Performing l-ḥrig: music, sound and undocumented migration across the contemporary Mediterranean (Morocco–Italy)

Abstract

ABSTRACT Based on ethnographic research that is part of a larger project on the role of music and sound among migrant Moroccan men in Italy, this article focuses on ‘L-ḥərraga’, a song that narrates the voyage and the experience of undocumented migration that ends with the tragic death of a young Moroccan man crossing the Mediterranean. Through ‘L-ḥərraga’, a song which belongs to ʿabidat rma – a musico-poetic genre whose ‘rough’ sound is particularly meaningful for Moroccans from the plains and plateaus – it is possible to reflect on burning political questions concerning a geo-cultural zone where historically determined differences between North and South are increasingly acute: the Mediterranean. Expanding on earlier writings about music and sound in the context of contemporary Maghrebi undocumented migration in the Mediterranean, informed by contemporary debates about mobilities in reference to Islam, and drawing on concepts that emerged during fieldwork, this article attempts to explore ‘L-ḥərraga’ as a sonorous account of a hazardous crossing in which migration is presented as an ethical horizon.