ECREA16-Abstract

Friday, November 11

1 6 : 0 0 – 1 7 : 3 0

CDE11

TheMediation of Refugeedom: Europe's Refugee Crisis Through Different Lenses

Y. Ekström

Uppsala University, Department of Informatics and Media, Uppsala, Sweden

The current stream of refugees from Syria and elsewhere has arguably put a strain on the European Union, causing harsh debates around European solidarity

with people in need as well as solidarity between EU countries. This panel investigates how this so-called refugee crisis is mediated, as well as how it can

be understood in terms of mediation, through different venues, platforms and practices. The panel spans over a diverse field of commemoration practices,

varied genres of journalism in different media, online discussions in social networks and narratives on social media platforms. The contributions are tied

together through addressing the mediation of refugeedom. The panel will start with Nico Carpentier’s reflection on the long-term impact of refugeedom

at the psychological, cultural and political level from the Cypriot experience, mostly mediated through commemorative statues and sites in the southern

regions of Cyprus. This will be followed by Cecilia Strand’s contribution on how the European refugee crisis is mediated in Uganda’s largest newspaper.

As the 9

largest recipient of refugees in the world and with a history of colonial discourses of ‘the Other’ as less valued, the Ugandan context provides

a multi-layered account of the mediation of Europe’s refugee crisis. Discourses of ‘the Other’and media’s role in constructing these, is also the topic of Vaia

Doudaki’s contribution, though focusing on the popular online outletThe Local (the Swedish edition) to discuss how immigration discourses and the refugee

crisis are mediated here. Journalistic practices is also at the core of Göran Svensson’s contribution, studying how ideas of political correctness of the main‑

stream media are connected to issues of migration, integration and refugees in discussion on the social network site Flashback. The discussion is analysed

using the concepts cultures of criticism and cultures of accountability. In the final contribution, Ylva Ekström takes us to the Swedish island of Gotland and

a sunshine story where refugees are welcomed with open arms and integrated into the local community of the summer holiday paradise. This story is

mediated through Facebook groups and different outlets of local media, and not necessarily representing the majority perspective of the local inhabitants.

But at the same time, these practices of mediation serve as odes through which integration and the formation of a new local identity take place. Individual

papers Paper 1: Remembering and forgetting Cyprus - Cultural trauma, the Cypriot refugee crisis and its memorialisations Author: Nico Carpentier Paper 2:

The European refugee crises through the lens of“the others”Author: Cecilia Strand Paper 4: Discourses of identity, discourses of the Other Author: Vaia Dou‑

daki Paper 3: Blaming the politically correct mainstreammedia. Cultures of critique/criticism and accountability in discussions over refugees, migration and

integration in a Swedish SNS. Author: Göran Svensson Paper 5: The mediation of a sunshine story in midst of the Swedish refugee crisis Author: Ylva Ekström

PN 208

Remembering and Forgetting Cyprus – Cultural Trauma, the Cypriot Refugee Crisis and Its Memorialisations

N. Carpentier

Uppsala University, Department of Informatics and Media, Uppsala, Sweden

Cyprus is situated at a strategic location in the Mediterranean Sea, which has resulted in the island becoming a crossroads for a multitude of movements and

currents. All of these movements crystallised into two, currently separately living populations – Greek-Cypriots and Turkish-Cypriots – along with a series

of (religious) minorities such as Armenians, Maronites and Latins, as well as, amongst others, Brits, Turks, Greeks, Russians and Filipinos. Even if there is

a long history of tensions (and even violence) between Greek-Cypriots andTurkish-Cypriots, the 1960s and 1970s were characterised by a severe intensifica‑

tion of the violence between these two communities. After a constitutional crisis in late 1963, theTurkish-Cypriots resigned from the Cypriot state apparatus

and continued to flee to homogenous enclaves all over the island (Morag, 2004; Michael, 2011: 28). Patrick (1976: 343 – see also Sant Cassia, 2005: 19)

estimated that 25,000 Turkish-Cypriots abandoned their homes and fled to these enclaves in this period. The ultimate confrontation came in 1974, when

the same junta intervened directly on Cyprus by letting the Greek-Cypriot National Guard – led by Greek officers –mount a coup d’état against the Makarios

regime. A few days later, on 20 July 1974, a Turkish invasion of Cyprus ensued, which in turn led to the collapse of the Greek junta three days later. In August

1974, during the second phase of the invasion, Turkey occupied more than a third of the island with new streams of refugees as a consequence, forcing

160,000 to 200,000 Greek-Cypriots to flee Northern Cyprus (Cockburn, 2004: 65; Morag, 2004: 603; Sant Cassia, 2005: 22; Gürel et al., 2012: 8–10). From

the south, between 40,000 and 50,000 Turkish-Cyriots fled to the north (Tesser, 2013: 114). The 1960s and 1970s have caused an intense cultural trauma

(Sztompka, 2000; Carpentier, 2015) for both communities, where a very large proportion of both populations became refugees in their own country. This

was worsened by the lack of recognition for the suffering of the ‘other’side, something which Papadakis (2006) has called ‘ethnic autism’. This Cypriot refu‑

gee problem – and the way it has been remembered by the own community, and the ways it has been forgotten by the‘other’side and by the rest of Europe

– allows for a reflection on the long-term impact of refugeedom at the psychological, cultural and political level. The material that will be analysed in this

paper are the commemorative statues and sites in the southern regions of Cyprus that thematise refugeedom and displacement. The paper is based on four

months of ethnographic research in Cyprus - in line with Murchison’s (2010) positioning of ethnography - as part of a one-year research stay from October

2013 till September 2014. The discourse-theoretical analysis of the commemorative statues and sites will allow reflecting about a conflict that is not very

well known in Europe, but that can teach us more about the human, cultural and political cost of refugeedom.