Thematic Focus
This panel will examine contested categories in the context of migration. We consider migration and related phenomena as especially fruitful sites for unpacking existing categories and categorization systems of all kinds and for recognizing novel and emerging ones. Governments, the public, and actors involved in processes of migration negotiate categories under extremely high stakes and often with unequal and shifting power relations. We welcome empirical and theoretical contributions on both current and historical intersections of migration, categorization, and their respective contestations. In particular, we are looking for topics that engage with the conference theme of time and temporality, such as:
- Historical analyses of the shifting meanings and functions of categories
- Analyses of political implications and power relations related to categorization
- Considerations of categories over the course of individual lives
- The role of categorization in migrants’ ability to meaningfully integrate pasts and futures into the present
- The impact of time and temporality and epistemological reflections on contested categories
Please submit a 250-word abstract by 30 November 2021 to:
Panel Organizers
- Ulrike Bialas (Max-Planck-Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity)
- Johanna Lukate (Max-Planck-Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity)
- Vanessa Rau (Max-Planck-Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity)
