Contrasting Performances of Tourist and Migrant Mobilities in Norwegian Hostels

Abstract

Hostels are synonymous with independent tourists and frequently identified as spaces of hospitality that enable a number of touristic performances to take place. These performances include resting, relaxation, destination or route planning, and interactions with other likeminded visitors. However, using Oslo, Norway as a research setting, we argue that such places may also permit a range of other performances to take place due to the increasing use of hostels as temporary and semi-permanent housing solutions for migrant populations. This alternative group of hostel users originated from a plethora of different countries and included economic and political migrants from Africa, the Middle East and Eastern Europe. Although hostel spaces provided comfort, safety, and platforms for friendships to prosper for non-tourist hostel users, they also served as settings for largely contrasting performances of immobility to take place. Thus, Oslo's hostels revealed a range of overlapping acts that resulted in a paradoxical ensemble of entangled tourist and non-tourist performances.