German public to let go of
their fears of, and, prejudices towards, Syrian refugees (Eine Nachricht 2015).

Scene 5: Abdul Abbasi is lying on the sofa, relaxed. His girlfriend, a young white
German woman with long dark hair, is sitting on a chair, looking at Abdul. We
see her face only in profile. While Abdul is talking, being carried away by his
emotions, his girlfriend is listening to him, only occasionally interjecting some-
thing. Abdul is telling her a story about how he imagined her long before he
met her. The image of the moon is a constant metaphor in everything he says.
When he decided to emigrate, he tells his girlfriend, he was thinking only of
her. “But you didn’t even know me then”, she objects. He brushes this objec-
tion aside, continuing to think of metaphors which describe his love for her.
The camera and sound now change to fast-​forward mode, suggesting that this
will go on for minutes, even hours. As the camera and sound resume normal
speed, Abdul is still on the same topic. In the moon, he tells his girlfriend, there
is a little box. In this box, there is his heart, which he is now offering to her. It
is only then that he adds, “And can I go hang out with my friends tonight?”
(Wenn eine Deutsche mit einem Araber zusammen wäre 2016).

Scene 6: Abdul Abbasi is sitting in the front row of a group of Syrian refugees.
They are men and women, all of them young. Some men have beards, others
are clean shaven. One of the women is wearing a head scarf. They have care-
fully arranged a group pose, as if posing for a class photo in a yearbook.
Many of them are smiling into the camera. While we are still looking at the
overall arrangement, trying to take in all the faces at once, Abdul Abbasi
begins talking. This time, he is not talking to a general German public, but
to the members of the AfD, the German right-​wing party “Alternative für
Deutschland” (“An Alternative for Germany”). In what he says, he seems to
be anticipating the replies or reproaches that members of this party might
address at Syrian refugees. “Hi, AfD”, Abdul says, smiling good-​naturedly
into the camera, “this is the refugee crisis speaking. It’s us, the parasites, the
 Migrant ethnography on YouTube 173

alleged tourists, or however your followers prefer to call us”. Abdul’s face, as
he is facing the camera, is calm. He is not angry but reassuring. He simply
wants to talk. “You may be surprised”, Abdul says, looking straight into the
camera, “that we are addressing you in German. . . . No, this is not a unique
case standing in front of the camera here. Many of us have learned to speak
German, some even speak Bavarian. Many of us work, or are in an appren-
ticeship, and very many of us study at the university. Among us, there are tall
and short people. There are even twins!” His words seem to reflect the diver-
sity of the group of fellow refugees standing behind and next to him. They
all continue to look into the camera, as if to reassure the audience that there
is nothing to fear. Each face seems to tell a different story. As the viewer is
still oscillating between the different faces in the group of Syrian refugees and
Abdul, Abdul resumes speaking. He tells the imaginary members of the AfD
that in fact, they should be grateful to them, the Syrians. Without them, Abdul
notes, the AfD might never have been elected to Parliament in the first place.
He has now come, Abdul says, to offer the AfD a deal: Now they have made it
into the German Bundestag, the members of the AfD might actually recipro-
cate and give something to the refugees in return. Instead of only talking about
the refugees, they may want to talk with them for a change. His last word to the
AfD strikes a note of reassurance: “We do not bite” (Flüchtlinge schicken eine
wichtige Botschaft an AFD 2017).

Methodological reflections –​Syrian lives on YouTube: From ethnography to

autoethnography
All of these scenes are taken from a series of videos by Syrian YouTubers
Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham. The video series entitled “GermanLifeStyle”
contains videos which are either in Arabic or German, with Arabic and German
subtitles. Their goal is apparently simple: The two YouTubers, Syrian refugees
who are now enrolled as students at German universities, want to teach their
fellow refugees about the particularities of German culture. While these particu-
larities may sometimes seem bizarre –​such as the German obsession with waste
separation –​Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham suggest that in order for Syrian
refugees to be integrated into German society, it is essential that they master
the German codes of conduct. Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham thus appear
to be mediators between the German mainstream public and the refugees. In
the current German debate on the so-​called “refugee crisis”, which ultimately
caused German chancellor Angela Merkel to step down as the chairwoman of
the “Christian Democratic Party” (“Christlich-​Demokratische Union”, CDU)
and to declare that she will not be up for re-​election, such a translation may
be more important than ever. In the heated debate in which some say German
society is being “swamped” by refugees who refuse to comply with the written
and unwritten codes of German culture, “GermanLifeStyle” functions as a
form of decoding, for Syrian refugees, of their “alien” surroundings. The two
young YouTubers have since published a book titled “Eingedeutscht” (“Turned
174 Mita Banerjee

into a German”) and, in an official ceremony, have even been awarded the
German “integration medal” (“Integrationsmedaille”) by Chancellor Angela
Merkel herself.
As a researcher moving into the interpretation of this material, I am aware
of the need to position myself with respect to the texts that I analyse. When
I came across “GermanLifeStyle”, purely by accident, I was aware that I was
not part of the intended audience. At the same time, because of my own immi-
grant background and my academic training in cultural studies, I found myself
curiously drawn to these YouTube videos. The more often I watched them, the
more I became aware that their youthful antics and slapstick humour might be
a form of camouflage for a message that was much more complex. I wondered
whether it was possible to view the YouTube videos of “GermanLifeStyle”
as a highly intricate form of refugee ethnography or autoethnography (Ellis
et al. 2010). As Brigitte Bönisch-​Brednich (2018, p. 4; insertion added) points
out: “Narrative analysis as such emerges as a useful tool to reflect on how we
deal with stories . . . . ‘[The] stories are co-​composed in the spaces between us
as inquirers and participants’ ”. This causes me to reflect on my own position as
I am reflecting on Abdul Abbasi’s and Allaa Faham’s YouTube videos. Trying
to reflect on my own subject position in watching these clips, I am intrigued by
how the videos create and speak to multiple audiences. What would it mean
to be an outsider and insider in these narratives, respectively? And what forms
of experience would the “inside” correspond to? The daughter of an Indian
father and a German mother, I have reflected on questions of marginalisation
and privilege all my life. I have felt simultaneously on the inside and the out-
side of many migrant narratives. I grew up in Germany in an academic family,
but all my life, the migrant side of my own history is one that I feel most at
home in. I find myself drawn to stories of unbelonging, of having to improvise
new homes and forms of belonging. It is this aspect of “GermanLifeStyle”
that I cherish in Abbasi’s and Faham’s stories, for all the dissimilarity of the
migrant and refugee experience that they focus on. At the same time, I am
acutely aware that my own subject position entails the risk of obfuscating the
differences between their story and my own.
Once I have explored my own subject position as I look at these clips,
I need to consider the questions that might be asked of this material. In
this context, a reading of video clips as ethnographic documents would
serve a number of purposes. First, it would enable us to have access to self-​
representations by refugees which we would otherwise be unable to see.
Given the specificity of media representation, YouTube videos can be seen
as a highly democratic and broadly accessible form of self-​representation.
While the publishing or film industries often feature gatekeepers such as
reviewers and editors, who may only allow for a certain range of opinions,
such gatekeeping is absent for YouTube videos. Yet, this does not mean that
these videos are “unfiltered”: They should not be taken simply as “authentic”
representation of migrant subjectivity. Rather, they constitute a visual per-
formance of the self.
 Migrant ethnography on YouTube 175

It is here that the concept of “autoethnography” may be particularly

fruitful. In their description of this paradigm, Ellis et al. (2010; emphases ori-
ginal, my insertion) have stressed the relationship between lived experience on
the one hand and, on the other, the theorising of this experience in the form of
autoethnographies: “When researchers do autoethnography, they retrospect-
ively and selectively write about epiphanies that stem from . . . a particular
cultural identity. However, . . . an autoethnographer must [also] ‘look at experi-
ence analytically’ ”. An ethnographic perspective on “GermanLifeStyle” may
enable us to ask a number of interrelated questions: To what extent do Abdul
Abbasi’s and Allaa Faham’s videos constitute a form of autoethnography on
the part of Syrian refugees? What function does the apparent self-​mockery in
these videos serve? Could self-​mockery be a form of empowerment? And to
what extent do these videos deliberately blur the line between migrants and
refugees?
At the same time, we need to take into account the constructedness of these
narratives. This is particularly true of the relationship between visual material
and narrative. As migrant ethnographies or autoethnographies in the form of
video clips, these representations visualise migrant experience even as they “tell
migrant stories.” At the same time, it may be interesting to consider the notion
of genre. What genre could these video clips be subsumed under? In this con-
text, it may be noted that they seem to fit a number of genres at once. They
alternately function as a form of advice literature directed at the YouTubers’
fellow migrants or refugees. In what relationship does this genre of advice lit-
erature stand to migrant ethnography or autoethnography?
One of the central questions that these video clips pose is the relationship
between migrant self-​representation and viewer expectations. By foregrounding
the fact that these migrant stories are staged and have been deliberately
scripted and arranged for a mainstream German public, the clips may defy
the audience’s expectation that there are unfiltered stories about migrant lives
“as they really are”. In the analysis of the clips, it is hence central to unpack
the notion of authenticity. In their constant self-​mockery, the video clips of
“GermanLifeStyle” may sabotage the audience’s desire for taking voyeuristic
pleasure in migrant pain. One of the predominant styles in the clips is the style
of slapstick. Many of these stories seem to be the antics of male youth, com-
plete with occasionally homophobic puns and allusions.
An analysis must hence take into account the complexity of this material.
Here, it could be argued that the apparent simplicity of the style (the humour
that is often crude, the slapstick style) serves as a way to camouflage the com-
plexity of the narratives that these clips tell about migrant lives. This may also
be true of the use of affect in these clips, or rather, their refusal to generate
particular forms of affect. By refusing to subscribe to the tragic mode, these
visual narratives refuse to cater to the mainstream public’s willingness to pity
these migrants for the hardships they have endured.
Finally, it is important to investigate the role of the title of this series of
video clips: “GermanLifeStyle.” The title might also serve to turn the notion of
176 Mita Banerjee

migrant ethnography on its head. In complete contrast to this expectation, the

clips pretend to provide an ethnography of German lifestyle, not of migrant
lives. At the core of this confusion of identities, the blurring of lines between
the migrant and the host society, there may be a complete reversal of power
relations. The migrant or refugee may resist the expectations of a mainstream
German audience which wants to learn the “truth” about migrant lives and
may go on to confront this audience with the “truth” about their own lives.
Rather than focusing on migrant lives as obscure and potentially threatening,
it is the “German lifestyle” which becomes enigmatic and has to be decoded
by migrant ethnography. Seen from this perspective, the relationship between
migration and ethnography may be turned on its head by the Syrian youtubers
Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham.
In order to answer these questions which can be brought to the material, we
need to reflect on the methodologies that we use to “decode” or “read” these
clips. To tease out the full complexity of the YouTube clips “GermanLifeStyle”
as a form of migrant ethnography, we must employ different registers. We must
subject these clips to both visual and narrative analysis. It is also necessary
to investigate how these clips invoke certain genres (migrant documentary,
slapstick comedy, advice literature), and how they may go on to sabotage the
expectations triggered by these genres. This sabotaging may also consist in
the mixing of multiple genres. Moreover, the use of humour may be central
for understanding the particular form of autoethnography that is at the heart
of “GermanLifeStyle”. The use of humour, it could be argued, is diametric-
ally opposed to the emotions that we associate with representations of migra-
tion, particularly with forced migration and the stories of refugees. Humour
may serve multiple functions here: It may stress the idea of migrant resilience
and survival. In “GermanLifeStyle”, humour may also serve as a means to
resist the tragic mode which may be expected by the viewer. By focusing not
on scenes of pain and misery, but on the youthful antics of young Syrian men,
these video clips refuse to tell stories of victimisation.
In terms of methodology, I am thus intrigued by how the repertoire of
very different disciplines –​migration studies, ethnography, narrative and cul-
tural analysis, film studies –​can be combined to unravel the complexity of
“GermanLifeStyle”. I would in fact argue that the sophistication of these clips
lies in the fact that such a combination of fields and methodologies is neces-
sary, in order to do justice to the complex narratives these clips tell. Ultimately,
it can be claimed that Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham do not so much tell a
migrant or refugee story, than tell us what story we want to be told. The central
element of their sophistication, I argue in this chapter, is their awareness of the
different frameworks through which their bodies will be read. By refusing to
tell a single and “authentic” migrant or refugee story, Abdul Abbasi and Allaa
Faham turn their own bodies –​as migrant bodies –​into an enigmatic sign that
needs to be decoded.
This “decoding” and the ways in which it is being sabotaged by
“GermanLifeStyle” is also true about the “autobiographical” content of the
 Migrant ethnography on YouTube 177

clips. Even as Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham appear under their “real” names,
they must nonetheless be seen as embodying particular roles. We must hence
consider the forms in which they play with the autobiographical mode while
at the same time, subverting this mode. Here, there may be a tension between
the autobiographical and the ethnographic, on the one hand, and the per-
formative, on the other. The former, it could be argued, imply that the clips as
migrant narratives “document” migrant life in its “reality”. The understanding
of “GermanLifeStyle” as migrant performance, on the other hand, would tend
to subvert this reality effect. The interplay between autobiography, ethnog-
raphy and performance may hence be crucial for reading Abbasi and Faham’s
YouTube clips.
A cultural studies perspective, combined with questions of life writing
(Jolly 2015, Hornung and Heinze 2013), may thus add different layers of ana-
lysis to the interpretation of immigrant lives. In migration studies and social
science research, YouTube clips have been recognised as a form of ethnography
(Kurtz et al. 2017). However, the methodology of cultural studies may add to
these studies by stressing the performative dimension in which migrant stories
are being told. Cultural studies may complement qualitative analyses in the
social sciences by focusing on questions of aesthetics, genre, camera style; they
may investigate the genre characteristics which come with certain modes of
representation (comedy, tragedy, slapstick) and the expectations which these
genres evoke in the audience.
Moreover, we might also employ performance and embodiment studies to
analyse the clips of “GermanLifeStyle”. How do these clips play with the phys-
ical presence of male migrant bodies? It is hence also important to consider
aspects of sexuality and desire when interpreting these clips. Both Abbasi and
Allaa Faham will be seen as attractive by a German public, and it is this “visual
pleasure” (Mulvey 2009) that they seem to play with in the way they stage their
own bodies as the bodies of young, male migrants from Syria. It may thus be no
wonder that some of their clips are concerned with romance: In videos such as
“Flirting in Arabic”, they teach a German audience, presumably a white male
German audience, how to romance white women. In this context, the clips can
also be seen to tease German right-​wing movements about their own sexual inse-
curity. Focusing on the staging of Syrian male bodies in “GermanLifeStyle”, we
may thus also inquire how these bodies are being staged as Middle Eastern,
male, and desirable. This in turn may invite questions about the gendering of
the audiences that Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham address in and through their
video clips. How, then, are the two Syrian YouTubers “doing community” in
their narratives, and what are the audiences that they may appeal to?

Analysis –​Autoethnography as “doing community”: Resisting the

xenophobic gaze
As ethnographic documents, the videos by Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham
accomplish three purposes in particular. First, they serve as a form of advice
178 Mita Banerjee

literature for the YouTubers’ fellow refugees about how to come to terms with
their alien German surroundings. Second, they can be seen as “doing” or cre-
ating community for Syrian refugees. Third, the YouTube narratives may prove
essential in terms of identity formation for both the migrant community and
the German mainstream.
In order to determine how these YouTube clips create community and “do”
identity, it has to be noted that the clips are highly complex performances.
A central part of this complexity may be the video bloggers’ multiple audiences.
While on the surface, the videos seem to be a cultural manual for other refugees
(the German equivalent of the Amy Vanderbild Complete Book of Etiquette,
or a moral and cultural manual for Germany’s growing refugee population),
their cultural translation can in fact be seen as a two-​way process. Not only do
they translate “German lifestyle” for Syrian refugees but, either in German or
through German subtitles, they also explain Syrian cultural habits to Germans.
In this latter vein, the videos target not one, but two German audiences. First,
they are aimed at entering a conversation with the German public, which is
often unaware of the refugees’ cultural background and the complexity of their
culture. Second, the videos are a direct message to Germany’s right-​wing party,
“Alternative für Deutschland” (AfD). The two young Syrian video bloggers
casually inform right-​wing politicians like Björn Höcke that if it had not been
for them, the refugees, the AfD might not have been so successful in both local
and state elections, given this party’s fuelling of anti-​refugee sentiment.
The video clips described above are emblematic of these multiple strategies.
To Syrian refugees, as well as to refugees and migrants from other parts of
the world, Germans’ emphasis on waste separation may often seem bizarre.
Yet, on a political level, the first video clip about Allaa Faham’s date with
his garbage can for organic waste could not be more complex, nor could it
be more subversive. A key argument which, in the current German debate, is
often raised as a reason to stop immigration and to close the nation’s doors to
refugees is the claim that the members of these communities will not be able
to assimilate to German mainstream culture. It is against this backdrop that
“GermanLifeSyle’s” demonstration of the bloggers’ acute awareness of every
tiny detail of German culture must be seen. In the video, Allaa Faham not only
tosses his teabag into the garbage can for organic waste, but he even knows that
he needs to remove the metal staple before doing so. While seeming to be mere
slapstick on the surface, “GermanLifeStyle” in fact evinces the bloggers’ com-
plex mastery of German cultural signification. In this context, humour is a key
means to defuse xenophobia. Right-​wing politicians such as Björn Höcke are
the butts of many of the bloggers’ jokes. While in keeping with the adolescent
humour of the clips, the video about Abdul Abbasi’s lying in bed with Björn
Höcke is clearly homophobic, it will nonetheless hit a nerve when watched by
members of the far right: Part of Höcke’s own agitation especially against male
refugees from Arabic countries has been his invocation of the threat of “Arab
masculinity”. In Germany, as elsewhere, right-​wing movements have portrayed
refugees, especially Arab men, as potential rapists; they have also warned
 Migrant ethnography on YouTube 179

against intermarriage between white German women and Arab refugees. The
AfD party’s slogan “Germans –​we make them ourselves” (with a visual of a
pregnant white German woman lying on a park bench with her head in the lap
of her white male German partner) can be seen as being directed towards the
fear of interethnic marriage.
Reading the YouTube videos of “GermanLifeStyle” through an ethno-
graphic framework (Kurtz et al. 2017) hence evokes “ethnography” in all its
different meanings. In the origins of the discipline, ethnography –​as the descrip-
tion of peoples (Breidenstein 2012, p. 29) –​was often seen as the portrayal
of “different” or “foreign” cultures, often from the perspective of a Western
observer. The method of “thick description” (Geertz 1973, Berg and Fuchs
1999) served as means to suspend all forms of value judgement (Breidenstein
2012, p. 29): The “other” culture was to be described in all its cultural detail,
but these details were not to be judged or dismissed as strange, peculiar or
bizarre. If this is the essence of cultural ethnography and thick description,
“GermanLifeStyle” can actually be shown to marshal all these elements in
the defence of refugee subjectivity against increasing German xenophobia. It
presents its multiple audiences with a “thick description” of German culture,
complete with the strange practice of waste separation. While such practices
may seem strange to Syrian immigrants or refugees, the thick description –​
through the use of the garbage can’s own emotions –​humorously refrains from
judging these practices. The same is true of the autoethnography contained in
the videos. Once again cloaked in humour, the YouTubers explain the intri-
cate details of Syrian culture to a German public, to which many of these
cultural practices may seem alien. Moreover, the stance which these videos
implicitly demand is one of reciprocity: If Syrian YouTubers’ thick description
of German lifestyle refrains from value judgements, so must German viewers’
observation of the Syrian refugees’ thick description of their own culture. In
this vein, Abbasi and Allaa Faham can be seen as subverting the ethnographic
paradigm: In these clips, it is German mainstream culture which is under scru-
tiny. In these clips, the migrant becomes the ethnographer, and refuses to be
studied by the “ethnography” of the German public.
Central to this analysis of “GermanLifeStyle” as a form of migrant self-​
representation is the use of humour. Humour and the constant role of self-​
mockery are tightly interwoven. The clips can be seen as constantly making fun
of the migrant inability to understand the complex codes of German culture
(and not only the grammar of the German language). In clips such as the one
about the Mülltrennung, the migrant subject laughingly admits his ignorance
of these cultural codes; yet, he also simultaneously highlights the absurdity of
some of these codes. While this may be controversial with regard to German
waste management –​since this is not so much a cultural habit than a prac-
tice to ensure sustainability –​it is true of other instances in different clips
where Allaa Faham describes his attempts to order products over the phone
or make a doctor’s appointment. It may be interesting to wonder here whether
humour is used to sabotage other genre expectations and expectations in style.
180 Mita Banerjee

One of the most central aspects in migration studies has been the question
of assimilation. In different cultural and national contexts, and certainly in
Germany, migrants have been called upon to assimilate to the German cul-
tural norm”. In fact, much of anti-​immigrant rhetoric has evoked the spectre
of the alleged “inassimilability” particularly of migrants from Islamic coun-
tries. Migrant narratives have stressed the pain inherent in having to abandon
one’s own cultural practices, religion, or lifestyle (Spikes 2020). It is charac-
teristic of “GermanLifeStyle”, and the specific ways in which it tells migrant
or refugee stories, that it refuses to cater to what may, in fact, be a voyeur-
istic expectation of migrant pain on the part of German mainstream public.
Instead of focusing on migrant pain, Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham resort to
humour as a complex strategy of sabotage: They resist the call, by the German
dominant culture, for migrant assimilation by humourously describing the
migrant’s painstaking attempt at mastering even the most bizarre of German
cultural codes. In keeping with “GermanLifeStyle’s” sabotaging of the codes
of ethnography, the clips confound the power hierarchy between “native”
cultures and the culture of the ethnographer. Inequalities of power have trad-
itionally been at the heart of the ethnographic paradigm (Ellis et al. 2010). In
Abdul Abbasi’s and Allaa Faham’s YouTube videos, on the other hand, it is
the “native” or immigrant who becomes the ethnographer, and it is German
mainstream culture which is studied in all its oddity. The target audience for
this immigrant ethnography of the host culture, clearly, are the YouTubers’
fellow refugees. Ethnographic paradigms can thus play a twofold role in
analysing “GermanLifeStyle”: They can highlight the ways in which these
YouTube videos are simultaneously a migrant ethnography of the dominant
German culture and a form of autoethnography. Not incidentally, the turn to
autoethnography has itself been born of a legitimation crisis in the history of
ethnography (Ellis et al. 2010).
This is a framework which is continually emphasised by the two Syrian
YouTubers. As Abdul Abbasi puts it in one clip, rather than talking about
the refugee crisis, it may be more instructive for the German public to talk to
migrants and refugees themselves. Autoethnography hence enters the debate as
an attempt, by migrant or refugee subjects themselves, to turn the tables and
to reframe the debate on what is known in Germany as the “refugee crisis”
(“Flüchtlingskrise” 2015).
One of the central questions which could be brought to the analysis of
“GermanLifeStyle” is the idea of creating community. Arguably, the clips
create different kinds of communities. The sophistication of the YouTube
videos lies precisely in addressing all of these communities at once. The clips
function as a form of “advice literature” for migrants and refugees who are
trying to come to terms with their alien surroundings. This function is espe-
cially fulfilled through the use of subtitles: For an Arabic-​speaking audience,
the clips provide advice about how to master German bureaucracy, and how to
deal with administration. However, it could also be argued that this function
of advice literature is undermined by the humour and mock-​ethnography used
 Migrant ethnography on YouTube 181

in most of these clips. Rather than being a how-​to-​manual on how to survive

in a bizarre German cultural landscape, the clips can be said to create com-
munity by sympathising with migrant ignorance about these strange cultural
practices. It could also be noted in this context that the clips self-​consciously
stress the idea of language learning. Since many of the clips are in German and
have Arabic subtitles, they can be used by migrants and refugees as a form of
German language practice. In this context, it can also be suggested that one
of the central moves made by “GermanLifeStyle” is that it deliberately blurs
the line between migrants and refugees. Even as some migrants, by virtue in
having been in Germany for a longer period of time, may be more familiar with
German cultural and social practices, they may continue to be struck by the
oddity of some of these practices. In this sense, too, “GermanLifeStyle” may
create a sense of community among migrants and refugees. Ellis et al. (2010)
have elaborated on the role of autoethnographies for community building.
Looking at Abdul Abbasi’s and Allaa Faham’s YouTube videos through the
framework of autoethnography research thus helps us to understand and high-
light the complexity, and the complex grafting, of these visual narratives. It
may also be noteworthy here that community building is related to the dialogic
framework of these clips. Not only do Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham interact
in many of the videos, they are also shown in conversation with their friends
and fellow community members. As Ellis et al. (2010, italics original) go on to
note, “Interactive interviews provide an ‘in-​depth and intimate understanding
of people’s experiences with emotionally charged and sensitive topics’ . . . .
Interactive interviews are collaborative endeavours between researchers and
participants”.
In conclusion, it is important to analyse precisely what form of com-
munity is created through “GermanLifeStyle”. It can be argued that these
autoethnographic narratives create two forms of communities: First, they help
create and consolidate a refugee community, particularly of Syrian refugees in
Germany. Second, however, they can also be seen as building a larger group
alliance between migrants and refugees. In this latter context, Abdul Abbasi
and Allaa Faham’s YouTube videos may actually strike a nerve in the German
public debate. Political discussion has often hinged on a separation between
migrant and refugee lives, to the extent of refugees being played off against
immigrant communities, who may already have become well established
in Germany. One of the most disturbing aspects about the reception of
“GermanLifeStyle” by different audiences in Germany concerns precisely this
aspect. In internet posts and social media, Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham
sometimes have been harshly criticised by Germans of migrant descent, who
stress their dissimilarity from the two Syrian YouTubers. One user, Magnone
Agostino, posted a comment to an interview that Abdul Abbasi gave on a
national talk show, the Anne Will show: “ist eine Frechheit ein syrer der kaum
deutsch kann. Darf hier studieren u. stelt Ansprüche. U. alles auf kosten d. st.
Zahler.” (“is an insolence a Syrian who hardly speaks German. Is allowed to
study here and makes claims. And everything at the expense of taxpayers”). It
182 Mita Banerjee

is noteworthy here that the language employed by the user criticising Abbasi
for taking advantage of the system, even though he hardly speaks German
is characterised by a large amount of both grammar and spelling errors.
Criticism such as the one voiced by Magnone Agostino is also concerned
with the high degree of media visibility gained by the two YouTubers: Abdul
Abbasi and Allaa Faham have been seen by German mainstream media as
model migrants, an idea which has not least been made explicit in their being
awarded the “Integrationsmedaille” (“integration medal”) by Chancellor
Angela Merkel. In this context, it may be useful to investigate the different
media that Abbasi and Allaa Faham employ: While their clips may be viewed
by migrant and refugee communities, their book seems to cater to a German
mainstream public. This difference in audience may also have a class dimen-
sion and concerns matters of accessibility. While the book is written entirely
in German, the clips are easily accessible on YouTube and have subtitles in
German and Arabic. One question which might give rise to future research
is the interplay between different media here: In fact, if the videos sabotage
the idea of documenting migrant lives, the book may at first be read catering
to the documentary mode by telling the story of successful assimilation.
The fact that this strategy “works” would then be documented by the book’s
winning the integration medal. However, this impression turns out to be incor-
rect at a second glance at both the book’s title and its cover: If a mainstream
German middle-​class audience expects a migrant or refugee story, they will
be disappointed. The book cover does not sport “Arabic” images or writing,
thus catering to an exoticist mode, but is covered entirely in the colours of the
German flag. This may easily be seen as a way of “overdoing” Germanness. As
performers of refugee and migrant identity, Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham
can in fact be seen as “doing Syrian identity” and “doing German identity” at
one and the same time. The emphasis on the “doing” identity here stresses the
constructedness of both these identities (Hirschauer 2014). The idea of “over-
doing Germanness” is also implied by the title of the book, “Eingedeutscht”
(“turned into a German”). Here, too, humour serves as a subversive strategy
of migrant empowerment. What the book gives us, is not the pain of having to
assimilate to German cultural norms, but the “joy” of having been given the
stamp of approval of successful assimilation. Not incidentally, the cover image
also features a wooden stamp, thus invoking the omnipresence of German bur-
eaucracy in granting or invoking cultural, social and political belonging.
At the same time, humour can be seen as a form of sabotaging expectations
(Gonzalez and Gibson 2015, 7). Moreover, what is key in this context is the
question of audience expectations. In their book Human Rights and Narrated
Lives, Sidonie Smith and Kay Schaffer have linked human rights discourse to
the ways in which stories of human rights violations must be told. They argue
that in order to support human rights campaigns against, for instance, female
genital mutilation, the general public expects gruelling stories by the victims
of human rights violations. These stories, they claim, must follow a specific
pattern: they must portray the victim (often from the Global South) as being
 Migrant ethnography on YouTube 183

in dire need for help from Western organisations. In order to evoke this need
for support, stories must be narratives of victimisation, and they must cater to
specific affects, such as empathy or even pity (Schaffer and Smith 2004). This
question both of victimisation and of particular affects, may well be applied
to the contexts in which migrant stories are being told, and the way in which
they are being told. It could be argued that “GermanLifeStyle” subverts pre-
cisely this expectation. Through the use of humour and even slapstick, they
resist what can amount to a voyeuristic pleasure in migrant pain. Only one of
the clips described in the first section of this chapter, “Scene 4” does not seem
to be in keeping with this sabotaging of expectations. This is demonstrated
not only by the content of the narrative told by Allaa Faham, but also by the
filmic style (camera, setting, and music). It is here that “GermanLifeStyle”
seems most overtly ethnographic in the sense that Allaa Faham is providing
the audience with his reasons for fleeing from Syria, and assures them that
if the circumstances permit, he would willingly return to his home country.
However, it has to be stressed that this clip, too, is staged. The performative
aspect of this “documentary” mode, which is evoked by the clip, is heightened
precisely by the fact that it is so out of keeping with the signature style of
the two Syrian YouTubers. Since each clip is part of a series, it will neces-
sarily be read by viewers as being in conversation with the other clips in the
same series. Rather than being seen as the “real” mode of representation, it
is hence this documentary style which will appear staged, since it is so incon-
gruous with the humour of virtually all other clips. The “GermanLifeStyle”
clips by Abdul Abbasi and Allaa Faham counter xenophobia with humour.
They choose a different style in order to tell stories about migrant lives. For
all the humour inherent in these filmic narratives, we may do well to take these
stories seriously.

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Filmography
5 Sachen die ich in Deutschland liebe (2017) Produced by A. Faham and A. Abbasi
(YouTube Video) [online]. Available from: www.yout​ube.com/​watch?v=​ZLEL​
wQgt​NKI.
Eine Nachricht (2015) Produced by A. Faham and A. Abbasi (Facebook Video: German
LifeStyle) [online]. Available from: https://​m.faceb​ook.com/​gls​germ​anli​fest​yle/​vid​
eos/​8879​1877​4619​927/​.
Flüchtlinge schicken eine wichtige Botschaft an AFD (2017) Produced by A. Faham
and A. Abbasi (Facebook Video: German LifeStyle) [online]. Available from: www.
faceb​ook.com/​gls​germ​anli​fest​yle/​vid​eos/​fl%C3%BCchti​nge-​schic​ken-​eine-​wicht​ige-​
botsch​aft-​an-​afd/​14320​9719​0202​080/​.
Syrian Stereotypes in Deutschland (2016) Produced by by A. Faham and A. Abbasi
(YouTube Video) [online]. Available from: www.yout​ube.com/​watch?v=​UWbE​2_​Lb​
EOg&list=​RDCMUC​H9c-​6MK​AokS​PmGc​4ylw​Fww&index=​15.
Wenn eine Deutsche mit einem Araber zusammen wäre (2016) Produced by A. Faham and
A. Abbasi (YouTube Video) [online]. Available from: www.yout​ube.com/​watch?v=​
qvM5​_​uWb​xCQ.
13 The migrant storyteller
Mnemonic and narrative strategies in
migrant stories

Brigitte Bönisch-​Brednich and Silke Meyer

In this last chapter we will focus on the migrant as storyteller. Collating the
material presented so far, we will examine how storytelling is done and, espe-
cially, discuss three essential aspects that are closely related to modes of migrant
storytelling: Time, memory and storytelling techniques. These are necessary to
shape and develop modalities of performing narratives. Time and timing are
central elements of migrant storytelling as migration more sharply divides life
into blocks that do not follow a settled life course. The role that memory plays
in migration narratives is inseparable from the storytelling process because it
links those time blocks and sometimes blends one into another. Asking how
memory is employed and invoked in order to construct and convey one’s
migrant story is, therefore, a central issue for our project. And, lastly, memory
organisation, time sequencing and temporality can only be accomplished with
storytelling tools or techniques and strategies that are essential to narrative
construction. To give stories shape, even to make events into stories or silence
them, migrants need a tool box of narrative strategies.
Günther Anders, a Jewish refugee philosopher who fled Nazi Germany in
1934, wrote in his philosophical essay on “The Emigrant” that,

We have learned that time has to be imagined [as one dimensional and
straight]. … This is prejudice. If a curriculum vitae has a dramatic turning
point because of a Damaskus or Kristallnacht, if the ongoing life has to
be filled with completely new content/​knowledge, with content/​knowledge
that has no linkage to the ‘ante’, then the new length of time is not viewed
as an extension of the previous length of time, but as a road that that goes
off at a very sharp angle from the previously travelled road. … Thus, these
two life periods are felt to have different lengths and cut across each other.
Every sharp turn makes the previous life invisible.... My previous lives in
Paris, New York and Los Angeles are deeply shaded, dark memories I have
difficulty to recall. The view around these time-​corners seems impossible; …
Time periscopes don’t exist.
(Anders 2021 [1962], pp. 14–​15; [authors’ translation])

DOI: 10.4324/9781003120520-17
This chapter has been made available under a CC-BY-NC-ND license.
186 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich and Silke Meyer

Anders’s argument and observation –​which he shares with many fellow

refugees –​is that the memories and perception of time spent differ substan-
tially for each emigration period. Some appear as shortened, fragmented or
even as foggy memories, other seem extended and clear (Anders 2021, p. 15).
He does not fully delve into the reasons why that might be so, which memories
have value and fit a retrospective narrative and which do not. He discusses
memory in order to discuss modes of being a migrant: The stubbornly liminal,
the resilient, the re-​turning emigrant, the being invisible, the becoming visible,
the prices that are attached to certain decisions about how one’s life is to be
led after turning at the crossroads. His narrative is personal and philosophical.
But his categories can be utilised to reflect on the ways in which migrants shape
such crossroading and review sharp turns and disruptions in narratives that
help navigate the turns and bends of migrant life stories. In short, we need to
ask which experiences remain important topics, how are stories memorised and
retrieved and, finally, which techniques are used to articulate these. By neces-
sity, all three categories are overlapping; but dividing them into different cat-
egories for the sake of analysis helps to clarify their roles in migrant narratives.

Time
Every migrant experience contains the above-​mentioned crossroads and turning
points that make up the personal travelogue to the point where researchers and
others are present to listen, to read and to question. The past is located some-
where else in a time zone of another, almost-​previous life or lives. Günther
Anders’s essay reminds us that not all stops are of equal importance, and not
all periods spent at such stops will be of equal importance: Some will be preva-
lent, others shaded and forgotten. But the cutting up or, rather, the turning
points of a life story constitute the frame within which migration storytelling
necessarily sits. It sits between the place that once was home or stable residence
and the point from which the narrative is performed; that is not necessarily
the endpoint, but the point where we receive the account or parts of it. Günter
Anders wrote his essay in 1962 from his home in Vienna; his philosophical and
personal reflections look back at his core migration (flight and exile) to the US,
which was preceded by a flight to Paris in 1933. He managed to get to the US
three years later, where he lived in New York and Los Angeles (1936–​1950).
He returned to Europe to live in Vienna until his death in 1962 (Grosser 2021,
pp. 62–​63). His migration CV shows very clearly the core structures of such
moves. A curriculum vitae gives a normative structure to a life; this then needs
to be filled with memories, stories, silences. When filled with narratives, the
migrant CV changes and not all parts will have equal importance for memory
and storytelling. Time is shortened and time is extended; it is cut out and
frozen; it slows, it quickens, it pulsates (see the sections about memory and
narrative techniques).
Time and narrative are closely linked; in fact, narrative turns time into a
human experience and thus into identity (Ricœur 1984, 1985, 1988). According
 The migrant storyteller 187

to such philosophers as Paul Ricœur, Charles Taylor, Alasdair MacIntyre,

Martha Nussbaum and others, the way of understanding, telling and living
life by and through stories is a human universal (Meyer, 2017, pp. 312–​318;
Meyer 2018). People tell their stories and, thus, shape events into meaningful
experiences, thereby enabling themselves to navigate and negotiate biograph-
ical choices and deviances. In order to create meaning, the storyteller uses
a timeline to lay out beginning, climax, turning point and coda (Labov and
Waletzky 1967). With regard to time, the coda, the closing part or aftermath of
a narrative, fulfils a special function: Here, the narrator takes his or her stand-
point in the present to evaluate the events of the past. Codas often include time
shifts from time told (referring to past events and actions) to time telling in the
present tense, and thus navigate a sense of self –​or rather a sense of selves –​one
which is engaged and entangled in the events and actions in the past (“erzähltes
Ich”) and one in the present which looks back and evaluates those events and
actions (“erzählendes Ich”) (Lucius-​Hoene and Deppermann 2004, pp. 115–​
126). The use of the present tense marks the enlightened and grown self and
can be used to dissociate oneself from past actions. Emplotment thus means
appropriating time: Whether the narrator wants to relate constancy or change
of character or persona, the correlation of past, present and future is a way of
creating meaning in narrative.
In migrant narrative, emplotment through time stances and time shifts shows
how migration is framed and interpreted by the narrator. For example, telling
time before the first departure can be narrated as paradise lost (Løland 2020);
this is a common trope as life is often remembered as stable, as slow moving.
The change, the actual leaving, is then remembered as something coming up.
The lifestyle migrant storyteller might, however, describe a growing wish to
start anew, a sense of time stalling which means life is felt to be too slow, stag-
nant even. Hence, we often encounter the topic and narrative pattern of the
quest as a way of shaping time. Narrating migration as a quest with an initial
call and a plot of overcoming obstacles and encounters with quest companions
and foes gives the experience a set temporal frame and also the perspective of a
happy ending. Mabel’s example shows clearly how she interprets her migration
experience as a quest and derives meaning from this interpretation (Ahmed,
this book).
The migrant narrative, however, might also be framed as the
opposite: Conditions becoming unbearable, dangerous, life-​threatening. When
a growing sense of departure was felt as being imminent, the story is told with
urgency, the narration about the weeks before flight or departure can have a
breathless quality; more often it is narrated as a short, dense sequence.
The journey, the getting there, can be a longer narrative or not mentioned
at all. In lifestyle migration the getting there is close to meaningless; it is
the settling there that shapes the narrative. In refugee narratives, the getting
there can stretch over years and include long periods of waiting in camps or
detention centres, and this might well be the core migration narrative. Time
stretches interminably, waiting is painful and uncertain, and that uncertainty is
188 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich and Silke Meyer

traumatic and tortuous. Behrouz Boochani’s memories of his flight from Iran
and detention on Manus Island exemplify the stretching of time as pain and
as punishment (2018); suffering through detained time is his core migration
experience and his core narrative project. Waiting stories express time as being
stalled, even frozen.
Waiting stories are varied, they can voice the waiting for closure like the
wife in Laura Huttunen’s chapter in this volume; it can be the waiting to be
able to return, waiting for asylum. Amela, who has been waiting to hear about
her husband’s fate after he disappeared during the war in Bosnia, is living in
two time zones moving at different speeds: waiting and hoping, and getting on
with life. She manages to make a new life for herself and for her children in
Finland and, in that sense, time is moving on for her. But the major narrative
in her life is frozen time, an ongoing sense of painful liminality: “ ‘There is no
peace, not for him, not for me’ she says”; Laura Huttunen expresses the sense
that the lack of closure “keeps the narrative obsessively future-​orientated”. As
long as Amela does not know the fate of her husband, she cannot bury him as
her culture demands, time stretches in endless waiting without hope of arrival.
Liminality is thus not merely a state in a ritual life cycle; for migrants, lim-
inality is experienced and narrated as a permanent sense of being in between, a
neither here nor there. This sense of in-​betweenness can be but does not have to
be traumatic; it can simply be narrated as part of a new subjectivity that is the
migrant self. The Australian writer Sarah Turnbull, in her memoir of building
a new life in Paris, describes this as being ‘almost French’ but knowing that she
will never quite get there. This sense of liminality in her migration narrative
involves both a sense of being enriching and a constant labour to fit in. Often
the sense of being in between is told as a comparison story, as she does between
her life in Paris and her home city Sydney:

The reality is in France I’m still an outsider. There seem to be so many

contractions, so many social codes for different situations that make life
interesting but also leave you feeling a bit vulnerable. Living in Paris requires
constant effort. … Yet in Sydney it was as though back in my old environ-
ment I could finally drop the guard I didn’t even know I’d been carrying.
(Turnbull 2018, p. 166)

Living in an ongoing present of liminality is narrated as being vulnerable; in

her case it is the sense of having to be “on guard” that so aptly describes the
sense that while a full “arrival” is not achievable, a sense of being settled can
be expressed: “The insider-​outsider dichotomy gives life a degree of tension.
Not a needling, negative variety but rather a keep-​you-​on-​your-​toes sort of
tension that can plunge or peak with sudden rushes of love or anger” (ibid.,
p. 298).
Arrival, however, is often narrated as a story of finding place and settling
into a new location. Although liminality might still be the state a migrant is in,
the “arrival story” is expressed as a new era in the life story. This is pertinent in
 The migrant storyteller 189

Anya Ahmed’s interview partner “Mabel” who describes her new life in Spain
as a new chapter (Ahmed, this book). Arrival can also be narrated as being
followed by a long time-​stretch of integration and then belonging or as taking
a stable perspective from which the story is told. Children very quickly will
have spent more time in the new country than the old one, whereas adults
and parents have longer lives to look back at so the period from the point
of migration can appear much shorter. The narratives of a settling-​in period
then turn into imaging and securing narratives involving the future. Future in
a migrant story often constitutes a metaphor for stability and thus a slowing
down of time. Annabel Whaba states in her essay on the migration story of
her family that, for her siblings, belonging to Germany was a stated arrival
and thus permanence: “My siblings had to settle in Germany, did drop their
Egyptian identity, in order to be like everyone else. That was successful. What
lay behind became meaningless” (Whaba 2022, p. 34 [authors’ translation]).
To pick up Günther Anders’s thoughts about emigrants’ uneven sequencing
of time, Whaba’s siblings extended the German time slot of their life story
and erased the memories and thus time spent in Egypt. In that sense “arrival
stories” and “integration narratives” can either mark a new sequence that
follows other lengthy period narratives, or it can become a lead story that
overshadows the past.
Arrival and integration time can also allow the narration of a sense of future,
of looking forward. This is often expressed in stories about the successful
settling of the children. The acceptance of a new status quo is narrated as
extending one’s own migrations’ experience into the next generation and that
of the grandchildren. Amela is expressing this quite clearly; while her life feels
stalled, her children can move on: “Life continues, my children at least have a
future. My daughter is grown up now, and she is pregnant, maybe something
good will come in the future” (Huttunen, this book).
Narratives of aspiration, of hope and planning for a future, are told to
extend time beyond the present and to imagine time beyond the drama that is
migration as a core narrative. These aspirational imaginings contain a new life,
a different future than was once envisioned.

Memory
When we think about the storytelling migrant, we need to consider memory
as an essential pre-​requisite of narration. “Memory” as Julia Creet reminds
us, “in all its forms, physical, psychological, cultural, and familial, plays a
crucial role within the contexts of migration, immigration, re-​settlement, and
diasporas, for memory provides continuity to the dislocations of individual
and social identity” (Creet 2011, p. 4).
Without memory there is no storytelling. What is remembered and how it
is expressed is what we gather as stories. What is forgotten, wrapped in silence,
suppressed, is harder to get to; but it might be evoked: By an interview situ-
ation, during therapy, or by children searching for answers to their questions.
190 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich and Silke Meyer

As researchers, we have to listen into the gaps, try to trigger memory, accept
silences but notice them as well (Eastmond, this book). We also have to accept
that memory is not necessarily set, it might evolve and change; it might be tied
less to place but also to emotion, connection and absences in general. Some
memories are set and are retold as ready-​mades (Bönisch-​Brednich 2002,
p. 309); other memories are evoked through an interview situation and unex-
pected questions. They might be triggered through news items, children’s curi-
osity, smells, sounds. Julia Creet argues that

Memory is where we have arrived rather than where we have left. What’s for-
gotten is not an absence, but a movement of disintegration that produces an
object or origin. In other words, memory is produced over time and under
erasure.
(Creet 2011, p. 6)

Migration produces memory that has by necessity certain traits and certain
suspensions. And memory can be produced and performed or withheld. The
way memory and migration are expressed by migrants is as fascinating as it
is difficult to grasp. When retrieving or evoking migrant stories in an inter-
view situation, we need to be aware of our role as the trigger of such mem-
ories. The withholding of certain migration stories is something we will need
to expect; the question is how we interpret such withholding which often
appears as silence or a statement of having forgotten or of being unable to
remember.

Silences and memory gaps

Katrin Ahlgren points to this when she argues that

narrating silence as a conscious act can also be a result of the asymmetrical

relationship between the talking subject and the researcher … intentional
silence is to be distinguished from what is unspeakable or untransmissible.
(2021, p. 843; see also Eastmond, this book)

The migrants themselves have to constantly make decisions about which story
can be voiced and shared and which stories might be known but are categorised
as “narrative matter out of place” (Bönisch-​Brednich 2019, p. 68; McCarthy,
this book). Narrative matter out of place can be stories that are part of the
migrant experience and reflection but do not fit into the wider political and his-
toric paradigm; unpalatable, non-​fitting attitudes of migrants towards the host
country or the home country are generally not openly shared. The unspeakable
memory, such as rape, has either to be locked away or needs to be painfully
worked into unpractised modes of expression (Eastmond, this book). Gabriele
Schwab, in Haunting Legacies, uses Veena Das’s work to apply the category
of dissociation to explain narrative coping strategies that employ silences
 The migrant storyteller 191

and silencing. Dissociation is an extreme form of psychic splitting that helps

to sustain life under catastrophic circumstances (Das cited in Schwab 2010,
p. 20); dissociation as a narrative mnemonic strategy can assist coping and
even healing. Das states that “the transitional space of narrative, and especially
memoir and literature, may facilitate such a practise [storytelling in contained
spaces] in the service of healing and reparation” (Schwab 2010, p. 20).
Roger Frie defines this compartmentalised form of storytelling as the
“memory gap”, arguing that “in order to address a traumatic history there
must be a context in which talk about the past can be generated and supported”
(2017, p. 179). Memory gaps are often evident in transgenerational story-
telling; stories are not told and children know not to ask. In her essay on the
Egyptian connections of her very German family and her Egyptian father,
Annabel Wabha recalls knowing not to ask why the family never travelled back
to her father’s home country: “That we never went to Egypt appeared perfectly
normal to me, I never asked … I only realised that there was a reason when
I finally asked my parents in 2005”; her finally questioning and learning this
reason was caused by an external trigger: Hate crimes against refugee centres
in Germany at the time (Wabha 2022, p. 33).
Unlocked memories, or seldom talked about recollections, can still make
it to the surface by the next generation. Memory work by migrants’ children
can build stories out of the more hidden layers of ghostly narratives. Such
stories, as Maria Turmakin describes it, are parts of our mnemonic traditions
where “I was not the author of my memories, not even their keeper, but merely
their unwitting host” (2013, p. 23). Such stories are often described as being
felt as an undercurrent (Grundrauschen) in these children’s lives that needed to
be brought to the surface to be viewed and touched. (Bönisch-​Brednich 2019,
p. 7; Spieker and Bretschneider 2016, p. 133; Schwab 2010). Similarly with
silenced or traumatic topics as discussed above, children of migrants, often
refugees, describe these undercurrents and their inability to even ask questions
as haunting, as a fog, or dense mist or muddy terrain. This corresponds with
children of World War II survivors describing a sense of shadows or of a
dense mist covering their childhood memories resulting in their inability to
get closure as adults. Silenced memories thus remain at best opaque, at worst
frightening or haunting, traumatic shapes that have a ghostlike quality (Lohre
2018; Schwab 2010).
Astrid Erll discusses such shifting of storied memories that can be told and
keep being told into the next generation as “memory fundamentally mean[ing]
movement: Traffic between individual and collective levels of remembering”
(2011, p. 27); and it is this movement that permits the making of new and
more appropriate connections with the past. When memories can be brought
up again to travel between generations, new narratives can be developed,
ideally resulting in a deeper understanding of trauma. The silences or par-
tial memories stretch into the next generations and might then be articulated
or reshaped; certain topics might continue to be suppressed, others might be
re-​interpreted and contextualised. Once migrant narratives are being retold
192 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich and Silke Meyer

by children or grandchildren, we are listening to a re-​mix of child and adult

perspectives which give memory and storytelling a nuanced maturity (Bönisch-​
Brednich 2019; Turmakin 2013).

Efficient storage and retrieval

In order to shape memory into narratives, we need mnemonic markers that

allow us to bookmark and bring up stories (Bönisch-​Brednich 2019). In col-
lective storytelling, for example in families, certain phrases, songs and jokes can
be used to retrieve memories together. To reclaim memories, to retrieve them,
are essential techniques of migrant storytelling. The past is structured by one
or more biographical and geographical breaks that partition narratives and give
them shape. Such mnemonic markers can be metaphors, places, memories and
crystallised episodes, pictures or objects. Research has increasingly recognised
the role that smells and other sensory markers such as sounds or taste can play in
evoking the home country. Smelling the past, for example through the blossom
of certain flowers or food, is a powerful memory evocation (Sayadabdi 2022).
The past can also develop a life on its own; it can be haunting migrants in
dreams, in everyday situations reminiscent of tense situations in the migra-
tion process, for instance, the task of queuing can remind migrants of border
controls or visa application. Haunting legacies, as Gabriele Schwab calls such
memories, are often described in metaphors. Things can be remembered as
fog, as mist, as closing in on you, as locked rooms, as darkness. Metaphors
can stand for a story that is yet to be developed but is currently existing in
a black box of the mind. In a recent conversation, Brigitte was told about a
never-​acted-​on, but perfectly prepared migration to New Zealand; the person
could not remember why she never left: “It is like a black box to me. I still
have the translated documents and all from 40 years ago, I even had a job
lined up; I simply can’t remember why I stayed in Austria” (personal commu-
nication 18.10.22). Metaphors, as Katrin Ahlgren points out, “can compensate
for words and expressions not yet acquired” (Ahlgren 2021, p. 843). They can
stand for a story that is yet to be developed.
Metaphors are also used in storytelling to emphasise a successful, maybe
even happy, migration. Anya Ahmed’s interview partner Mabel told her life-
style migration story as a quest for the best life (this book); people describe a
new country as like a safe haven, anchoring after a storm, finding paradise on
earth. Such metaphors and the attached stories often have a spiritual element;
it was meant to be, it had to happen, there were signs and so on. Such spiritual
elements are part of a set of mnemonic markers that help to explain the migra-
tion decisions; they are a part of justification narratives.
Photographs and memory pictures support and locate memories; there is a
strong tendency to anchor stories by citing “scenes”, snapshots, and short film
clips from memory, often narrated as “my favourite picture” plus story line, “I
will never forget that moment when …”, “It was like a movie scene but it was
real”. Such pictured scenes, whether existing or not, are deeply set memories
 The migrant storyteller 193

that allow instant evocation; they are hitching posts for storytelling, especially
stories that describe a special, meaningful episode, a moment or experience of
intense emotion. This can be happiness or relief (sighting the Statue of Liberty
on Ellis Island) or it can be a moment when life shattered into pieces (Amela’s
“picture of her husband being driven away to his death” Huttunen, this book),
or a rescue out of a desperate situation (Escher, this book).
Effective re-​evocation is also accomplished by trigger phrases or sentences
belonging to a narrative that captures a whole world of experience. Bönisch-​
Brednich’s family narrative of war trauma, occupation and eventual transpor-
tation to West Germany was always started by a trigger. Her mother’s trauma
was evoked by her stating (shouting) “The Poles are worse than the Russians”,
which was for her and her family the encapsulation of terror, the end of the
war, the occupation and finally expulsion (Bönisch-​Brednich 2019). For col-
lective memory it can be a crucial situation that the whole group had to go
through or remembers as jointly met crossroad (Karner, this book).

Spatial and sensory paintings –​scenes

Creating memorable scenes within migrant storytelling works very well by

employing the senses, painting scenes that draw the listener into the life of
the migrant and its core experiences and moments. Migrant children often
talk about the learning of being different being defined by physical difference,
by language and by food. They share with us the memory of having to bring
lunches to school that were labelled as smelly or yuck; consequently, they will
share their ability as adults either to celebrate their migrant food traditions or
to choose to blend in with local food habits. Blending in or standing out can
become the intergenerational matrices of migrant-​family stories (Meyer, this
book). Some powerful embodied food memories are painted in the movie “The
Big Fat Greek Wedding” (2002), in which food scenes are clearly set memory
markers of difference, adaptation and merging. These scenes strongly resonate
with migrant children. Sensory memories by children, the embodied narratives
of being different, also serve as a bridge between memory and the present.
Such stories demonstrate the past as well as a present and future that include
settling narratives and retrospective analysis.
In a podcast series on migrants in Vienna, Menerva Hammad talks about
such experiences as a highly educated adult who reflects on everyday racism.
Her childhood memory in Vienna is of being a migrant kid but unable to
understand what was wrong with her, just having the knowledge that she was
not quite right:

I often had strangers’ hands in my hair, you know, from people who wanted
to explore the texture of my hair, older people; that was a formative experi-
ence. You start feeling uneasy about yourself, you sense that something is
not quite right, but you can’t work out what’s going on.
(Ozsvath 2022 [authors’ translation])
194 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich and Silke Meyer

The hands in her hair are embodied memory that stands for her childhood
migrant experience; the intrusion into her personal space, to have adults
touching her in public, is a striking mnemonic device that leads on to other
stories about being a migrant.
Hammad describes repetitive scenes that are shaped as “knowing how it
feels” to be the other, to be migrant. But mnemonic markers are mostly set
by recalling a scene that feels like painted or acted on a stage. Such scenes
are encapsulations of visual impressions, of emotional memories and physical
memory. An example of a frequent sharing of one such memory is the act of
embracing a long-​lost person. The hug as a crystallised memory of touching
the past, of reconnecting with relatives and friends, is a powerful narrative
scene that is understood by all listeners.
Migrants tell of the memory of being embraced by relatives after a decades-​
long absence, being hugged as the long-​ lost daughter, son, grandchild,
childhood friend. Being hugged for the first time after long absences marks
happiness as the relief from sadness. But talking of a hug before departure
is often part of a story of leaving without being able to return. A silent hug,
unspoken grief that is memorised in that physical closeness that also stands for
connection and pain. Bilal J, in conversation with students in Austria, paints
such a picture: “The first hug I got from my father as an adult I got the day
I was leaving. I don’t know why he hugged me, he also knew maybe” (J. et al.
2020, p. 66). In this story, he states that he does not know why his father hugged
him. Yet the hug is remembered and rendered meaningful. It is depicted as a
silent goodbye to embrace emotions of pain without talking of pain. This is
then cast into a departure story of a secret and hurried escape from Syria.
Such painted sensory scenes can also express coping strategies and thus are
told as moral tales to message resilience. The well-​known Viennese migrant
chef Sohyi Kim uses such a scene to describe her linguistic-​integration strat-
egies in Austria: “In the beginning I was like deaf and dumb”. Nothing made
sense, and even when she started to understand [hear] she could not speak back
[dumb]. But she persisted and trained herself:

I had words I could not pronounce properly; so I practised in front of the

mirror and told myself, ‘you are a parrot!’ (laughs). Shut off your brain and
move your mouth like all the other people do: do dialect. 100000 times I
looked into the mirror and said ‘Das Pferd’, ‘Psychologie’, or ‘Rad’. The
teachers said, ‘you can’t pronounce that’; but I can. You have to just prac-
tise (laughs).
(Ozsvath 2021)

Kim aims to convey a strong message by narrating this very small vignette as
a moral tale: as a migrant you have to adjust to your new environment, and
you have to try hard. This is because the environment and its conditions were
always there, and you are the new person that needs to learn to fit in; you have
to be the parrot in front of the mirror (ibid. 2021).
 The migrant storyteller 195

This last example brings us to the final part of this chapter: The tools
migrants need and employ to shape their narratives. The toolbox of story-
telling strategies and techniques is essential to any reflection on how migrant
storytelling works.

Narrative techniques
Migration demands that migrants develop a migrant narrative that is their own
and makes sense of their migration experience. This is a deep human necessity,
we need and want to tell stories about ourselves, but it is also a social and cul-
tural expectation. We need to have a history and an origin. Migrants need to
be able to answer the everyday question: “Where do you come from?” in order
to satisfy an audience’s curiosity but also in order to assure themselves (Zhu
2016). Not knowing where one comes from, for example when migrant chil-
dren get lost somewhere on the way, is a traumatic experience. This last section
aims to bring together essential topics and techniques in migrant narratives
by showing how “circumventing ‘the truth’ or highlighting some aspects while
downplaying others, demonstrates a type of individual narrative manoeuv-
ring which challenges collectively sanctioned modes of remembering” (Løland
2020, p. 754).
As discussed above “mnemonic devices are used to store and narrate infor-
mation, and also to structure and package them for storytelling” (Bönisch-​
Brednich 2019, p. 63). Thus, we need to consider which techniques are used as
tools to create and to actively remember the episodes of migrant storytelling.
Not all that is packed into such a story chest is part of the publicly available
inventory. Some stories are shared on a day-​to-​day basis, such as the “where do
I come from?”. Other stories are shared with family and close friends, others
again only with a trusted doctor, priest or counsellor; specific stories are care-
fully shaped for immigration officers. A certain number of stories will not get
shared at all, will be silenced or forgotten. Much depends on how one’s own
story has to be shaped to fit the new country and its administration and culture
(McCarthy, this book). Others will have to be withheld or shared to support
making place and shaping a new identity that also supports children and per-
haps grandchildren.
The body of a migration story consists of the travel story, including
departure, arrival, survival, homemaking and belonging. These topics are
part of every individual or family migrant story; they are the chest that holds
both the toolbox of storytelling and the actual narratives that are shaped
with these tools. The tool box of migrant narratives holds many ready-​mades;
that is, stories that follow an expected narrative structure and cover migra-
tion topics of departure, journey and arrival as well as experiencing a new
country and its culture. Such ready-​mades will range from being able to talk
about one’s new country and the place where the migrant lived; a story about
a professional trajectory or the lack of it. It will contain some indication of
learning about the new culture. It will be likely to include participating in
196 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich and Silke Meyer

food conversations, as these are the weather talk of migrant communities.

One can always ask about ethnic food and newly acquired tastes without
offending. Stories about food are safe, entertainment and social glue all in
one. Such narrative work requires placing information and homing stories.
In cases of successful migration and integration, these experiences are often
related in humorous anecdotes including funny misunderstandings of the
novices (Bönisch-​Brednich 2002a, 2014). When migration leads to social
exclusion, the ready-​mades emphasise eagerness to integrate by praising
the new country and culture. Ulla Ratheiser shows how Shazia Mirza uses
comedy in order to re-​interpret the collective experience of social exclusion
into an integration story (this volume).
Naturally, ready-​mades differ according to audience: Arrival and departure
stories, for example, are part of every-​day conversations and of official immi-
gration and employment procedures. These are not necessarily aligned, as
immigration officers need to be served a narrative that fits immigration policy,
including standardised reasons for seeking residency or refugee status, infor-
mation about education, financial resources and much else. Migration stories
for more private audiences have to contain a justification narrative that
conveys a story about decision-​making, departure and arrival tales and an
indication of having made place or intention to journey onwards. These are
narrative-​anchoring strategies that need to be somewhat developed, otherwise
the narrative is weak, bland and unconvincing.

“Where do you come from?”

Being able to answer the question of “Where do you come from?” is the essen-
tial tool that needs to be at hand, and needs to be pretty-​much ready-​made.
Having said that, the answers to this question can require a layered approach,
like a set of screwdrivers that are used for different requirements. The answer
depends on the knowledge the questioning person has about the home country
of the migrant, maybe even the continent. Many migrants from the African
continent discuss their discomfort at being labelled simply “from Africa”;
they cherish their tribal affiliation, their region, then perhaps, but often not,
the national belonging. Their response to “Where are you from?” requires a
set of varied responses according to the knowledge and curiosity level of the
questioning person. In most cases, however, the migrant has to invent a story
that constitutes a compromise about place of origin by giving an answer that
will fit the knowledge frame of the new country. In answering the question
“Where are you from?”, migrants often position themselves within a col-
lective identity of varying scales (“From Africa”, “From West Africa”, “From
Ghana”, “From Accra” and so on). However, the question also gives them the
opportunity to individualise their story by following the initial answer with a
more detailed account: “I am from West Africa but before I got here, I lived
in France for two years”. In analysing migrant narrative, it is worth exam-
ining where and when collective versus individual positioning occurs. When
 The migrant storyteller 197

do people talk about themselves as individuals (“I”) and when as part of a

group (“we”)? In Hatice’s story, we can see how much narrative effort goes
into dissociating her biography from other migrant stories, thereby positioning
herself as a potent and successful woman and against the hegemonic discourse
on Turkish immigration (Meyer, this book). To have a satisfying and scalable
answer to the question of origin is a way of self-​positioning and thus a means
against positioning through others. The narrative ready made to answer the
key question in migrant biographies serves as a way of empowerment navi-
gating and owning a sense of self (Deppermann, 2015).

Justifying migration: Stories about personal growth, learning and success

The decision to migrate constitutes a big life rupture and, consequently,

migrant narrative needs to justify this choice of leaving and beginning else-
where. Hence, migration is related as a personal success and the right choice.
Accordingly, migrant narratives often deal with personal growth and learning.
The narrative pattern of such a success story is structured in a before and
after linked by meeting the challenge of migration. Through courage, discip-
line and tenacity, migrants come out of the difficulties of migration as grown
and enriched individuals in their stories. These stories need not align with
real experiences; rather, their purpose is to tame chaos and insecurity through
narrative order (Meyer 2017, p. 134) and convey a purpose to the challenges
of migration.
Migrant stories of personal growth and learning often deal with a new cul-
ture and country and are therefore mostly comparative in style. Everything
new is compared with the formerly normal, with the former home (Bönisch-​
Brednich 2002a, p. 207; Lehmann 2007, p. 192). The toolbox of stories from
home does not usually fit the new country’s narrative requirements, but it
can be used to compare and to adjust how things are done, thought about,
organised and so much more. Comparing countries is a storytelling technique
that is essential for learning and grasping new skills. Such stories are ubiqui-
tous and thus we will concentrate on a few striking versions of that important
theme. These stories often happen right in the beginning, where the old country
is normally favourably compared to the strange habits of the new one. But the
longer migrants have stayed in their new country, the more such stories will
switch focus and emphasis. As the migrant story is usually shaped as success
story, the comparative narrative frame gets more balanced and nuanced. After
all, one has migrated for a reason. Again, food stories might still focus on pre-
ferring and maintaining the comforting tastes from home (Sayadabdi 2022).
But most stories will be told as personal-​growth narratives. We will discuss a
few examples in more detail to demonstrate how comparing countries is use-
fully employed in migrant storytelling.
One often-​narrated reflection in this context falls into the category of
shadow biographies. Every migrant carries a life story that might have been,
should have been, and thus remains a conjecture. Imagining what life would
198 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich and Silke Meyer

have been without migration to the new country most often imagines con-
tinuing life at home. For refugees, a shadow biography might be following
a different escape route, but for most migrants it is the imagined life trajec-
tory at home with which the new life is compared. As migrant life stories are
overwhelmingly told as success stories, the shadow biography is normally
employed to compare the new life as being the preferred trajectory to the
old one. If that is not possible, as migration has proven to be the wrong
path chosen, then we encounter silences instead of comparison. A failed or
unhappy migration decision seldom goes beyond narrating facts and some
carefully chosen entertaining stories. But a shadow biography throws light
onto a narrative, embellishes it and gives it a deeper three-​dimensional
quality. Sohyi Kim, the celebrity chef in Vienna, offers such a reflection by
asking herself how her life would have been had she remained in or returned
to Korea:

Without Vienna I wouldn’t be as independent as I am now … I don’t know,

how would I be in Korea? The same? A lot of people say, they would be the
same … but I doubt that. I likely would have married, had children, would
be at home [not working]. Well here [in Vienna] I feel at home, I won’t go
back.
(Ozsvath 2021 [authors’ translation])

A story that presents itself as a shadow biography is also presented as a

reasoning for having made the right move. Sohyi Kim asks herself whether
she would be the same person had she lived in Korea. With this she implies
the question, whether she would still have become a successful, independent
celebrity chef. Would she be single? Would her lifestyle be accepted in Korea?
By asking all these implicit questions, she also states that she views her life in
Vienna as the right life but unusual and unlikely to be achieved and enjoyed
in Korea. Shadow biography stories end by asserting one’s status as a migrant
having found the right place to live. They constitute a statement about one’s
migrant identity and more so a successfully shaped identity that encompasses
the old and the new self. A similar purpose, telling the story of a migrant life
of personal growth, is served by revelation narratives.
With revelation narratives we mean stories that are shaped by learning or
discovering a key skill or element of the new country. These stories point to the
ability of the narrator to grasp the new environment, to having made sudden
jumps and skips, in short, having had revelations on the progress to “get”
the new country. Such stories are about sudden comprehension, where unre-
lated bits and pieces suddenly fall into place and form a picture, framed by a
new form of knowledge. This is only possible by a preceding longer period of
incomprehension and often refusal or inability to understand the subtleties of
the new culture. Having such a story to tell is a narrative spotlight as well as a
highlight. Sarah Turnbull tells such a story in her autobiography of her new
life in Paris. She introduces the story by lamenting the different social rules for
 The migrant storyteller 199

socialising in France, which have been jarring and even scarring her Australian
sense of self. The turning point came when watching the French movie Ridicule
(1996), about life at the court of Louis XVI:

To me Ridicule was a revelation. … The film forced me to face facts –​my

style of communication does not work in France. It had to change. And
gradually it did. These days, I don’t feel compelled to fill silences. It has
sunk in: there is no obligation to make small talk in France. I’ve learned
to control my Anglo-​Saxon impulse to persevere with questions … I can
maintain stoic silence throughout entire weddings and dinners. It may not
sound exactly like progress but it beats heading home with a sense of being
diminished by wasted efforts.
(Turnbull 2018, p. 273)

This story, we could also call it an adjustment narrative, marks a turning

point in Turnbull’s life and thus constitutes a key narrative in her account.
Things suddenly become clear, are revealed, and she starts analysing her life in
Paris according to the set of social rules prevailing in her environment. She is
developing a more attuned skill set and thus a hybrid identity that allows her
to narrate her life as guided by curiosity, humour, compromises and most of
all resilience.

Resilience and agency

Resilience narratives too have an underlying framework of comparison, but

they are mainly future-oriented. By emphasising resilience strategies, migrants
are telling stories about how to cope in the new environment, how to shape a
new life and how to ensure a future. The more recent past is the comparative
frame rather than the old country. The past often simply refers to the time
after arrival. These stories are about personal growth in a very applied sense.
They are less about serendipity (such as watching the right movie at the right
time) or inner musings (such as contemplating shadow biographies) than about
relaying coping strategies that have been successfully acquired and now guide
the new life.
One important medium for resilience narratives is the use of humour.
Once you can laugh about yourself, you can share stories of cultural
misunderstanding which are always about self-​education by using retrospec-
tion. Humour and laughter in growth stories are implicitly comparative, as
the migrant stumbles about their old knowledge system that does not fit the
new environment.
The chapters by Ulla Ratheiser about “Shazia Mirza’s comedy” and by Mita
Banerjee about the YouTube videos on “German Lifestyle” are great examples
of how humour is utilised to offer whole bundles of stories about the new
country. Mirza’s comedy style is very much about her and her family’s inte-
gration story in implicitly comparing life in the old and new countries. They
200 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich and Silke Meyer

contain carefully chosen and exaggerated examples of cultural misinterpret-

ation or of overdoing integration, which come across as incredibly funny. The
German Lifestyle videos achieve this by referring only subtly to the author’s
Syrian heritage; the stories exaggerate German habits and cultural and social
rules (such as recycling) and thus create entertainment and enlightenment.
In narrative, resilience is often achieved through the construction of agency
on the level of content and linguistics. Talking about decision-​making and
having a choice to stay or go often marks the beginning of narratives on life-
style migration. Labour migrants like Hatice’s family might refer to their work
ethos and their hands-​on approach to life in order to demonstrate agency
(Meyer, in this book). Another topic is the sending of remittances and thus
supporting the homeland as an act achieved through migration (Ströhle, in
this book). When migrants lack this choice, they might want to make up
for it through linguistic markers of agency like the frequent use of personal
pronouns (“I”), active verbs like “make”, “achieve”, “manage” or “accom-
plish” or by the use of active rather than passive voice. Evaluative comments
are used to claim a position of power within the narrative. Zoe’s first words in
her migrant narrative are:

I am glad that I can participate in such an interesting project. I hope that

your visit to Cyprus is really creative in all respects and I will try to describe
briefly to you a life of migration and diaspora. I was born to a diaspora
family because since 1932 my father’s brother was the first who migrated to
London and then followed all my mother’s siblings […].

She starts the interview communication by congratulating the interviewer and

thus underlines her own significance in the project. Otherwise, the frequent use
of the pronoun “I” is remarkable, again stressing her active role in the cooper-
ation (Christou, in this book).
Another denotation of agency is to underline a character’s involvement in
the narrated storyline or by singling out events in terms of their tellability: Who
and what moves the story forward? (Bamberg, 2005). An example would be the
involvement of migrants in national sports: Ferit derives a sense of empower-
ment from Mesut Özil’s success in the German national football team. But we
can see how fragile this sense of empowerment is when Özil leaves the team
with the official statement, “I am German when we win, but I am an immigrant
when we lose”. When Ferit translates the phrase for the researcher, he replaces
the word “immigrant” with the pejorative word Ausländer (alien). “Immigrant”
conveys notions of agency and choice, whereas “alien” takes up the perspective
and judgement of others (Ströhle, this book).
Finally, agency can be established through counter-​ narratives challen-
ging the big story. This is a common narrative technique in migrants’ stories.
Hatice uses her own biographical story as counter narrative to jeopardise
the hegemonial discourse on Muslim women in Austria as submissive and
powerless (Meyer, this book). Introducing one’s own voice into or against the
 The migrant storyteller 201

discursive choir of opinions in migration society can be an act of empower-

ment. Counter-​narratives foster diversity in narrative and provide a plurality
of positions.
Resilience narratives often address language learning and comprehending
linguistic subtleties. What makes a good joke in the new country? How does
one frame criticism of something, how praise or acknowledge, how refuse
without causing offence? All such linguistic barriers are part and parcel of
migrant storytelling and of looking back with humour and comprehension. As
such stories are about mastering the new language and its underlying culture,
they are simultaneously funny and cathartic.

Closure: The importance of having a coda

Like stories, interviews, memoirs and autobiographies, even casual migration

storytelling occasions tend to end with a coda, a summary, a reflection. Again,
in order to fit the migrant narrative as an overall story of challenge, quest
and success, this tends to have a positive message. Having a narrative of re-​
assurance –​this has been good for me/​us –​is vital to create a balanced and
stable migrant narrative that supports life and a future. It might not be out-
right positive or optimistic, but even a tentative statement about a good move,
maybe a life-​saving move, or a possibility of a better future, offers a narrative
closure that the storyteller can live with.
Sarah Turnbull offers such a reflection in the last chapter of her book:

There is a certain comfort –​serenity even –​which comes from being able
to see my experiences in this country as a whole: the good and the bad, the
bitter the sweet. Having emerged from the fog of the early difficulties …
has been incredibly enriching, even if it did not seem so at the time ... for
me the experience has been humbling. Cultural misunderstanding make for
snap judgements. It just takes time in France. Frédéric [her partner] said so
a million times. He was right.
(Turnbull 2018, pp. 299–​300; emphasis added by authors)

By choosing the term “serenity”, she indicates closure; by using the verb “emer-
ging” she indicates progress; by labelling the arrival phase as “fog” she files it
clearly as passed; the term “enriching” relates us to her period of learning,
“humbling” to her change from a true Australian to a better version of herself.
By naming her partner as a guide, accomplice and cultural coach she extends
her story beyond herself.
A coda often covers the migrant story as success, as personal growth, as
connection and as having achieved a certain clarity and agency in life. This
narrative pattern is not only significant for the individual story and its ending.
It also gives us an idea about the migrant perspective within the dominant dis-
course of integration, social exclusion and discrimination. What kind of self
is presented in the coda? Does the story of personal growth end in resilience
202 Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich and Silke Meyer

or in assimilation? How is the social position of the migrant navigated? When

we want to learn about migration and social inclusion, we need to look at the
codas of migrant narratives.

Conclusion
Migrant narratives are about survival, success, adventure, ambition, personal
growth, political or personal quest, belonging and homemaking, love and ser-
endipity, accidentals or simply getting stuck. A certain reflexivity is necessary
to shape stories into a reasonable narrative, a certain wit is needed to make
them entertaining. Editing skills are required to choose fitting sequences for
specific occasions, to tailor for an audience, to give a story the right word count
and the right emphasis at any given time. Being able to tell the migrant story is
one of the most useful and essential social skills needed after arrival.
It is important to remember that not every migration experience will be
part of the migrant story. Some things are unspeakable, silences will remain
and are often essential to hold on to in order to reach a stable migrant iden-
tity. Conscious sharing of stories goes with often (sub)consciously withholding
others. Some silent stories might eventually be shared with carefully chosen
listeners, others not.
Migrant storytelling might employ a set of narrative strategies employed
in all life narratives. In this chapter, however, we have tried to offer an ana-
lysis of what makes migration narratives into a specific genre of autobio-
graphical storytelling. A life shaped by migration is, as Günther Anders has
pointed out, structured by crossroads, angles and thus sequences that require a
specialised set of storytelling strategies that sets it apart from other life stories.
A migrant life asks for a set of narratives that pays attention to such moves,
often violent. The right or wrong construction of the narrative can have ser-
ious consequences, but it can also stabilise a social position, it can offer res-
pite from doubts and it can reassure about future possibilities. By comparing
countries, by learning to convey narratives of resilience, by learning to employ
codas, and even by employing strategic dissociation, migrant narratives are
an integral part of living with migration. They give voice to migrations and
support the crucial identity work that goes with them.

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Index

academic storytelling 7 Dennison, J. 1

agency 3–​5, 11, 38–​40, 50–​2, 55–​7, 59–​71, diasporic experience 44
86–​101, 104–​5, 129–​32, 199–​201 disappearance 16, 21–​8
agency as key to success 65, 67–​9, 97–​8, dwelling with stories 49
129–​32, 199–​201
alternative narratives 150–​1 embedded stories/​story within the story
Anders, G. 185–​6, 189, 202 64, 66–​9
Australia 139, 154, 159 emotions 6, 16, 43, 47, 50, 105, 125, 127,
Austria 59–​71, 72–​85 134, 141–​6, 171–​2, 176, 179, 194
emplotment 4–​7, 10, 37, 56, 62, 187
Bamberg, M. 56 Erll, A. 191
Barrington, J. 6 ethics of academic storytelling 7–​8
Bosnia-​Herzegovina 16, 19–​30, 121–​33 ethnic stereotypes 63, 66, 69
Bosnian refugees 21–​8, 121–​33 ethnography 9–​10, 20, 22, 152, 172–​83
Bosnian War 19–​30, 126–​33 ethnographer’s presence 6–​7
burial 20–​1, 24–​8, 35
Butler, J. 66 Facebook 154–​7, 160, 163, 167
family 16, 19–​28, 43–​6, 51–​2, 59–​63,
Ceylon 134–​48 66–​8, 72, 74, 76–​82, 86–​9, 96, 107–​19,
Children 19–​20, 24, 33, 59, 67, 105, 110, 122, 124–​7, 130–​2, 141, 143–​5, 154,
115, 121–​5, 131–​2, 134–​7, 142–​4 157, 160, 167, 174, 189, 191, 193, 195,
Clifford, J. 9 200
coda 187, 201–​2 female agency 59–​69, 86–​99
cohesion of diasporic communities 160, Finland 19–​22, 25, 188
164–​5, 167 food 60, 62, 67, 77, 110, 139, 192–​7
collective identity 161–​63, 165–​8 Frie, R. 191
collective narrative 11, 48, 149–​51, 161–​6
collective nightmare 162 gender 11, 16, 43–​53, 59–​69, 76, 86–​99,
colonial narrative 134–​47 107–​19, 126–​32, 177
comedy 86–​99, 177, 196 Germany 72–​5, 77–​8, 80–​2, 108, 171–​83,
community building effects 164, 167 185, 189, 191, 193
comparing countries 197, 202 Gormick, V. 4
conflict 20, 24, 47, 51, 78–​9, 104, 129
counter narrative 66, 68–​9, 77, 200–​1 homecoming 43–​53
Croatia 19, 122, 124 humour 2, 7, 10–​11, 86–​101, 151, 171–​83,
Cyprus 16, 43–​54 199–​201

Damascus 107–​10, 113–​16 identity 2–​5, 9–​11, 23, 31, 36–​8, 47, 50–​2,
deep listening 2–​4, 8, 10, 49 62, 64, 83, 86, 91–​9, 150–​1, 159, 161,
206 Index

165–​8, 175, 178, 182, 186, 189, 195–​6, plot 3–​4, 21–​2, 31, 36–​7, 55, 108, 187
198–​9, 202 positioning of the narrator 37, 63
India 98, 96, 134–​46, 174 positioning practices 37–​9, 51–​2, 55–​6,
Indian rebellion 134–​8 63–​9, 76–​83
intersectional approach 49, 51–​3, 62–​3, Prince, G. 22–​3
66–​7
quest 2–​3, 10, 36–​9, 52, 65, 187, 192,
Jonathan Ross Show 86–​91 201–​2
journey 3, 16, 43–​4, 49, 51, 117, 131, 154,
157, 187, 195–​6 racism 82, 90, 97, 143, 193
justification narrative 3, 10, 192, 196 rape 125, 130–​1, 190
justifying migration 197–​8 reconciliation 48–​50, 52
refugees in Sweden 123–​33
Kfarsghabi collective narrative 153–​70 reluctant stories 126–​33
Kreiswirth, N. 1, 6 remittances 56, 59, 62–​3, 75–​83, 200
renunciation 92–​3
labour migration/​labour migrants 59–​71, researcher-​informant relationship 119
72–​85 resilience narrative 199
Lebanese Civil War 110–​11 resourceful victimhood 66–​9
Lebanon 109–​12, 153–​70 restorative silence 131–​2
letters 134–​46 retirement migration 31–​40
liminality 2, 7, 10–​11, 16, 19–​28, 188 return migration 43–​54
life story 38, 43, 47, 49–​52, 64, 91, 104, Ricoeur, P. 35–​7, 186
113, 116–​18, 126–​8, 186, 188–​9, 197 rumours 19, 116

Malays 136 Schwab, G. 190–​2

Malula 107–​16 sensory markers in narratives 193–​4
Memory 2–​3, 5, 10, 12, 20, 25, 49, 52, silences 2, 5, 11, 103, 128–​32, 190–​2, 202
126, 129–​31, 139, 161, 185–​6, 189–​94 solidarity story 67–​8, 151, 154–​5, 157,
Metaphors 78, 80–​2, 172, 192 161–​3
migrant autoethnography 171–​83 Spain 16–​30
migrant correspondence 134–​46 storage and retrieval of narratives 192
migrant storyteller 185–​202 story elicitation 126–​7
migrant voice 1–​4, 7, 10, 48 success stories 197–​8, 201
minimal story 22–​3, 27 survivor 105, 126–​9, 131–​2, 191
Mirza, Shazia 86–​101 Sweden XV, 104, 122–​4, 126, 128–​9,
missing persons 20–​1, 23–​4, 26–​7, 52 131–​2
mnemonic strategies 92, 95, 185–​204 Syria 107–​20
moral tales 37 Syrian refugees and German Lifestyle
Muslim identity 86–​101 171–​83
Muslim women 86, 94–​5, 98, 200
Taylor, J. 105
narrative agency 55–​6, 63 tea 105, 134, 139–​41
narrative community 11 tellability 63, 65, 68, 200
narrative control 5 time XV, 6, 12, 16, 22–​8, 36, 44, 50, 62,
narrative ethics 7 98, 127–​8, 141–​2, 151, 160, 162–​3, 181,
narrative identity 23, 37, 52, 64 185–​90, 199
narrative techniques 115–​202 Titanic 153–​70
narrative turn 1, 6 translocational positionalities 52
transnational lives/​biographies 25, 48,
Pakistani immigrants 92, 94–​5 62–​3, 66, 77–​8, 83, 158
personal growth narrative 55, 197–​9, trauma narrative 7
201–​2 traumatic memories 25, 126
 Index 207

Turkey 59, 61, 64, 66–​7, 72–​85 waiting stories 16, 19, 26–​8, 187–​8
Turnbull, S. 188 war XV, 11, 19, 21, 24–​5, 47, 104, 111,
121–​2, 125–​32, 188, 193
USA 151, 156 war crimes XV, 5, 11, 24–​5, 126–​32
war-​related stories 126–​33
victimhood 2–​3, 11, 55–​7, 59, 63–​6, 86, where do you come from? 196–​7
94, 129–​31
violence 16, 18, 24–​5, 27–​8, 32, 39, 51–​2, xenophobia with humour 86–​101, 171–​84
105, 122, 126, 128–​30, 132, 134, 137,
142–​3 Youtube 175–​80