Forced Migrants and Digital Connectivity: Social Media + Society

K.H.A. Leurs, Kevin Smets

Research output: Contribution to journalSpecial issueAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

Digital migration has emerged as a contentious topic during the recent so-called “European refugee crisis.” The wide circulation of news images of smartphone carrying Syrian refugees, and Syrian refugees taking selfies upon their safe arrival on European shores became resources for various actors in Europe to imagine themselves and their relation to incoming others. Digital technologies have been mobilized and imagined in contrasting ways by different groups of state actors: for example, as a way of understanding contemporary migration, as a way to control mobility, as a way to attack it, as a way to esthetically capture it, and as a way to uncover agency. Focusing on the context of Europe, this special collection of Social Media + Society seeks to historicize, contextualize, empirically ground, and conceptually reflect on the impact of digital technologies on forced migration. We position our intervention in response to the recent upsurge of popular and emerging academic debate on refugees and digital technologies, and it is our specific ambition to recover and foreground again a shared commitment toward social change, equity, and social justice. By reflecting on what is specific about digital connectivity and refugee experiences but also by acknowledging parallels with other communities, we plea for reflexive politics of knowledge production on digital migration. This emerging research focus which seeks to understand the relation between migration and digital media technologies can be labeled digital migration studies. The collection consists of 14 pieces authored by 27 collaborators: alongside our introduction, there are 10 original research papers included, as well as 3 thematic book reviews that include a Q&A dialogue with the authors of the reviewed books. Authors draw on online and offline fieldwork and empirical data covering various forced migrant communities including Syrians, Somalis, Palestinians, Tamils, and Iraqis across contexts including Austria, France, Germany, Sweden, Somalia, the Netherlands, and Turkey
Original languageEnglish
JournalSocial Media + Society
VolumeSpecial Collection
Publication statusPublished - 2018

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