Relational (im)mobilities: a case study of Senegalese coastal fishing populations

Abstract

ABSTRACT Immobility and mobility are often viewed as fixed, binary opposites: one is either a migrant or a non-migrant. Yet, everyday experiences and realities elude such simple bifurcation. Non-migrants are not necessarily immobile: they frequently participate in small-scale movements and are well-engaged in social spaces that cross international borders. Similarly, migrants often engage in corporeal, material and communicative practices that anchor them to their homelands. This article applies a climate mobilities lens to a qualitative case study of an urban Senegalese fishing community, characterised by its ‘micro-mobilities’ as much as by its international migration. Specifically, I take the case of Guet Ndar, Saint-Louis. Faced with rising seas, eroding coastlines, and depleting fish stocks and biodiversity, Guet Ndarians abroad and at home respond to the ensuing degradation of livelihoods and the destruction of homes by altering their mobility patterns through circular labour mobility to Mauritania, which then enables smaller-scale local movements including self-relocation via social and financial remittances. I argue that (im)mobilities are neither fixed nor all-encompassing but are rather relational and uneven – in time, space and agency – and that environmental changes pressure people, regardless of their migration status, to redirect their (im)mobilities into new constellations.