WELCOME TO LESVOS! Incontri di confine tra locali, turisti e migranti nelle isole dell’Egeo settentrionale

Abstract

The Mediterranean has historically been crossed by multiple forms of mobility, which have contributed to shaping its identity and specificity as a cultural, social, economic and political area. In our contemporaneity, tourism and migration have emerged as emblematic forms of the transformations produced by the interconnected impact of local and global forces. My contribution, grounded in anthropological theory and based on ethnographic fieldwork, focuses on the case of the North Aegean islands and in particular on Lesvos, which has become a symbol of the tensions between securitization and humanitarianism in the management of migration in the Mediterranean. Starting with a critical reflection on the concepts of hospitality and border, the article analyses the different dimensions of the encounter between the inhabitants of Lesvos, the migrants who reach the island by sea and the tourists who go there for their vacations. Such encounters are marked by highly structured, politicized “gazes” capable of building categories and hierarchies that make the different people who move around the island mutually (in)visible. However, Lesvos also offers interesting examples of practices that transgress and overcome such “boundaries of invisibility”, showing how the categories of host and guest are actually more ambiguous and fluid than what is represented by the dominant public and political discourse. Focusing on a series of “transformative encounters” between locals, tourists and migrants, the article argues for the importance of critically discussing those experiences of interchange, sharing and conviviality that seem to indicate a common aspiration to live together “through differences”.