The voices from the Mediterranean must be heard

In this horizontal lecture, five ethnographers invite everyone to imagine migration otherwise. They are part of the collective Tanimar, named after the vessel used for research purposes in the Mediterranean.

“If you are an undocumented migrant, you are only either a threat or a victim.” In the EU, these are the dominant categorisations aimed at those who are crossing borders with the only hope to improve their living conditions compared to their country of origin.

Migrants’ voices are lost in the West's narrative over migration, a depiction that has hegemonic power. Alongside journalist Christian Elia, Tanimar’s research crew proposes an alternative, a counter-vocabulary assembled by the very protagonists of the migration routes between Tunisia and Sicily. These are Tunisian migrants who were deported or rejected from Europe, but also Sicilian and Tunisian fishermen working in the area, as well as political activists and inhabitants of the Pelagian islands.

Tanimar’s crew starts with a capitain, a specialized person who, in exchange for a free travel opportunity, leads migrant ships to Europe. Upon arrival, he will be seen differently, no longer a savior but an exploiter, and thus arrested.

The existence of comita further disproves another misconception, that journeys are only led by criminal organizations. Comita is a form of small-scale travelling where members of the same family or social network gather to reach Sicily from Tunisia. Having lived by the sea, they can face it on their own, relying on their maritime expertise.

Migration routes are studded with terms like capitain and comita. With far-right governments on the rise in Europe, these words, and with them the knowledges and practices they represent, risk being forgotten. Instead, to break free from the invader-victim dichotomy is to imagine with and based on the lived experience of migration.