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Workshop: Transnational Networks - National Democracies
Political mobilization and engagement among minority youth
| Name: |
Urmila Goel and Synnøve Bendixsen |
| Position: |
European University Viadrina, Frankfurt/Oder, Germany and Center for Metropolitan Studies, Berlin |
| Paper title: |
Spaces of the Othered: Strategies of Negotiating Othering Discourses |
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| Abstract: |
The current discourses on migration in Germany focus on the need of ‘integration’ and the fear of ‘segregation’. The Othered, i.e. the migrants and all those who are classified as such, are considered as posing a threat to the German society, if they do not cease to be ‘the Other’. In this very discourse they are at the same time fixed as ‘the Other’, making it thus impossible for them to escape this category. All structures, institutions and spaces established by the Othered for the Othered are considered as signs of segregation and condemned as contributing to the establishment of ‘parallel societies’ in Germany. While all Othered are considered a potential threat, those mistrusted most in contemporary Germany are people marked as Muslims.
The aim of this paper is to look more closely at two spaces of the Othered, analyse which functions they fulfil for the participants, and contextualise the functions of these spaces within the dominant German discourses on migration. On the one hand, we introduce the group of the Muslim Youth Germany, a multi-ethnic religious organisation created by and for young Muslims as a space for learning about Islam. On the other hand, we describe the internet portal http://www.theinder.net (called the Indernet), which is ethnically defined as Indian and has been created by those considered to be Indians of the second generation for Indians of the second generation. These two spaces differ in many aspects; one is based on religion, the other on ethnic identity; one is a network of small groups meeting weekly in Berlin and in other larger German cities, the other is a virtual network of people scattered all over German-speaking Europe; and one is constantly accused of being Islamist, whereas the other is observed with interested Orientalism. However, there are also several similarities between the two spaces; both are spaces of belongingness in which othering on the basis of religion/ethnic identity are absent; both are spaces in which the participants can negotiate the identity ascribed to them by the public discourses on their own terms; and both are spaces which do not exist parallel to the spaces of the mainstream German society, but are interlinked with and localised in them.
The paper analyses the differences and similarities of the two spaces of the Othered, the different strategies of dealing with the Othering discourses, and doing so also analyses how these discourses contribute to the constitution of these spaces.
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