Affective Spaces: Migration in Scandinavian and German Transnational Narratives by Anja Tröger

Abstract

Reviewed by: Affective Spaces: Migration in Scandinavian and German Transnational Narratives by Anja Tröger Thomas Herold Affective Spaces: Migration in Scandinavian and German Transnational Narratives. By Anja Tröger. Cambridge: Legenda, 2021. Pp. xi + 181. Cloth £79.99. ISBN 978-1839540134. Anja Tröger’s 2021 monograph Affective Spaces: Migration in Scandinavian and German Transnational Narratives examines twelve novels whose fairly recent publication dates are bookended by Vigdis Hjorth’s Snakk til meg (2011) and Zeshan Shakar’s Tante Ulrikkes vei (2017). The novels are written in Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, and German, take place in the respective countries, and are all transnational narratives, populated with characters who are in transit or have already arrived in one of the respective countries. The study is organized into five chapters that thematically follow the chronology of the “migratory journey” (4), from examining personal motivations and circumstances of migrants’ decisions to leave their home countries (chapter one); [End Page 328] to an evaluation of the processes of border-crossing and asylum-seeking (chapter two); to the encounter of Scandinavian travelers with those whom they perceive as “other” (chapter three); to Scandinavian characters who are confronted with asylum seekers within their own communities (chapter four); to post-migrant characters who have to deal with situations in which they are completely embedded and yet marked as “other” by their fellow citizens (chapter five). The examination of nine Scandinavian texts (three each from Sweden, Norway, and Denmark) is complemented by the analysis of three German texts, in order to, as Tröger explains, break through the assumption of Scandinavian homogeneity and probe the notion of Scandinavian exceptionalism. The latter point is a recurring theme, as the study repeatedly returns to Scandinavian privilege and surveys that link Scandinavian countries to the highest levels of quality of life and happiness. These concepts, according to Tröger, do not appear to hold true in the comparison of Scandinavian and German transnational narratives. I discern two main points of inquiry in the study. The first has to do with Scandinavian privilege and is more accidental than substantial to the study: the question as to what these texts can tell us about Scandinavian society. According to these novels, Scandinavian society seems to be, all the privilege and happiness notwithstanding, just as xenophobic and bound to an exclusionary mindset as other Western societies. The second and more important interest that holds the entire study together is its theoretical framework and method of inquiry, which digs deeply into theories of affect and ultimately pursues ethical questions. Particularly, the inquiry starts with the example of racial profiling in Sweden in the context of anti-immigration measures, deportations, and an open letter (2013) by Jonas Hassan Khemiri, a Swedish writer of color, who suggests to then Swedish Minister for Justice, Beatrice Ask, “to trade our skins and our experiences” (1). Khemiri points to “practices of exclusion, processes of othering, and the disparate distribution of precarity in the context of migration” (2) in Swedish society. Tröger uses this starting point to ascertain similar patterns in the twelve novels, maintaining that Khemiri’s suggested “body swap” is similar to what happens during the consumption of literature, where the reader steps into the shoes of characters–in other words, how the act of reading generates an affective reader-character relationship. Such exchange of experiences goes beyond just that, however, and the study’s ultimate goal is the examination of an ethical imperative. Tröger is interested in finding an answer to Judith Butler’s question: “What is our responsibility toward those we do not know, toward those who seem to test our sense of belonging or to defy available norms of likeness?” Whereas Butler sees “critical reflection of exclusionary norms” as the main ethical answer to this question of collective responsibility, Tröger adds that “affect in situated and embodied encounters” (6) must complement such critical thinking. Accordingly, the close readings of the novels examine the affective encounters between white and privileged Europeans and migrants or post-migrants of color and suggest that those experiences carry over to [End Page 329] the reader, creating a sense of “affective responsibility.” In this context, Tröger cites Emily Beausoleil...