Introduction When Displacement Studies Meets Hostile Environment Politics.- Chapter 1. Displacement and Racial Bordering What Next for Higher Education.- Chapter 2. Unsettling Narratives, Learning from Lived Experiences Displacement, Borders and Explorations with Embodied Art and (Counter) Maps.- Chapter 3. Unsettling Narratives, Reflecting on Policy and Intersectional Practice.- Chapter 4. Unsettling Narratives, Exploring Activism Networks Learning in/from Counter Hegemonic Worlds.- Chapter 5. Conclusion.

This short book discusses some of the urgent critical debates regarding intercultural education on displacement during turbulent times of contentious border politics and ramped-up anti-migrant discourse. Drawing on original research and teaching insights from a team of co-authors from Pakistan, Iraq, Zimbabwe, Italy, India, Canada, the UK and beyond who are involved in teaching students from more than two dozen countries, it focuses on experiences of teaching in the midst of controversial refugee detention and deportation schemes – just some of many developments in the United Kingdom condemned strongly by several United Nations agencies. The authors’ analysis engages reflections, from diverse backgrounds and positionalities, on approaches to education that seek to deepen understandings of displacement experiences in an interconnected world as well as geopolitical responses, methodologies and representational practices.

Dr. Samuel J. Spiegel has been teaching at the University of Edinburgh since 2011 and has published extensively on issues of mobility justice, migration, and political, ecological, cultural and socio-economic dimensions of displacement. A Senior Lecturer in International Development based at the Centre of African Studies, Dr. Spiegel currently serves as the Deputy Director of Research at the School of Social and Political Science.

Blessing Mucherera,

Sidra Idrees

Francesco Moze

Kanak Rajadhyaksha

Boel McAteer1

Thabani Mutambasere1

Georgia Cole1

Jean-Benoit Falisse

Savan Qadir

“A critical resource in the growing field of migration studies, Displacement, Borders and Unsettling Narratives inspires educators towards emancipatory, care-full pedagogical praxis. Grounded in diverse experiences from different positionalities, the ten co-authors eschew prescriptive how-tos. Rather, by engaging in reflective analysis of their own pedagogical approaches, they model different ways of knowing, doing, learning, and teaching in politicized and polarized contexts of displacement. Addressing the challenges of critically engaging with difficult topics through innovative, creative teaching methods, refreshing book is a must-read for instructors, administrators, and policymakers.” (Christina Clark-Kazak, Professor, School of Public and International Affairs, University of Ottawa)

“This book represents a deeply attentive and insightful intervention. Authored by critical thinkers at the forefront of generating original scholarship on bordering, and centring voices often pushed to the margins, the analysis and understanding it provides is invaluable. This is a profoundly important contribution and will be a reference point for many readers.” (Nasar Meer, Professor, School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Glasgow)

“This book issues an important and timely call to critically consider the role of higher education in an era of both intensifying displacement and anti-migrant violence. In doing so, it invites educators to confront the colonial root causes of migration and accept our responsibility to unsettle racist bordering processes and enable different futures.” (Sharon Stein, Associate Professor, Department of Educational Studies, University of British Columbia)

“It’s one thing to talk analytically about displacement, borders and the jolting narratives that have pervaded the UK’s hostile environment with global ramifications for refugees and people seeking asylum. It is quite another to engage in activism within the academy and to try and demonstrate what responses, and resistance might look like when embodied. This collective work of scholarship offers a critical and reflective approach to the praxis of advocacy and activism for and with and by refugees on campus in the UK. It’s an important shift in decoloniality and does not presume to preach or theorise from afar, but to be actively seeking ways of instituting and being change. I whole-heartedly endorse this work and the approach taken by the scholars.” (Alison Phipps, Professor, School of Education, University of Glasgow)