Author: Luna Ramirez Castellanos

While reading The  New Censorship, I kept thinking about the presidential election held earlier this year in my own country. Abelardo de la Espriella, flamboyantly far-right, dressed in the fashion of Nayib Bukele, an avid Trump supporter and former lawyer for right-wing paramilitaries, was elected Colombia’s president.

In the months leading up to the vote, Colombian media attacked, fact-checked or praised him. Even from thousands of kilometres away, my FYP could not escape him. One morning, scrolling mindlessly through Instagram, I came across a reel by his youth coalition.  The person speaking was my former classmate. I kept digging, and sure enough, most of my classmates, many of whom were close friends, had liked it, reposted it or shared it to their stories. I was appalled.

I spent the day calling and texting them, getting a sense of “why?” More often than not, the answer was some version of: “I am not right-leaning; I’m just tired of the left. I am a centrist, but the centre candidate is not popular enough to win”.

And so Panievsky’s “deceptive appeal of the middle-ground” resonates deeply with this experience. De la Espriella was not originally leading the polls, but as the campaign progressed, media outlets began portraying him as one side of a symmetrical contest— that he was an equally opposing side to the old establishment. So much so that he became the only alternative in my classmate’s view.

What happened to my classmates isn’t just a Colombian anomaly. Reading about the AfD, I wonder if, for young voters in Germany, a skewed perception of the AfD’s rising popularity might swing undecided voters to the right.  Political scientist Gefjon Off characterises young voters as having “looser affiliation to any particular party”, which is why platforming extremists as “surging” alternatives is so dangerous.

A recent DW report on AfD influencer tactics  opens with the question: “To what extent are young people being politicized by the right? Or are they simply disillusioned with the established parties?” I think the word disillusionment carries a risk of normalising extremism just because it is “out of the norm”. It creates a false perception that just by being outsiders, they are a viable alternative to the mainstream. My classmates’ answers echos that framing. None of them told me they were choosing the far-right, “dissilussion” made sense to them as a neutral standing point that saw itself materialized in an outsider like De la Espriella.

The numbers show a divided picture. In Berlin, Left Party voters skew young: 43% of 16-24-year-olds voted for the party, and only 12% opted for the AfD. Yet a POLITICO article titled “The Far Right Is Winning. These Young Germans Show Us Why,” documents rising extremist views in the Eastern-German youth. For example, growing affiliation with Young Nationalists, the youth wing of “The Homeland,” and, perhaps most striking, 41% of 18- to 24-year-old voters backed the AfD in the infamous Saxony-Anhalt September election.

This gap shows that young voters are not destined to shift right. But it also warns us that an extreme opinion could become ordinary if the media chooses to treat it as such. Outlets risk painting outsiders as an alternative, young electorate who see themselves in the middle may start to view them as such.

On September 25, the Trump Administration proposed cuts totaling $810 million. The package rescinds funding Congress appropriated to support refugee and immigrant service programs the Administration deems “wasteful spending”.

“The idea that immigrants are draining on the country and the economy is just fabricated,” warns Dr Amelia Frank-Vitale, Anthropologist and Princeton University Professor. She understands the rescission as part of “a project of telling the world: ‘the United States does not want you here’— whether you have skills, whether you have needs for protection.”

To her, it all points in the same direction: “This administration is firmly anti-immigrant.”

The move has been denounced as “illegal” by Members of the House Appropriations Committee. Timing is what makes it contentious. And the clock is no longer ticking.

After the White House submits a rescission, Congress has 45 days to act before the funds expire. By timing the request so the window runs past September 30, the end of the fiscal year, the administration has effectively cancelled them without congressional vote.

The Government Accountability Office denounces that letting funds expire this way violates the Impoundment Control Act of 1974. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, House Appropriations Committee Member, calls the maneuver a line-item veto. Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley echoes her call, arguing it is “Congress, not the president, who decides what programs are designed and at what level they are funded.”

No need for Refugee Resettlement: the Administration has got you covered!

The proposal’s largest cut removes $567 million from the $6.3 billion allocated in FY 2024 to the Refugee and Entrant Assistance Account, which funds Office of Refugee Resettlement programs.

This is not the first reduction in the account. In its Justification of Estimates for Appropriations Committees for 2024, the Department of Health and Human Services had already lowered funds by $893 million compared to 2023.

Now the Administration deems the account “overfunded due to the Administration’s successful border policies,” citing Executive Order 14165, “Securing Our Borders,” and Executive Order 14163, “Realigning the United States Refugee Admissions Program“. Their rescission proposal also argues that programs financed by the account are operated by “pro-illegal immigration non-profits, which provide services to refugees, asylees, and other eligible non-citizens, and put unaccompanied alien children in harm’s way”.

So what exactly is the Account financing?

This border policy rationale sits somewhat awkwardly with what the account actually pays for. The Refugee and Entrant Assistance account helps refugees, asylees and humanitarian parolees, among others, “become employed and self-sufficient as quickly as possible”.

The cuts are felt harshly on the ground and are mounting on years of financial pressure. Jennifer Chacón, who supports Refugee Resettlement at New York Catholic Charities, knows it firsthand. As she puts it, “The little funds we still have are provided by the state. We were a team of between 100 and 80 people; today we are 15.” Organizations feel increasingly discouraged; “We decided to stop applying for these types of grants,” she adds.

Following the Homeland Security Act of 2002, the account also serves another vital purpose: financing the care and placement of unaccompanied children apprehended by immigration authorities.  Looking at the 2024 account plan paints a better picture of what this entails—equalizing benefits for minors in the Unaccompanied Refugee Minors (URM) program and families separated at the US-Mexico border during Trump’s First Term; and providing immigration legal assistance to children and youth in the URM.

Fewer people crossing the border do not reduce the need for these services.  Chacón agrees, “We are assisting the same amount of people with limited personnel and resources.”

Father Fabián Arias, a volunteer at New Sanctuary Coalition and Saint Peter’s Church, has been accompanying minors at risk of deportation to court since 2000.

For him, the loss goes beyond basic services.  The cuts also strip away a sense of protection for the children he accompanies to court. “It is a matter of protection—of ensuring they are not alone—because when they are alone, they are far more vulnerable to a system that seeks to abuse them.”

His eyes water when he thinks of the children, lined up before court in borrowed suits that fall from their shoulders. “Being uprooted from the place that has seen you grow is very painful—it is overwhelming enough as it is, without having to fight alone, without any protection system.”

At Saint Peter’s Church, the legal clinic that supports them is struggling to stay afloat. “They do not even have the budget to assist the minimum number of people requiring this type of support,” Arias says.

The situation he describes is desperate. Many lack the financial means to hire a private lawyer, and “support organizations are overwhelmed and unable to take on their cases”.

Putting the American Pocket First

The Administration’s justification promises to end “the use of Federal taxpayer dollars to support non-citizens, putting Americans first.”

Where is the taxpayers’ money really going? Dr Frank-Vitale points to detention: holding more people, she says, “is what cost[s] the taxpayer more than anything.”

Spanning border security and interior enforcement, DHS has seen a record-breaking influx of funds in fiscal years 2025 and 2026.

The 2025 “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” (OBBBA) and the House Homeland Security Committee’s budget reconciliation recommendations allocated $56.7 billion for DHS.  Immigration centers alone received $45 billion, and ICE received a further $30 billion to expand its workforce.

The Secure America Act of 2026 then added $69.5 billion to ICE and CBP for immigration enforcement functions, including transport to and from detention facilities and operational costs of mass deportations.

What worries Dr Frank-Vitale is not that the streamline is being cut, but that it is being diverted. “It’s not that there isn’t funding,” she notes. “It’s just being chosen to be directed towards enforcement, in extreme amounts, rather than towards due process.”

While humanitarian services are defunded, security enforcement has expanded; the contrast is the point: “We have to put the context of defunding services against the hyper amount of funding that’s been provided for enforcement,” she adds.

This is felt most starkly at humanitarian protection and adjudication systems. In 2025, Congress allocated just $800 million to the immigration court system. Department of Justice received $3.3 billion for immigration enforcement under OBBBA, but funding is divided among prosecutions, local-government reimbursements and counter-narcotics work. Immigration judges are only one allowable use. Even then, the same law caps immigration judges at 800 from 2028, only 100 more than when it passed.

The cap becomes more concerning as backlogs are mounting. By the middle of FY 2026, more than 3.5 million cases were pending resolution, and an immigration judge’s average caseload stood at 5,450. Congress has provided $11.4 billion to immigration courts from 2003 through 2026. This is only one-fourth of the amount appropriated for ICE detention in 2025.

Challenging the Cut

California and six other states have sued President Donald Trump and Office of Management and Budget director Russell Vought, arguing the pocket rescission constitutes an unlawful impounding of congressionally appropriated funds.

Spearheading the lawsuit, California Attorney General Bonta firmly believes the cuts are damaging the livelihoods of his constituents: “No President has ever worked so hard to rip healthcare, childcare, housing, and educational opportunities away from families. He should be ashamed. We’re going to court — once again — to protect against the rampant abuses of power by this Administration.”

As the lawsuit pends settlement, all left to do is wait.

Willkommensklassen (welcome classes) are branches of the Nelson Mandela School in Wilmersdorf for newly arrived refugee children and young people, aged 6 to 18, to learn the necessary German language skills to progress into the public school system. In Berlin, two standalone educational centres for “welcome classes” currently operate at eight refugee arrival centres, including Tempelhof and Tegel. Meant as a “pass-over”, the attendance at welcome classes should “generally last no longer than one year”. The reality is much different. Children and young people are still attending schools at emergency shelters and arrival centres even when they have stopped being housed there.

The Left Party has consistently denounced the “segregation” of refugee children from regular school systems. It is not hard to see where this worry stems from: the Senate Department for Education indicated that in June, 137 children attended an education centre in Tegel. Only 13 school-age children were housed in the emergency shelter.

Now, as the Senate plans to build a new centre at the Hasensheide refugee accommodation centre, the conversation is gaining momentum. The center will welcome 900 people, including many unaccompanied minors, 75 of whom will have a place at the “welcome classes.”

Back in February, the district assembly of Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg had already stipulated that children should enter schools in Kreuzberg and Neukölln. The Senate argues otherwise: “Individual calculated excess capacity in North Neukölln is insufficient to ensure the reliable and permanent accommodation of all children.”

The Left Party has not been the only one to denounce the continuous operation of these school centres; the Berlin Refugee Council makes a similar denunciation: “The Senate is clinging to an expensive, discriminatory, and segregating parallel system, even though the conditions on which it was originally justified have long since ceased to exist”. The continuous operation of these centres could also, in principle, violate the recently adopted Common European Asylum System. In particular, under Article 16, member states must grant “the same access to education as their own nationals and under similar conditions.”

Then, how to speak of integration?

I want to report on how the educational experiences of children in these centres differ from those of refugee children in public schools. I am also interested in exploring meaningful ways in which children can be integrated into German society.

Children as “voices aware of their vocality”

In Silencing the Past, anthropologist Michel-Rolph Trouillot reminds us: “While some of us debate what history is or was, others take it in their own hands”. The making (and unmaking) of history is characterised by silences: marginalised voices are inherently forgotten because power structures dictate what is remembered, who makes it, and how we interpret memory. Despite severely suffering due to conflict, children are often sidelined in policymaking practices that affect them (Martuscelli & Villa, 2018). But I think their role as peacebuilders and agents in the construction of collective memory is crucial. Art therapy practices are particularly interesting because, in being co-creators of a learning space, children reclaim ownership of their experiences of trauma (Trouillot, 2015).

A Child’s Laugh is Worth All the Money in the World!

Currently, several child rights organisations operate educational programmes for refugee children.Clown4All, launched in Berlin with cooperation from the European Solidarity Corps, regularly performs in refugee shelters, open-stage ‘Clown Jams’, and training sessions. Clowns Without Borders also operates a chapter in Germany. I am working to get in touch with them and, hopefully, understand how their work helps manage their transition into schooling.

The articles trace a shift in German political attitudes toward both immigration and the far right. Most striking is the growing regional cooperation between AfD and the CDU, the country’s traditional party of government. The Brandmauer (“firewall”), the principle of non-collaboration with far-right extremism, is breaking down. In efforts to make their views more palatable to a roaring German nationalist sentiment, traditional parties are making pacts with AfD.

“My party doesn’t speak the language of the people on the streets,” says Markus Töns of Gelsenkirchen’s SPD.

Töns criticises a national party out of tune with voter perceptions, but the question remains: should parties align themselves with street-level far-right sensationalism?

Back in 2025, the Courthouse News made a premonitory claim: “People are afraid of a further deepening gap in society due to polarization”.  Trends in voter intent show the divide is now palpable at the state level. The Economist argues AfD’s rise does not necessarily signal a “blue wave” but a “growing apart” of communities. To make the point, it paints a grim picture of Gelsenkirchen as a town stripped to its bare bones; in contrast with richer, graduate-heavy cities like Cologne, Bonn and Münster, the AfD underperformed. Likewise, CNN attributes the party’s strength in Eastern Germany to economic disparity and the carrying of a communist legacy. That explains why Saxony-Anhalt shows 40% voting intention for AfD, but fails to account for growing affinity in Western Germany: in Baden-Württemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate, the swings were 9% and 11%, respectively.

The Economist also calls out the growing pro-Russia sentiment. Officials in Gelsenkirchen, where AfD has secured one-third of seats, are seeing a push for discourse against Germany’s support for Ukraine. In the east, where the AfD is strongest, CDU politicians have adopted positions “friendlier to the Kremlin than their party leaders in Berlin might like”. In the Ruhr, local SPD campaigns for stricter immigration policy than the national party does.

Importantly, this deepening collaboration entrenches a division of immigrants into wanted and unwanted. The AfD’s election manifesto is explicit about who should be allowed to enter, remain and work— a warm welcome for “European skilled workers” and a points system for non-EU migrants.

The party also advocates a German Germany. Central to its programme is “Leitkultur,” or leading culture: the protection of Germany’s culture and language and their establishment as dominant, so that everyone adopts “the values and morals seen to be inherently ‘German’”. By demanding that immigrants assimilate to this dominant culture, Leitkultur echoes the National Socialist ideal of cultural and racial homogeneity. CNN reads it similarly, noting that remigration carries inherent “Nazi connotations”.

Unsurprisingly, the AfD’s language on reclaiming living spaces for German-born citizens resonates heavily with nationalist sentiment. The AfD’s aim of letting “each German citizen build their own four walls instead of living as renters” and the party’s calls for cutting ties with the EU in pro of a “sovereign Germany” and a “Europe of Fatherlands”.

For Germany, then, it seems that “To Open the Gate” is taking on a new meaning— letting the AfD in. As Anna-Lena Karl, an SPD councillor and interviewed by The Economist, puts it: letting the AfD have such an active role in city structures poses a “normalisation” effect. To answer Töns critique, to align with the AfD is to make a discourse of xenophobia normal.

On September 14, 2026, New York City joined the City of Chicago, the City and County of San Francisco, and three others in a lawsuit against the Trump Administration’s new public charge rule.

The U.S. public charge rule allows the Department of State to deny visa applicants deemed “too reliant” on public benefits. DOS says the rule is part of government efforts to prioritise immigrant self-sufficiency.

While “public charge” has long been part of U.S. immigration law, who falls under this category is up to the presidential administration. In his first term, President Donald Trump expanded the discretionary capacity of individual immigration officers, suggesting anyone who used public benefits or qualified for them based on income could be deemed a public charge. The Biden Administration then ruled to standardise the principle as someone who relied on government aid as their major source of income.

On July 17, the Trump administration undid it.

Too Expensive to Live Here

For the recently arrived, becoming self-sufficient takes time— and money.

Jennifer Chacón, a case manager providing job placement services at Catholic Charities, knows it firsthand.

“I had to find out on my own; what do I do? Is my title valid here? Looks like it doesn’t; Is there a way to validate it? Oh, you can’t”.

Now she helps newcomers navigate these questions.

“Not everyone knows that they can do it […] and secondly, not everyone can access these services”. Professional accreditation is one example: “We’re talking about a process that could cost you five to six hundred; only to validate a bachelor’s”, Chacón says.

But, as Chacón says, many cannot afford to support their livelihoods, much less validate their degree. “They can’t just survive on their salary […] a household earning a minimum wage in New York City, which is seventeen dollars an hour, to pay rent food, and everything else is simply not possible.”

Chacón estimates that “ninety-eight, to not say a hundred, per cent of our clients receive public benefits”. Yet, many have been increasingly deterred from getting them. Indeed, researchers estimate loss of coverage will have a disproportionately higher impact among eligible noncitizens.

“Many are scared,” she says. “Our legal team mentioned that while the law says they are not subject to public charges, anything can happen, and it can change tomorrow or the day after tomorrow.”

Too Expensive to Support You Here

The agencies providing Refugee Resettlement Services are bearing the weight of budget cuts.

As recently as September 25, the Trump Administration proposed a ‘Pocket Rescision’ of $810 million targeting funds that directly support refugee and immigrant services. The breakdown: $567 million for the Refugee and Entrant Assistance account, which funds Office of Refugee Resettlement programs under HHS; and $10 million from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Citizenship and Integration grant program that provides ESL services.

For resettlement organisations, the cuts are mounting on years of financial stress. As Chacón puts it, “The little funds we still have are provided by the state. We were a team of between 100 and 80 people; today we are 15.”

Too Expensive to Care?

For newcomers, refugee resettlement organisations are a vital source of support.

Father Fabián Arias, a volunteer at New Sanctuary Coalition and Saint Peter’s Church, where budget cuts have reduced legal-clinic services, continues to build community.

Increasingly, he fears, the “Trump administration has targeted sanctuaries”. Arias not only worries about providing basic services, but also about a sense of security.

To him, these rulings are preventing “the community from feeling that it is a safe space, that ICE will not enter there”.

Though his eyes water, he still jokes about the importance of accepting help: “I’m sorry for whoever thinks of themselves as Superman, who thinks they don’t need to be taken care of”.

The landscape for Afghan asylees is changing drastically worldwide; in particular, the pieces by Reuters and Politico draw parallels between migration landscapes in the US and Germany.

Beginning in October 2022, Germany’s admission program for Afghans helped resettle those persecuted based on political activism, gender, religion or sexual orientation. Hoping to welcome more than 1,000 refugees monthly, with more than 17,000 still in the early stages of selection and stranded in bordering countries like Pakistan, it has fallen short of all expectations.

Non-Refoulement is a pillar of asylum and refugee protection in international law; it stops states from obliging a person to return to territories where they are exposed to persecution. As such, protection from forcible return applies both within a state’s territory and, most interestingly, to rejection at its borders. For the EU, a territory that functions “without internal frontiers”, this is particularly interesting: how can one restrict mobility both within the EU and on its shared external border?

Turns out there’s more than one catch.

Back in March, the European Parliament made a historic decision: any EU nation is now allowed to deport migrants to facilities settled outside the 27-nation bloc. Most recently, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Austria and Greece have negotiated an agreement for “return hubs”.  In June, European lawmakers voted to allow EU members to set up centres outside the EU to send rejected asylum seekers, instead of back to their home countries. While media centers on the Global North as refugee resettlers, this reminds us to look back at the Global South. Most notably, Iran and Pakistan hold the largest number of Afghan refugees, with 4.4 and 1.6 million, respectively. Reuters reports that Pakistan is intensifying efforts to forcibly return Afghans, which becomes even scarier in this context. A figure noteworthy: Pakistan and Iran pressured the return of or deported more than 280,000 Afghans only in April. For its part, the U.S. has also resorted to externalised border enforcement, suspended refugee admissions to the U.S., leaving thousands of Afghans stranded who awaited processing in Pakistan.

The Euronews piece reminds us that deportation to risk areas is prohibited under this principle, except if the person is convicted of criminal charges. This sounds reasonable, especially when followed by: “Officials said all deportees had criminal records and were required by law to leave.” But one must be careful to account for what it actually means to be convicted of “criminal charges”. In U.S. immigration law, for example, mandatory deportation, denial of reentry and ineligibility for other forms of relief are stipulated for those convicted of “aggravated felonies”. Aggravated felonies, however, are only a legal placeholder for offences Congress sees fit to label as such: they don’t have to be aggravated or classified as felonies in state and federal criminal law. Today, even failing to appear in court is an “aggravated felony.”

Increased use of surveillance technologies is also racialised and highly susceptible to bias, as Azmat Khan’s piece reminds us:

“Whoever analyzed the surveillance footage interpreted the normal activity of the household through an incriminating lens”.

In proposed plans for the EU’s shifting border control policy, biometrics and “European return orders”— a document in which member states cite reasons for the return decision of refugees— have been recently introduced, leaving those whose claims were denied perpetually singled out and marked: you are not worthy of resettlement here.

By Luna Ramirez Castellanos

At 9:10 AM, a line wraps around the Ted Weiss Federal Building; the quiet crowd is pressed against the towering facade. Farther down the road, NYPD officers and two Federal Protective Service cars are stationed. A security guard paces around the line; handcuffs and a gun are visible in his back pocket. From time to time, he pushes to move into line: “Hey! One line. Make it to the side of the building.” Amidst the chaos, an Argentinian priest hopes to bring calm to those awaiting their hearings: “No tengan ningún miedo. ICE no está acá.” [“Don’t be afraid. ICE is not here”] Rev. Eduardo Fabian Arias goes to court every day.

He tells me, “Lo que está instalado aquí es el miedo.” [“What they have instilled here is fear”]

Later that morning I experienced that fear.

Inside the building, we were immediately approached by a security officer who warned us [you] “might have to leave. The courtroom size is too small to host you.” A few moments later, I sat down in the waiting room— a volunteer asked me to help her translate for a respondent. As the security officer noticed me speaking with them, he approached us: “The only thing I ask for in MY waiting room is that you remain seated. I retrieve a couple of phrases from his rant: “Everybody notices” that we are students and what we are doing is “frowned upon.” It ended with a warning:

“Be careful”.

The immigration system functions under the Executive; with judges appointed by the Attorney General, there is little room for independent supervision. Immigration Court can therefore be a black box, and most often, the only way to hold it accountable is to be there and to report back. Journalism acts as the public’s check and balance.

Though Immigration Courts are open to the public, harassment and violence directed at observers is pushing many out the door. Fear-mongering against the press reduces public scrutiny of institutions. The Guardian’s piece reminds us that this is happening worldwide, and at an alarming rate. In Germany, the figures are daunting: only last year, 218 refugee shelters faced “politically motivated” assaults, many of which were orchestrated by far-right political movements.

Read against “The New Censorship”, a term pops up: legal authoritarianism. Constant campaigning against the free press and critical journalists plays a key role in eroding democratic institutions.  Populism is both a divisor and homogeniser; while pushing for a distinction between “real people” and “corrupt elites”, the populist leader hopes to create a mono-intellectualist culture. Criticism directly challenges the populist-imposed media’s role as a mirror to what the “real” people want. Indeed, Jan-Werner Müller reminds us “populists are not anti-elitists as much as they are anti-pluralists—only one way of thinking is allowed” (p. 25). In A Faith Under Siege, Rostyslav Pavlenko, Member of the Parliament of Ukraine, makes a similar appeal regarding the Russian government: “They condemn the values of freedom; they condemn the values of free speech”.  Mykhaylo Brytsyn, Evangelical Pastor, commented on the same rhetoric. His Church, which had been persecuted during Stalin’s terror, was accused of hosting German spies. 80 years later, in 2022, they were now being accused of hosting American ones. Marc Mcdonel, a Baptist Missionary in Ukraine, experiences the same delegitimisation: he is labelled as a CIA agent, solely because of his origin.

“Democracy has been the main source of legitimacy for journalists in modern societies” (p. 39). But democratic institutions are changing. By utilising an exploitative definition of democracy, which the book defines as “direct, majoritarian, [and] expressive”, populist leadership is pushing an “illiberal democracy”.

If this is the case, how do we bring these institutions back under the magnifying glass?

By Luna Ramirez Castellanos

After reading, the first thing that comes to mind is the categorisation of immigrants: how does superimposed language alter the public perception of refugees? How does it bend, shape and regulate their own identity?

The New Odyssey follows the journey of Hashem al-Souki as he leaves his home in Damascus, Syria, to reach Sweden in the hopes of acquiring a legal pathway for his three children to emigrate with him.

The Arab Spring, a wave of anti-authoritarian protests across the Arab world – namely in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Bahrain and Yemen—reached Syria in February 2011. Under the dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad, the Free Syrian Army emerged as a guerrilla-rebel force. Hashem, a regular worker at a water plant, was abducted, tortured and unjustly incarcerated by the regime, as were at least 11,000 others. Faced with a country becoming unrecognisable, Hashem is forced to flee. However, as he leaves the country, he encounters a paradigm: “does it make him any less Syrian to leave?” On a personal level, leaving the country also means leaving those who rely on him, especially his father: “I have to go – not for me, but for my children and my wife.” His journey out of the country also confronts him with guilt; at checkpoints he is cursed by soldiers, “Why are you abandoning the nation?”, or by members of the Islamic State ‘, You’re abandoning jihad. You don’t want to be mujahideen. His seeking of safety is constantly permeated by a “failure” to be patriotic, to love his country, to be Syrian.

A similar theme is explored in the New Arab’s piece: uprooting and belonging, as Syrians have built a new home far from theirs. Far-right politicians, in particular, have seen the fall of the Assad regime as a call to depart. Bavarian Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann commented:  “Those who have already integrated well are still cordially welcome. But it is clear that there are also people who have been here for 10 years and don’t have a job and haven’t integrated well, and then it’s right to help them return to their homeland”. Assimilation, to him, is a taxonomy indicator of worthiness: His use of language equates it to the capacity of Syrians to join the labour force. The piece further reads:

“superbly integrated in our country, have a job and are urgently needed here” and no one is thinking of getting such people to leave Germany.

The construction of social hierarchies for migrants enables a discursive construction of “otherness.” Who are “such people” relatively valorised against other Syrian migrants? What makes them deserving of refuge and others not? The piece draws from an “ideal” migrant. Recursive language used by language politicians creates a mediatic depiction of Syrians as docile, hardworking and grateful, juxtaposing them with the dependent, aid-demanding and unassimilated. This comparison produces “relative valorisation” and “civic ostracism”, where an ideal citizen-in-the-making is pushed against an unwanted removable immigrant. Thus, reinforcing a perception of migrants as “passive market and state subjects” (Valles, p. 290). [1]

A social construct that characterises migrants as a threat to order justifies punitive legal and security measures in immigration policy. Because it is clear that some have not been well-assimilated into the labour market, then it is “right” to “help” them return to their homeland. But is that truly what they want? Yamn Molhem, a Syrian emigré who has lived in Germany for ten years, is ready to stay: “They can’t deport our family,” he said, “My son is German.”

Molhem believes “Germans should think twice before they even consider sending back Syrians who work, pay taxes and help keep the economy running.” As an immigrant himself, he places value on their stay: we deserve to be here because we produce for the economy.

Read against The Washington Post’s “6,000 Syrians work as doctors in Germany. Some weigh whether to stay or go.” This valorisation and uprooting becomes more evident. The piece sets the theme in its opening phrase:

Amid rising calls in Germany for Syrians to return home after the fall of Bashar al-Assad, one group of professionals is being encouraged to stay: doctors.

Indeed, politicians view this population sector in high regard; for Interior Minister Nancy Faeser, Syrian doctors are actively sustaining the health sector. Rania Kadib Alban, a Syrian ear, nose and throat specialist, notes this distinction: “As doctors we’re a little safer, because the German health-care system needs us,” but she says, “If my family and friends aren’t allowed to stay, then I don’t want to either.”

For doctors, like for Hashem, their decision to build a home away from home is underlined by guilt. Mohamad Ghazal remarks that even if he feels “obliged” to help Syria rebuild, he sees himself in Germany long-term.

In her memoir, Loubna Mrie makes a similar appeal to finding identity as she carries the ‘guilt’ of leaving. Like Hashem and the doctors, Loubna deals with the guilt of what is left behind: her mother has been abducted and murdered by her father in retaliation for her defiance against Assad’s regime.

Received in Istanbul as an activist, though, Loubna experiences a different categorisation of “otherness,” one that exploits her identity for meaning-making and political discourse. Loubna retells her experience attending Civil society workshops sponsored by the US and the EU. Her initial perception is that they have been made to appear diverse:

The participants, who come from different parts of Syria, seem to check all democratic boxes: The woman wearing a headscarf, the man with a beard, the Christian, the Isma’ili, the Kurd.

They are curated in appearance. Loubna jokingly adds, academics are there to “explain the concept of civil disobedience to [them] in broken Arabic.” And the pointless metaphoric exercises, like the partition of an orange, are only “intended to reassure donors that their quest to save Syria is going well”.

“It all feels so performative.”, she says, and it is.

To me, this performance of media evokes a greater tension in journalistic work: how to humanly portray experiences of those affected by violence? And most importantly, how do we remain true to their experience when there exists a narrative pressure to weaponise their suffering? How we use language actively shapes, redresses and strips identity. Discursive resources can attribute value to the experience of immigration, justify violence, and reinforce stereotypes. No matter who the source is, a far-right politician or a seemingly well-intentioned multinational organisation, how we choose to tell stories of migration can actively diminish the lived experience of those who’ve made the journey.

Notes:

[1] The text by Valles examines the case of ‘Haitianos’ in Tijuana. His theory of valorisation, though, is applicable in a similar scenario: “what grants someone deservingness of legal status?” Read more in: Cuando llegaron los Haitianos”: Black and Central American Migration, Respectability, and the Asylum Crisis in Tijuana, México

By Luna Ramirez Castellanos

Winnie Lin returns to her sixteenth birthday when asked about her favourite memory:

Glasses are fume-flogged up, utensils shimmer under a glazing sun, sweat runs down a treasured black apron: dad is on “cooking mode”. The sun burns, and the grill is a non-stop machine— plates of lamb chops, clams, and the star of the show: lobster.

Her father: a server, line cook, head chef and griller, all at once. He is out there for hours, prepping the machine, then setting the table, putting the food on the plates. It’s an all-consuming endeavour, “you could make a show about it”, she adds. In conversation, you can almost savour the final product: “It’s just marinated so well. He spreads mayonnaise on it. It is like, perfectly simmered. Oh my God, it is perfect”.

It takes time to put that lobster on the plate.

I asked if she had the recipe. “My dad is afraid of me handling seafood, because the pincers of the lobster are kind of sharp… But I want to try it. He was like, ‘No. Don’t touch it.’” It isn’t the food delicacies or the long list of visiting family relatives that she reminisces about, but getting to cook with her father: “But that day, I was helping my dad with it. I just felt so good, working with him on it. I think it just shows me how fast time flies by.”

Winnie grew up in Flushing – “the place with good food”, as she describes it. Her parents emigrated from China, an identity woven into the culinary scene around her. The annual family barbecue. She describes Flushing as a tight-knit community, a “suburban” enclave: her “bubble.”

Winnie’s day begins the night before, everything planned. Life at Princeton is busy for her; she wakes up at 8:30 AM, grabs breakfast, works for three hours at the library, gets lunch, goes to class and then meets up with her friends or advisees. 

Winnie Lin: a PAA co-chair, a PCA, and a great friend, all at once. Her first-year roommate and close friend, Prisha Maggu, jokingly notes, “If you wanna meet with Winnie, you have to be in her Google Calendar.” She carries a deep sense of admiration for her. Having known her for so long, she can only name about “70%” of everything Winnie does on campus. Mackynzi Adams, another of her freshman-year roommates, attests to this: “[Winnie] is always working for the community or a part of a club. She certainly cares about others and getting to know people deeply”.

When asked about Princeton, Winnie always goes back to community: her zee group from freshman year –whom she religiously grabs dinner with at 5 P.M. in RoMa- or making space in her (very packed) calendar to help her advisees.

It takes a hell of a lot of time to do all she does. But Winnie does it happily: “I’ve grown up with a mentality of giving to a community that needs it, being […] with people”.

Interviewer: Luna Ramirez

Interviewee: Winnie Lin

The Lobster

Glasses are fume-flogged up, utensils shimmer under a glazing sun, sweat runs down a treasured black apron: Dad is in “cooking mode”. The sun burns, and the grill is a non-stop machine— plates of lamb chops, clams, and the star of the show: lobster. Winnie Lin goes back to her sixteenth birthday celebration when asked about her favourite memory. It isn’t the food or the long list of visiting family relatives that she reminisces about, but her getting to cook with her father: “But that day, I was helping my dad with it. I just felt so good, working with him on it. I think it just shows me how fast time flies by.”