The Growing Crisis of Refugees and Statelessness: A Practical, Pedagogical Workshop for Community College Educators

Speakers:

• Rachel Ida Buff, Professor of History, UW-Milwaukee
• Anna Oltman, Lecturer in Human Rights, Department of Political Science at University College London
• Ingrid Jordt, Associate Professor of Anthropology, UW-Milwaukee
• Almita A. Miranda, Assistant Professor in Geography and Chican@/Latin@ Studies
• Alicia Barceinas Cruz, PhD Student in Environment and Resources, UW-Madison

At this workshop, experts on refugees and statelessness across the globe (Latin America, Europe, Southeast Asia, and the United States) will discuss the causes and effects of rising tides of involuntary migration.

In a series of four presentations led by experts on crises, causes and solutions, we will explore the topic statelessness. Community college educators will be provided information and practical resources for  teaching undergraduates about migration and past and impending global transformations.

Sponsored by: UW-Madison’s Center for Southeast Asian Studies, European Studies, Latin American, Caribbean, and Iberian Studies Program, Institute for Regional and International Studies; Madison College Center for International Education, Office of International Education at Harper College, Community Colleges for International Development, and Illinois Consortium for International Studies. 

“Thinking Like a Caravan: People on the Move in Crisis”

Presented by Rachel Ida Buff, Professor of History, UW-Milwaukee and author of Against the Deportation Terror: Organizing for Immigrant Rights in the Twentieth Century and A is for Asylum Seeker: Words for People on the Move / A de asilo: palabras para personas en movimiento

About the presentation: In this keynote address, Professor Rachel Ida Buff will deliver a brief reading and then talk about her new book A is for Asylum Seeker: Words for People on the Move / A de Asilo: Palabras para Personas en Movimiento. As millions are forced to leave their nations of origin as a result of political, economic, and environmental peril, rising racism and xenophobia have led to increasingly harsh policies. A mass-mediated political circus obscures both histories of migration and longstanding definitions of words for people on the move, fomenting widespread linguistic confusion. Under this circus tent, there is no regard for history, legal advocacy, or jurisprudence. Yet in a world where the differences between “undocumented migrant” and “asylum seeker” can mean life or death, words have weighty consequences. This talk will reframe key words that describe people on the move and offer a new perspective on the fascinating stories, challenges and aspirations of migrants in the world, with particular focus on the US.

“The Spatial Nowhere of Rohingya Lives: How Myanmar’s Toxic Citizenship Regime Created a Stateless People”

Presented by Ingrid Jordt, Associate Professor of Anthropology, UW-Milwaukee; author of Burma’s Mass Lay Meditation Movement: Buddhism and the Cultural Construction of Power

About the presentation: National identity has come to be the seat of human rights in the Global Era. The nation-state confers citizenship within a spatially distinct territory and polices criteria for belonging. Individuals denied a national identity, Hannah Arendt famously said, are reduced to a “bare life,” a presence defined by the absence of rights. In this presentation, I survey Myanmar’s deadly nation-state building project since Independence in 1948, with particular focus on its impact upon the Rohingya of Rakhine state. Myanmar nationalist ideology, state policy, and populist anti-Rohingya sentiment have combined to erase the Rohingya people through genocide, expulsion, and razing of the physical landscape where Rohingya rights, culture, and habitation existed. I recount historical and contemporary processes that reduce the Rohingya to a stateless people—the State implementation of a regime of “toxic citizenship” premised on the fictions of primordial identities and territorial belonging, and affirmed in political parables whose purpose is the defense of Burmese Buddhist cosmological spatialities and eschatologies.

“A Crisis of Migration Governance: Europe’s Failed Cooperation on Refugee Protection”

Presented by Anna Oltman, Lecturer in Human Rights, Department of Political Science at University College London and a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

About the presentation: Many Americans view Europe, with its common currency, accessible air and train travel, and “open” internal borders, as a continent of free movement. But for asylum seekers and other migrants seeking safety, Europe is a fortress built to keep people out. Efforts at pushing back migrant boats crossing the Mediterranean Sea, poorly resourced detention centers and migrant camps, and inconsistent cooperation across countries have all come to characterize the European treatment of refugees. In this workshop we will discuss the ways that European countries, both together and individually, have created barriers to prevent refugees from reaching the continent. We will also explore the unique ways that European countries have worked together to address the refugee crisis, the challenges of creating a fair international system for aiding refugees, and the prospects for future refugee protection in Europe and the world.

“Las Dos Fronteras (The Two Borders): Perspectives on Mexico’s Southern and Northern Borders”

Presented by Almita A. Miranda, Assistant Professor in Geography and Chican@/Latin@ Studies and Alicia Barceinas Cruz, PhD Student in Environment and Resources, UW-Madison

About the presentation: In recent years, there has been increased attention placed on the U.S.-Mexico border, from proposals to increase border security, to reports on the human rights abuses of migrants and asylum seekers from Central America and Mexico. In this talk, we will draw on our respective ethnographic projects with Mexican mixed-status families (Miranda) and Central American migrants in transit (Barceinas Cruz) to present a comparative analysis of the Mexican government’s treatment of asylum seekers and return migrants at both their southern and northern borders. Central to our discussion will be questions of immigration policies and processing in border cities as well as resource management and local-level conflicts between Mexican nationals and Central Americans. This talk will also reference some of our pedagogical tools for teaching on subjects, such as border crossings, immigration bureaucracies, economic and environmental migrants, as well as local-level and transborder community organizing.