Breaching Borders: Art, Migrants and the Metaphor of Waste (International Library of Cultural Studies)

"As migration is described as a problem, mobility is seen as a goal. In a 'Europe without Borders', a place that prides itself on multiculturalism while struggling with racism, two opposing paradigms characterise contemporary discussions surrounding migrants. Breaching Borders: Art, Migrants and the Metaphor of Waste aims to interrogate the familiar debates, evolving new textual and interdisciplinary approaches to European cultural policies and unmasking the assumptions of the essentialist identity politics that go undeclared at the borders of cultural discourse. Twelve leading figures in post-colonial and translation studies, political philosophy, art, radical aesthetics, policy-making and sociology, reflect on the political and cultural meanings of migration; their arguments framed by artworks that provide glimpses of cross-cultural encounters. Essays - including a meditation on "wasted lives" by internationally renowned academic Zygmunt Bauman - explore the challenges of migration, history and integration and attempt to develop radical new figurations of migrant identity, underlining the necessity of an imaginative reach towards "The Other". This book brings together the roles of translation and of art in the central metaphor of waste - the trail of rubbish left behind by mechanisms of mobility; the excised narratives of wasted identities and people."--Bloomsbury publishing "As migrations is described as a problem, mobility is seen as a goal. In a Europe 'without borders', a place that prides itself on multiculturalism while struggling with racism, two opposing paradigms characterize contemporary discussions surrounding migrants. Breaching borders: art, migrants, and the metaphor of waste aims to examine familiar debates, evolve new textual and interdisciplinary approaches to European cultural policies and illuminate the assumptions surrounding the essentialist identity politics that lie unacknowledged at the borders of cultural discourse. Twelve leading figures in post-colonials and translation studies, political philosophy, art, radical aesthetics, policy-making and scoiology, reflect on the political and cultural meanings of migration; their arguments framed by artworks that provde glimpses of cross-cultural encounters. Essays - including a meditation on 'wasted lives' by internationally renowned academic Zygmunt Bauman - explore the challenges of migration, history and integration and attempt to develop radical new figurations of migrant identity, underlining the necessity of imaginative reach towards 'The Other'. This book brings together the roles of translation and of art in the central metaphor waste - the trail of rubbish left behind by mechanisms of mobility; the excised narratives of wasted identities and people." In the context of the harsh current economic, social and political realities of Europe and beyond, 'Cross Cultural Identities: Art, Migrants and Metaphors of Waste' contributes to new ways of thinking the prospects of a community of values and principles across Europe's diverse communities of peoples. The anthology brings together prominent writers, artists and theorists to explore figurations of migrant identity and reflect on the political and cultural meanings of European identity, belonging and exclusion. Waste is the exploratory model for reappraising the structural dysfunctions and exclusions of contemporary Europe. The European Union has established mechanisms of mobility that leave a trail of rubbish. Through the invisible, unspoken narratives of 'waste', of wasted identities or peoples, the challenges of migration, integration and history and identity are explored Part 1: Mediations on Waste -- 1.Zygmunt Bauman: Wasted Lives -- 2.Nadja Stamselberg: Visualisation of Exclusion in Contemporary Europe -- 3.Christian Sørhaug: On Wastelands -- 4.Peter Mörtenböck: Waste and Relations -- Part 2: Translating New Communities -- 5.Alexander Nikolic: The Art of Cultural Activism -- 6.Sandro Mezzadra: The Labyrinth of Contemporary Migrations -- 7.Marina Grzinic: Art, Globalisation, Coloniality -- 8.Karen Seago: Transcultural Translation -- Part 3: Art and other Paradigms -- 9.Richard Appignanesi: Dust, Ashes, Residua -- 10.Anthony Gardner: When Art Migrates: Biennales and Itinerancy -- 11.Juliet Steyn: Out of Place: Experiences of Modernity -- 12.Nikos Papastergiadis: The Role of Art in Imagining Multicultural Communities In a 'Europe without borders' that prides itself on multiculturalism while struggling desperately with racism, populated by ghettoized communities, refugee camps and zones of exclusion, two opposing paradigms characterise the discourses of migration: migrants as a problem, a parasite on the nation that disrupts social life, and mobility as the posi