Talk: Targeting Albanian Communities for Immigration Detention (part one)
This is part one of a talk on developments which have led to Albanian communities being the most common nationality in detention in 2023. Piro Rexhepi situates the detention of Albanian people in the wider context of international migration policies, albanophobia and racist discourses.
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Prejudice against people from Albania is not new. However, in recent years, the Albanian community have been increasingly vilified with the rise in inflammatory discourse in the media and from the government. This has justified restrictive immigration policies and made it exceptionally difficult for people from Albania to have their case heard, let alone accepted. There has been an exponential increase in the number of Albanians being deported and Albanians are disproportionately represented in immigration detention centres. The impact on peoples lives has been devastating.
In this event, we discuss how people from Albania have come to be a convenient scapegoat for divisive immigration policies and rhetoric. In this first part of the talk Piro Rexhepi talks about Albanaphobia situating this in the wider context of international migration policies and racist discources.
About the speaker:
Piro Rexhepi is an author and researcher who works on decoloniality, sexuality and Islam. His book “White Enclosures. Racial Capitalism and Coloniality Along the Balkan Route” (2023) situates the Balkans within the context of postcolonial border regimes, shedding light on the way racial hierarchies have been imposed and perpetuated through the production of whiteness in the area. Piro is interested in the way that solidarities form and how we can bring these to the forefront in order to disrupt dominant narratives.
This video was part of AVID's Winter School 2023/4, exploring key issues and challenges in acting in solidarity with those impacted by detention.