New forms of transnational mobility and diasporic belonging have become emblematic of a supposed ‘global' condition of uprootedness. Yet much recent theorizing of our so-called ‘postmodern' life emphasizes movement and fluidity without interrogating who and what is ‘on the move'. This original and timely book examines the interdependence of mobility and belonging by considering how homes are formed in relationship to movement. It suggests that movement does not only happen when one leaves home, and that homes are not always fixed in a single location. Home and belonging may involve attachment and movement, fixation and loss, and the transgression and enforcement of boundaries. What is the relationship between leaving home and the imagining of home itself? And having left home, what might it mean to return? How can we re-think what it means to be grounded, or to stay put? Who moves and who stays? What interaction is there between those who stay and those who arrive and leave? Focusing on differences of race, gender, class and sexuality, the contributors reveal how the movements of bodies and communities are intrinsic to the making of homes, nations, identities and boundaries. They reflect on the different experiences of being at home, leaving home, and going home. They also explore ways in which attachment to place and locality can be secured - as well as challenged - through the movements that make up our dwelling places.Uprootings/Regroundings: Questions of Home and Migration is a groundbreaking exploration of the parallel and entwined meanings of home and migration. Contributors draw on feminist and postcolonial theory to explore topics including Irish, Palestinian, and indigenous attachments to ‘soils of significance'; the making of and trafficking across European borders; the female body as a symbol of home or nation; and the shifting grounds of ‘queer' migrations and ‘creole' identities.This innovative analysis will open up avenues of research an

Central Asia is a region singularly marked by attempts to transform social life by transforming place. Drawing together established scholars and a new generation of historians, geographers and anthropologists, this volume brings empirical specificity and theoretical depth to debates about the politics of place-making in this diverse region, making an important contribution to Central Asian studies and a distinctive regional comparison to the ‘spatial turn’ in social analysis. Case studies draw on archival research and oral history to explore the workings—and unintended consequences—of policies aimed at sedentarizing, collectivizing and resettling populations as a means to fix and territorialize space. The book also examines ethnographic studies attuned to the role of movement in sustaining social life, from Soviet-era trade networks that linked rural Central Asia and the Russian metropolis, to pilgrimage routes through which ‘kazakhness’ is articulated, to the contemporary moralization of migration abroad in search of work. Rather than analysing ‘flows’ as abstract processes, the book enquires about effortful activity, material infrastructures, political relations and social habits through which people, ideas, knowledge, skills and material objects move or are prevented from moving. As such, it offers new insights into the complex intersections of movement, power and place in this important region over the last two centuries. This book was originally published as a special issue of Central Asian Survey.

How are im/mobilities articulated, imagined and practiced in relation to multiple futures? A critical examination of im/mobilities raises questions as to how power relations and crisis-driven futures enable, inhibit or prevent mobility, what meanings are culturally constructed around im/mobilities and how they are experienced. The contributors to this volume look at entangled future mobilities and immobilities using humanities and social science approaches in diverse examples: Afrofuturist poetry, de-extinction projects, dystopian novels, a Uruguayan planned relocation program, lives of rural Zambian women, climate adaptation in Morocco and Austrian financial literacy policy.

This book assesses the impact of liberalization on practices of government and relations between state and society. It is clear that liberalization as state policy has complex forms of regulation and deregulation inbuilt, and these policies have resulted in dramatic increases in productivity and economic wealth but also generated spectacular new forms of inequality between social groups, regions, and sectors. Through a detailed examination of the Indian state, the contributors - all experts in their respective fields - explore questions such as: Have the new inequalities resulted in greater social unrest and violence? How has the meaning of citizenship changed? What will the long-term effects of regional economic imbalances be on migration, employment, and social welfare? Will increasing federalism result in new problems? Will smaller governments be more effective in providing basic necessities such as clothing, housing, food, water, and sanitation to citizens? What does liberalization mean to Indians in cities and villages, in small towns, and metropolises, in poor, middle class, or wealthy homes? Are concepts like social capital, decentralization, private enterprise, and grass-roots globalization effective in analyzing the post-liberalization state, or are new concepts needed? By focusing on what specifically has changed about the state after liberalization in India, this volume will shed light on comparative questions about the process of neoliberal restructuring across the world. As such, it will be of interest to scholars of a variety of disciplines, including sociology, anthropology, political science, geography, international studies, public policy, environmental studies and economics.

Nuruddin Farah is widely regarded as one of the most sophisticated voices in contemporary world literature. Michel Foucault is revered as one of the most important thinkers of the twentieth century, with his discursive legacy providing inspiration for scholars working in a range of interdisciplinary fields. The Disorder of Things offers a reading of the Somali novelist through the prism of the French philosopher. The book argues that the preoccupations that have remained central throughout Farah’s forty year career, including political autocracy, female infibulation, border conflicts, international aid and development, civil war, transnational migration and the Horn of Africa’s place in a so-called ‘axis of evil’, can be mapped onto some key concerns in Foucault’s writing most notably Foucault’s theoretical turn from ‘disciplinary’ to ‘biopolitical’ power. In both the colonial past and the postcolonial present, Somalia is typically represented as an incubator of disorder: whether in relation to internecine conflict, international terrorism or contemporary piracy. Through his work, both fictional and non-fictional, Farah strives to present alternative stories to an expanding global readership. The Disorder of Things analyses the politics and poetics that underpin this literary project, beginning with Farah’s first fictional cycle, Variations on the Theme of an African Dictatorship (1979-1983), and ending with his Past Imperfect trilogy (2004-2011). Farah’s writing calls for a more refined, substantial reading of our current geo-political situation. As such, it both warrants and compels the kind of critical engagement foregrounded throughout The Disorder of Things. This book will appeal to students, academics and general readers with an interest in the interdisciplinary study of literature. Its engagement with theorists, drawn from postcolonial, feminist and development studies, set against the backdrop of a host of philosophical and sociological discourses, shows how such intellectual cross-fertilisation can enliven a single-author study.

This edited volume discusses the discourse, experience and representation of Diaspora from a variety of cultural and disciplinary perspectives and offers new and original insight into contemporary notions of Diaspora.

The Routledge Queer Studies Reader provides a comprehensive resource for students and scholars working in this vibrant and interdisciplinary field. The book traces the emergence and development of Queer Studies as a field of scholarship, presenting key critical essays alongside more recent criticism that explores new directions. The collection is edited by two of the leading scholars in the field and presents: individual introductory notes that situate each work within its historical, disciplinary and theoretical contexts essays grouped by key subject areas including Genealogies, Sex, Temporalities, Kinship, Affect, Bodies, and Borders writings by major figures including Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, Judith Butler, David M. Halperin, José Esteban Muñoz, Elizabeth Grosz, David Eng, Judith Halberstam and Sara Ahmed. The Routledge Queer Studies Reader is a field-defining volume and presents an illuminating guide for established scholars and also those new to Queer Studies.