Mobility and displacement are major characteristics of contemporary societies. These population shifts are far from fluid, homogeneous or linear, but are, instead, interspersed with a range of longer or shorter periods of waiting. Whether these intervals are technically, administratively or politically motivated, they are often understood in spatial terms: waiting societies have a territorial dimension. This volume examines and assesses the many forms that waiting territories take, in order to better understand their various juridical statuses, their relationships with their spatial environment and specific forms of temporality, and the various economic and social relationships which they foster. The contributions primarily focus on the Americas because this continent is the product of the (voluntary or forced) displacement of various population groups that have themselves left their mark on the territories which they have appropriated. The book is divided into five parts. Part I, “The Genealogy and Stakes of Waiting Situations”, presents waiting as a state of mobility; Part II, ‘”When Waiting Defines a Territory”, focuses on the spatial implications of situations of waiting; Part III, “Social Practices and Spatial Dynamics in Waiting Territories”, explores the ways in which people inhabit waiting territories; Part IV, “Waiting Territories and the Challenges to Identity”, examines the mutations of identity in situations of waiting; and Part V, “The Memory, Heritage, and Curation of Waiting Territories”, looks at the way in which waiting territories can become the focus of heritage practices and the politics of memory.

Named one of the ten best books of the year by the Chicago Tribune A Publishers Weekly best book of 2019 | A 2019 NPR Staff Pick A pathbreaking history of the United States’ overseas possessions and the true meaning of its empire We are familiar with maps that outline all fifty states. And we are also familiar with the idea that the United States is an “empire,” exercising power around the world. But what about the actual territories—the islands, atolls, and archipelagos—this country has governed and inhabited? In How to Hide an Empire, Daniel Immerwahr tells the fascinating story of the United States outside the United States. In crackling, fast-paced prose, he reveals forgotten episodes that cast American history in a new light. We travel to the Guano Islands, where prospectors collected one of the nineteenth century’s most valuable commodities, and the Philippines, site of the most destructive event on U.S. soil. In Puerto Rico, Immerwahr shows how U.S. doctors conducted grisly experiments they would never have conducted on the mainland and charts the emergence of independence fighters who would shoot up the U.S. Congress. In the years after World War II, Immerwahr notes, the United States moved away from colonialism. Instead, it put innovations in electronics, transportation, and culture to use, devising a new sort of influence that did not require the control of colonies. Rich with absorbing vignettes, full of surprises, and driven by an original conception of what empire and globalization mean today, How to Hide an Empire is a major and compulsively readable work of history.