Panel: Onward Migration within the Global South: Empirical Realities, Theoretical Directions

Abstract

Scholarship has increasingly looked at how migration journeys in the contemporary world involve multi-faceted aspirations, fragmented journeys, changing destinations, and multi-sited networks of different kinds. Onward migration is an emerging area of research that is rooted in this very complexity, acknowledging this increasingly dynamic nature of migration decision making, journeys, and settlement. For instance: people forcibly on the move may have different sets of aspirations and strategies guiding their onward movements even after initial displacement, generating multi-directional journeys, often creating transnational families. The disrupted nature of networks produced has unique implications for transnational networks that persist, are (re)created, and leveraged, generating what scholars have termed a ‘multi-sited’ transnationalism. However, despite the prevalence of onward migration among countries of the Global South, much of the research around the phenomenon, with some notable exceptions has focused on South-North movements. Research has also often been shaped by an economic lens, whereas the social, political, and cultural nuances of onward migration can be crucial.

This panel seeks to shift the locus of research to the current geographies of onward migration, aiming to explore questions of aspirations, asylum in onward journeys, multi-sited networks, intergenerational engagement, and, particularly, the postcolonial context of onward migration in many countries of the Global South. We will be primarily seeking papers engaging with the empirical realities of onward migration and refuge in the Global South so as to have an empirically informed discussion on underlying patterns, discourses, and theoretical directions. Suggested topics include (but are not limited to): specific cases (Rohingya, Venezuelan, South Sudanese, Syrian, Afghan), postcolonial contexts of mobility and borders, migration aspirations and decisions, protracted and intergenerational displacement, multi-sited networks, home- and place-making, onward precarity, and trajectories of return. The goal will be to build upwards and collectively rethink the landscape of onward migration and its manifold consequences within the Global South.

Each presenter will be allocated (15) minutes for the presentation and (5) minutes for a paperfocused Q&A. At the end of the presentations, a panel discussion of 30 minutes will be held, with the objective of drawing linkages, identifying underlying patterns, and discussing theoretical directions in studying onward migration in the Global South

in-person or hybrid will be announced