Abstract
ABSTRACTOne consequence of European unification has been the transformation of the Mediterranean Sea into a defensive moat to stop the flow of unwanted migrants. In this techno-political moat, the communication networks of ‘Fortress Europe’ have established, through monitoring and interception technologies (and their corresponding speech acts), a buffer zone surrounding European Union (EU) territorial waters. In this buffer zone, the EU and its member states impose on refugees and migrants a survival test that stops all but the fittest from entering – a test that often results in serious and irreversible human rights violations. This paper examines the Mediterranean as a transidiomatic environment: a multilingual space shaped by the communicative practices of groups of people, either territorially defined or deterritorialized, who interact using an array of both face-to-face and long-distance media. These interactions are activated by two sets of opposing players: those involved in border reinforcement and those engaged in border crossing. Transidiomatic practices, in the form of either order-words or passwords, provide an effective angle for the analysis of the intense conflicts and struggles that today fill the Mediterranean borderscape.
Published Version
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