On Anthropology and the Importance of Indignant Compassion - by Dr. Trish

I am not a refugee. I have never had to face the destruction of my home town. I have never suffered persecution for my race, my gender, my religion, my political opinion, or on account of a social group identity. Most likely I will never have to watch years or months of my life, let alone my dreams for the future, disappear into an indifferent and indeterminate future from within the confines of a refugee camp. I will probably never be forced to make the agonizing choice to leave all that I know and love behind in order to seek safety elsewhere. These dilemmas are not mine. But I do know hundreds of people for whom this has been a reality. I have talked to them at length, sometimes together in the tiny makeshift homes they have built out of mud in the deserts of enemy territory. I have accompanied them as they navigate the painful and confusing requirements of asylum procedures. I once knew them on the streets and cafes of Asmara only to meet them again in Washington DC, Chicago, Atlanta, Frankfurt, and Addis Ababa. As an anthropologist who carries a privileged passport and nationality, I am a witness to experiences I can never claim. I am a commentator and interpreter of social and political realities my country has helped to create and sustain but increasingly refuses to address in a meaningful and responsible way. I am an anthropologist, a researcher, a writer, an advocate, and a teacher. This blog, created together with my students at Ludwig Maximilians University, is a testament to our shared commitment to understand the "refugee crisis." But whose crisis is it? From the vantage point of European countries like Germany, where more than a million refugees have arrived in just a few short years, the crisis might seem to belong to the global North, to the governments and societies that now host more displaced people than at any time since World War II. But from the perspective of refugees, the "crisis" looks very different indeed. Anthropology provides a unique opportunity to see the refugee situation today from multiple angles, to offer interpretations that go beyond the superficial "noise" of the media, of political debates and elections, of fears and anxieties that haunt the human condition everywhere. It is a lens that requires us to view the world with compassion - and yet indignation. The authors of this blog represent many different countries and nationalities, experiences and perspectives. Using the common perspective of anthropology, we hope to share other stories from the "refugee crisis," stories that emerge from our deliberate engagement with the world around us through an ethnographic approach. We hope to learn from one another, and to teach one another. We hope to make a contribution to understanding what it means live in a world beset by displacement and crisis, and to imagine different possibilities. This is our space of reflection, and we invite you to share it.