Making Home in the Earth: Ecoglobalism in the Camps

Shamma, Yasmine

Abstract

This chapter dwells on the notion of building in home-making, in the Heideggerian sense, by drawing attention to the periphery of the refugee tent and caravan, and the way refugee gardening within camps is at once transgressive, regressive, and progressive. The focus on the experience of Syrian refugees living within camps in Jordan highlights the tendency to root in the act of home-making in gardening practices and metaphors. It shows how Syrian refugees temporarily or impermanently displaced throughout the camps of Jordan’s deserts exhibit, in their gardening practices and pursuits, an environmentalism whereby something transgressive is at play. Drawing on interview material with the refugees, the chapter works to foreground refugee voices in understanding the complexities of displacement. It reflects on the progressive yet regressive implications of the transgressions of gardening and the tendency of stateless subjects to become entangled in the timeless practices of planting trees, flowers, and fruits in the here and now.

Citation

Shamma, Y. (2023). Making Home in the Earth: Ecoglobalism in the Camps. In Y. Shamma, S. Ilcan, V. Squire, & H. Underhill (Eds.), Migration, Culture and Identity: Making Home Away (147-167). Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-12085-5_8

• Online Publication Date: Feb 1, 2023
• Publication Date: Feb 1, 2023
• Deposit Date: Dec 9, 2024
• Publicly Available Date: Feb 20, 2025
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Pages: 147-167
• Series Title: Politics of Citizenship and Migration
• Book Title: Migration, Culture and Identity: Making Home Away
• ISBN: 9783031120848 ; 9783031120848
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-12085-5_8
• Public URL: https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/4961542