The aesthetics of migration

For the fourth lecture, we read a short story written by Unigwe. First, we defined what an 'aesthetic' is, and then we applied the concept to migration. We had a small discussion about the difference in portrayal between male and female African migrants. We talked about the strategies used by Chika Unigwe in her story. Lastly, we discussed precarity and the migration of West-African women and human agency in texts.

I think this lecture will definetely be useful for my paper, which is also about migration. The difficulties that migration brings with it are so much more elaborate than people realize or expect. It is more than just packing and moving, it really impacts your identity. Not only do they come into a new culture, with a new language, they are also often marginalised. That is something that I have seen and read in other courses as well. Migration and identity are very closesly interlinked and that often seems to be forgotten. 

This is something that literature often is about, this loss of identity that goes hand in hand with migration. Examples are 'A Pale view of Hills' by Ishiguro, or Radna Fabias' 'Habitus'. This is a societal and human issue that is important and this is something that is really put into the spotlight by literature.