Refugees' transnational mobility: a study of asylum seeking in Hong Kong and urban Thailand

Document Type

Journal Article

Publication Date

2014

Keywords

Urban refugees, Transnational mobility, First asylum port, Hong Kong, Thailand

DOI

10.1093/rsq/hdu013

Abstract

Based on qualitative interviews conducted between 2011 and 2013 with urban refugees in the first asylum ports of Hong Kong and Thailand, this study examines three inter-related dimensions in refugee migration: aspirations, practices and embodiment. It demonstrates what actually happens in the asylum seeking process, from home to host destinations, and the cultural process of “becoming a refugee”. Travelling abroad is not merely a matter of crossing “the border” at an immigration checkpoint. Rather, the participants in this research have to “fashion” themselves as potential “legitimate” travellers or smuggled persons in the making of exits and entrances. This article shows how they make use of their local and transnational social connections for making both “legal” and “illegal” exits and entrances, and how the embodied experience of cross-border movement influence their perception of being refugee.

Source Publication

Refugee Survey Quarterly

Volume Number

33

Issue Number

4

ISSN

1020-4067

First Page

50

Last Page

80

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