TAKE THE #20MOVIECHALLENGE!
The Migration+Media Network is taking the #20MovieChallenge! We are highlighting one movie per day for 20 days… and all of our movies are by migrants, about migrants, or starring migrants! Join us on Twitter @migrationmappng and let us know what your favorite migration-related films are!
DEFINING “THE MIGRANT”: REFLECTIONS OF AN IMMIGRANT
BY: JEN EVANS
Today’s world is rich in content for those of us studying migration. Political landscapes from Germany to Argentina are consumed by controversy surrounding immigration policy. Neighbors engage in divisive migration debate as they walk their dogs and pass each other at the mailbox. In my own home country of Canada, over 22% of the total population are now immigrants—and a further 17.4% are the children of immigrants.
Words like “immigrant” and “refugee” are a part of our daily lives now, and disputes on related matters are seemingly as routine as brushing our teeth and preparing dinner. What we rarely discuss, however, is the very definition of “migrant”. Are the people with whom you debate migration policy truly having the same conversation that you are having? You may be surprised.
“I’m an immigrant,” I recently stated, matter-of-factly, as I argued in favor of migrant rights.
“But you’re not really an immigrant,” my sparring partner retorted.
This response took me aback. It had never occurred to me that my immigration status was up for debate. Certainly, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services would not think so. I have endured the anxiety of a green card interview. I have suffered through the red tape of importing my belongings to the United States. I have even installed an app on my iPhone which automatically converts all fahrenheit temperatures to their celsius equivalents.
Yes, I am an immigrant.
Except, to some, I am not.
You see, few passersby realize that I was not born in the United States. English is my first language, and it takes a keen ear to pick out the remnants of my Canadian accent. I celebrate Christian holidays. I favor American music, television, and fashion. And let’s not mince words: I am white.
Race seems to be the proverbial elephant in the room in political and social debates the world over. It is not uncommon for proponents of closed borders and anti-immigration policy to express approval of my immigration, or that of my British neighbor. Few want to introduce the issue of race in these often inflammatory debates, yet racial considerations are increasingly evident—and influential—in today’s conversations surrounding migration.
“This is the kind of immigrant we want here,” was the dubious introduction which preceded my meeting a small group of conservatives—friends of an acquaintance who I surely had no intention of engaging in political debate. What does that even mean? I wondered, but I didn’t have to speculate for long: “She speaks English, she went to college,” my acquaintance continued, as though justifying this mere association with an immigrant.
It’s true: Dictionaries may have rigid definitions for words such as “immigrant” and “refugee”—but we, as people, do not. A former colleague in Canada explained to me that her father, a Dutch immigrant, was curiously anti-immigration. He had received an ‘invitation’ to immigrate to Canada following Holland’s liberation in 1945. And this, my colleague’s father had decided, was very different from modern immigrants who arrive in our nation of their own accord. This immigrant was desired by Canada, in his mind, while other immigrants were not.
Debate is a healthy process. It ensures the proper functioning of democracy and the exchange of new ideas. But perhaps, in our world’s now-constant debate regarding migration, we must first consider what we are debating. Modern discussions are filled with infinite, fluid ideas of who and what migrants are. Even unknowingly, we as individuals categorize migrants based on need, based on language, based on origin. The immigration process itself encourages the classification of migrants through elements such as prioritization and visa types.
So as we continue on this debate, with its critically life-altering implications, perhaps we should take a moment to consider what we mean when we say the word “migrant”—and what those whom we debate with mean, also. We may find that the discussion we think we are having, is not the discussion we’re having at all.
THE REFUGEE CRISIS AND AI WEIWEI’S SEARCH FOR HUMANITY
BY: SOFIA SILVEIRA
I often wonder, “Who am I?” I always thought that to make an impact in this world one should define one’s identity firmly. “I am a pharmacist,” “I am an engineer,” “I am a doctor,” I am a… ?
When I think about Ai Weiwei’s life and work, my fingers stop frenetically rubbing against each other, my breath goes back to normal and a wave of calm sways over me. I float through my own thoughts, feeling better, feeling alive and ok for not having the right answers – or answers at all – about the role I play in this world.
Geniality aside, Ai Weiwei is hard to define. At the same time the artist made his whole career by blurring lines of what he is; there are few people alive today that have had a greater positive impact in the world. He is the antithesis of the idea that one can only succeed by finding an area of interest and working at it until they master it.
If on one hand Ai Weiwei has based a lot of his work on minutiae and detailed techniques that took years to master, he does not make a single craft his artistic identity. His plurality is his identity, and I will argue that this is what we need today to talk about challenging issues such as migration.
Ai Weiwei is an artist and an activist, a designer, an architect, a filmmaker, a painter, an investigator, a protester. He revives
ancient techniques of Chinese handicraft to make a point about the necessity of breaking traditions. Ai Weiwei has made his own place in the world, changing and experimenting as his surroundings demanded it.
The same can be said of the artist’s fluctuation between multiple themes, always unique but at the same time interchangeably linked to human dignity and freedom. Born in China from a father who was a poet persecuted by the cultural revolution, Ai Weiwei lived amidst repression, sensitive to the loss of freedom both at home and around the world.
When I visited his exhibit “Root” in my hometown of São Paulo, Brazil, on January 10th, 2019, it was no surprise that one of the many places that called Ai Weiwei into action was the refugee crisis.
Maybe you’ve heard of Ai Weiwei’s documentary “Human Flow.” It is an almost silent investigation into some of the trajectories taken by more than 65 million people around the world who have been forced from their homes to escape famine, climate change, and war. Despite being the most famous piece on the subject, it is far from being his only one.
At the exhibit “Root” we see another consequence of this process as the artist takes up a different focus: the marks left in history by the violent odyssey faced by refugees today. The wallpaper imitates the style of ancient Greek paintings, now portraying the modern conflict relating to migration.
Representation of modern armies merges with poses historically linked to ancient warriors, past and present combine as the artist explicitly points to mistakes made now and then: violence that will leave its mark on history.
Maybe that is what Ai Weiwei is. An artist, but also resistance against the establishment in all its forms. Resistance made through both content and format – exactly the type of mediamaker we need producing migration-related content.
In an interview for the exhibit’s catalog, Ai Weiwei talks about his greatest fears: “If I could no longer be critical or if I lost my compassion for humanity. If I could no longer examine the human condition, life would lose its luster.”
I think we often stop having the ability to examine the human condition out of self imposing limitations. If we can learn something from Ai Weiwei it is that we should be flexible with our research tools, so we can pursue permanently deeper corners of ourselves and the world around us.
Ever since I started learning about migration, I feel like I have fallen into a space that demands new skills, a greater sensibility and a greater capacity to endure the sight of human suffering and the depth of state administrational problems that defy basic democratic principles.
To talk about these issues, it is necessary to have cross-media skills. May we have the wisdom to be like Ai Weiwei: a man with the freedom of having no single answers on sight and the will to permanently look for them.