Whose Home?: Hospitality and Homemaking Among Afghan Refugees in Albania

Fekonja, Eva (author), Lipovec Čebron, Uršula (mentor), Verstappen, Sanderien (co-mentor)

This master thesis analyses the structural position of Afghan refugees in the Albanian town of Shëngjin through the notions of hospitality and homemaking. It tracks various discourses, ideologies and practices of hospitality as enacted by different actors: The Albanian government, local authorities, international organizations involved in the evacuation of the Afghan refugees, and the refugees themselves. It further uses the notion of homemaking to show the concrete ways in which the position of the refugee as a guest is negotiated by the Afghan refugees themselves. The ethnography starts with the analysis of the political discourse of hospitality and counterposes it to the examples of hospitality practices enacted by the Afghan refugees. It continues by taking a closer look into tangible manifestations of Afghans’ homemaking in Shëngjin, such as the opening of the Afghan restaurants and creation of street art. It concludes by analyzing ways in which the cultural difference as the marker of Otherness is expressed and managed through performances of hospitality, and shows how the Pitt-Rivers’s (2012 [1977]) observation of hospitality on the verge of hostility is manifested in the organization of lives of the Afghan refugees in Shëngjin. The thesis problematizes the notion of home as static and territorialized and the dichotomy between being at home and being displaced. Hospitality, a key concept in understanding the social position of Afghan refugees in Shëngjin, provides a fruitful framework, through which the entanglements of the refugees’ political subordination as well as refugees’ agency can be accounted for and understood, without resorting to simplified and dichotomized representations of refugee lives.

• Language: English
• Keywords: hospitality, homemaking, refugees, Afghanistan, Albania
• Work type: Master's thesis/paper
• Organization: FF - Faculty of Arts
• Year: 2022
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-142333
• Publication date in RUL: 30.10.2022

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Title: Čigav dom?: Gostoljubje in ustvarjanje doma med afganistanskimi begunci v Albaniji

Abstract

Magistrsko delo analizira strukturni položaj afganistanskih beguncev v albanskem mestu Shëngjin. Ukvarja se z različnimi diskurzi, ideologijami in praksami gostoljubja s strani različnih akterjev: albanske oblasti, lokalnih oblasti, organizacij, ki so sodelovale pri evakuaciji afganistanskih beguncev ter beguncev samih. Preko pojma ustvarjanja doma, magistrsko delo osvetli prakse afganistanskih beguncev, ki nasprotujejo oziroma predstavljajo alternativo njihovi pripisani socialni vlogi gosta. Etnografski del magistrskega dela se začne z analizo gostoljubja kot političnega diskurza in ga postavi v nasprotje z gostoljubnimi praksami afganistanskih beguncev. Nato se poglobi v konkretne primere ustvarjanja doma v kraju Shëngjin, kot je odprtje afganistanskih restavracij in ulična umetnost. Zaključi z analizo načinov, na katere gostoljubje postane način obvladovanja kulturne razlike, kot pomembnega elementa Drugosti. Poglavje pokaže tudi, kako organizacija begunske nastanitve v kraju Shëngjin odraža opažanja Pitt-Riversa (2012 [1977]) o gostoljubju, ki se lahko hitro sprevrne v sovražnost. Magistrsko delo problematizira pojem statičnega in teritorialnega doma ter dihotomijo med “biti doma” in “biti stran od doma” oziroma med domom in begunstvom. Gostoljubje se je izkazalo za produktiven teoretični okvir, skozi katerega je mogoče razumeti tako politično podrejenost beguncev, kot tudi njihovo delovanje (“agency”). Preko pojma gostoljubja lahko torej razumemo družbeno pozicijo beguncev, ne da bi se morali zatekati k poenostavljenim in dihotomiziranim reprezentacijam begunskih življenj.

• Keywords: gostoljubje, ustvarjanje doma, begunci, Afganistan, Albanija