The following text1This essay was first published in Heriskop (21 May 2024): https://dediscina.zrc-sazu.si/en/2024/05/counter-archive-reflections-on-the-nonpossibility-of-migrant-heritage/#page-content is an attempt to reflect on the counter-archive2Gal Kirn wrote about the counter-archive in his book The Partisan Counter-Archive: Retracing the Ruptures of Art and Memory in the Yugoslav People’s Liberation Struggle (2020), also referring to Foucault’s concept of counter-memory (1977). as an instrument of resistance and departure from structures of power and authority – in this case, the militarized border regimes of the EU and their epistemological impact on migrant heritage. Although our reflections build on the specific ethnographic work on the Balkan migrant route, the notion of the counter-archive could be applied broadly, foregrounding issues related to the (im)possibility of an uncharted, forgotten, invisible, subversive or (im)possible heritage. Our discussion acknowledges research on counter-mapping, which has been used in various situations (one of the early examples where the term was coined refers to the discussion of counter-hegemonic maps that reinforce the resource claims of forest users (see Peluso 1995)) and appeared under different names, with these ideas existing before the term was coined (e.g. mental mapping in behavioral geography, parish maps that aim to put locals in the role of experts, etc.). More recently, however, the notion of counter-mapping has also been used for methodological reflections3As Ceola emphasizes in her research on migrant camps, counter-mapping serves as a methodology and analytical lens to uncover, convey, and decode the proliferating meaning-makings of social, political, and economic relations that uphold the everyday life of the “camp,” determine the shapes of its spaces, and signify its materiality (2023: 137). A current five-year ERC-funded project “The Game: Counter-mapping Informal Refugee Mobilities along the Balkan Route” is also currently being conducted at the University of Bologna under the direction of Prof. Claudio Minca. The project aims to understand how informal migration corridors such as the Balkan Route function (https://site.unibo.it/thegame/en). on migration and migrant infrastructure (Tazzioli, Garelli 2019; Ceola 2023). Moreover, the notion of heritage as used in this text recognizes the critical perspective of heritage, but strives to go beyond the critical view by embracing criticality4As discussed by Irit Rogoff (2006), criticality is not about finding an answer, but rather about accessing a different mode of inhabitation. In her discussion of criticality, she asked what comes after the critical analysis of culture? What goes beyond the endless cataloging of the hidden structures, the invisible powers, and the numerous transgressions that we have been dealing with for so long? Beyond the processes of marking and making visible what is included and what is excluded? Beyond the possibility of pointing the finger at the master narratives and the dominant cartographies of the inherited cultural order? Beyond the celebration of emergent minority group identities or the emphatic recognition of another’s suffering as an achievement in itself? In asking these questions, Rogoff dismisses alternative views and possibilities that acknowledge the importance of critical judgment but attempt to move beyond it. She writes: “While being able to exercise critical judgement is clearly important, it operates by providing a series of signposts and warnings but does not actualise people’s inherent and often intuitive notions of how to produce criticality through inhabiting a problem rather than by analysing it” (ibid: 1). (Rogoff 2006) as a guiding principle for the discussion.
When thinking about the counter-archive, we must first think about its counterpart, the archive. An archive is both a place and an idea. It is an idea of the accumulation of historical records and materials for present and future use, selected by recognized experts and stored in specific places, the archives. As such, they connect the past with the future in the present (usually in specific locations). We assume that archives harbor within them the notion of commencement and the commandment, as Derrida (1995) suggests, but the counter-archive seems to lack these two qualities – the possibility of commencement – whether physical, historical, or ontological (having no place on which to stand on and evolve), and those who command. The counter-archive is thus located in a place full of absences that reveal themselves in ephemeral traces and in constantly changing situations. It consists of things, contents, memories that have been – intentionally or accidentally – blocked, erased, and forgotten, “evicted” from the collective consciousness, or only made it into the archives as pathology or incomprehensible and excessive “noise.” As we will suggest in the conclusion, sidelong glances and stepping aside (as methodological practices) and metaphors (as representations) might be of particular importance given the fleeting and vulnerable position of counter-archives. Indeed, if we adopt criticality as a guiding principle, we need to “move away from notions of immanent meanings that can be investigated, exposed, and made obvious« (Rogoff 2006). This seems to be particularly relevant with regard to ethical issues related to counter-archives.
When thinking about the (im)possibility of migrant heritage in the context of the Balkan migration route, one must consider two interconnected yet distinct modes of being – a turbulent stillness (Martin 2010) and a turbulent mobility. Both are important for our discussion of the heritage of the Balkan migration route, as the traces of both modes are erased, torn down, deliberately hidden or removed, leaving behind empty places full of stories. When the possibility of exposure exists (e.g., art exhibitions, academic conferences, etc.), the vulnerability of the traces, the notion of commandment (who curates?) and commencements (what kind of ontology is behind it?), and the consequences of exposure need to be considered.
WEAPONISED LANDSCAPE, OBJECTS, SETTINGS, AND EXPERT STORIES
Walking through the area where the northern sections of the Balkan migrant route(s) runs(run) (appearing, disappearing, and reappearing), we reflected on the place(s) of counter-archives and the (im)possibility of migrant heritage by observing the traces scattered across the weaponized landscape. Weaponized landscapes are those landscapes that have been transformed into active factors for the creation and maintenance of border regimes and for the deterrence and expulsion (deportation) of irregular migrants (Hameršak, Pleše 2021). As Hameršak and Pleše noted, such landscapes are transformed into places where people are fatigued, injured, imprisoned, humiliated, tortured, harmed, and subjected to suffering (ibid.). Could such weaponised landscapes accomodate a counter-archive? Could we consider the sites and objects scattered along the Balkan migrant route as artifacts of a counter-archive? If so, who are the experts who would recognize, use, select, categorize, filter, and study these objects? During a walk through the area between Buzet (Croatia) and Trieste (Italy) with a group of artists, researchers, and an asylum-seeker currently living in Ljubljana,5The research walk was part of a walking-writing seminar organized as part of the project Route Biographies. Walking and writing as methods of researching border regions (J6-4611), founded by ARIS. The seminar was organized by Lucija Klun and Jure Gombač in September 2023. the latter somehow spontaneously took on the role of an expert. He was able to contextualize objects and settings along our route and help us understand them. It was his stories and our curiosity that turned the objects into artifacts. But his stories also shifted our attention and cast a sideways glance above, below, and away from the objects, into the (better) future.
We saw barbed wire, panel fences with barbed wire at the top, cameras, auxiliary roads built by the Slovenian army for easier vehicle access, mowed grass and bushes near the fence, locks on water sources (in cemeteries, in churches…), binoculars, walkie-talkies, and more. We saw the remnants of different “games”6Minca and Collins describe the GAME as “perilous journeys and a geography of makeshift and institutional refugee camps, border controls and pushbacks, smuggling networks and international support, dangerous crossing of mountains, forests, rivers and fields along the route.” (Minca, Collins 2021). – the taxi game (you don’t need walking shoes), the walking game (good shoes!), the ticket game (torn tickets), the solidarity game (things left behind for those who come next). All these different tactics to cross Slovenia and reach Italy left traces. Without stories, they were objects, with stories they became artifacts.
Our interlocutor spent three years “in games” before he finally got the chance to seek asylum in Slovenia. He developed an “involuntary expertise” in various tactics for games emphasizing the importance of understanding the natural environment. During our walk through Istria, we learned that the northernmost Mediterranean peninsula is quite specific for bipedal activities. The paths are often exposed (no dense forests), water is hard to find, Karst phenomena and steep slopes make walking difficult, and you stumble over overgrown layers of forgotten human labor (former agricultural terraces, for example, which make running difficult). Here you have to walk fast and during the night, 7Records of the fieldwork of Nataša Rogelja Caf (September 2023). he explained.
We also observed traces that point to practices related to the autonomy of migration. As various researchers point out, migratory movements temporarily precede attempts to control, regulate, and valorize them (Scheel 2021). People on the move build barbed wire crossings and “road” signs. They dry sleeping bags on bushes and leave them behind for others. Our collocutor explained to us that tracks can be seen as maps for other migrants, as signs to mislead the police, and also as acts of solidarity. This got us thinking about how a victimhood discourse erases the ability of migrants to subvert border controls, which in turn allows observers to ignore the fact that “migrants have a will of their own, one that lies outside of the hands of those who wish to help or control them (Scheel 2021). Stewart, Gokee and De León also emphasize that “people develop and/or repurpose counter-infrastructures to avoid resist or subvert structures of power and authority” (2021) – in this case, the militarized, brutal border regime of the EU. “They are vital to migrants navigating the fields of in/visibility imposed by infrastructures of border security” (ibid). These tactics include various tools, techniques, and practical knowledge to survive in different environments such as desert, forests, and Karst regions, and evade border surveillance (see de León, Gokee, Schubert 2015).
If you walk through Istria today, you will also come across various sites that contain objects and stories. Based on the location, the characteristics of the site, the artifact inventories, and the knowledge of the migrants, we were able to distinguish between border resting areas, camps where people gathered and rested for a few hours, rest areas where people stayed only for a very short time, and assembly points. The border rest areas were simple places (with just a few empty cans and bottles of food) or more elaborate ones, with fire pits, sheltered sleeping areas, and large amounts of clothing, cans, and plastic bottles. Once I travelled with two women and a child. We were slow because of them, but we didn’t want to leave them behind. One woman was still breastfeeding, but as we didn’t have enough water, blood was coming from her breasts. […] Just before crossing the border, the child started to cry. We tied a scarf around his mouth; I felt sorry for him.8Records of the fieldwork of Nataša Rogelja Caf (September 2023).Depending on the group, migrants can spend anywhere from an hour to several days in these locations, waiting for the right moment to cross the border Small fire pits, discarded equipment, T-shirts, socks, raincoats, and sleeping bags mark the camps where people gather and rest from a few hours to all night. In addition, rest areas are places where people stop briefly to eat and drink, and where bottles, cans, and energy drinks can be found. Assembly points are places where migrants leave their gaming equipment behind. They are taken onward by smugglers in vehicles (see also De León 2015) or they continue on foot or by public transport. Near the assembly point there was a small pool where people on the move could clean themselves and remove traces of the game to give the impression of being inconspicuous passers-by (traces such as toothbrushes, deodorants, clothes, and all kinds of shaving tools could be found there). By leaving behind worn clothing, backpacks, and documents, they try to get rid of any incriminating evidence that might suggest that someone is a migrant on their way to Trieste. One may also come across torn and stitched backpacks and demolished and repaired bags, knotted straps, and sneakers knotted with laces – evidence of human suffering that De León (2015) describes with the term “use wear,” which refers to changes of objects that occur when people use them in different ways. Such objects were scattered across the various sites we encountered.
From the perspective of the nation states involved in the border regimes along the Balkan migrant route, the police take operational-tactical measures at the “migrant disposal points” to protect the national border, so they usually keep information about them secret. However, as soon as the location becomes known, the route changes and the sites reappear elsewhere. As researchers have noted, migrant routes are deliberately being pushed towards difficult terrain, so that nature can play the role of gatekeeper causing “natural accidents” (Hameršak, Pleše 2021, Hameršak 2022, De León 2015). The abandoned and uncovered sites are subject to further procedures. The police examine the “trash,” identify it as “migrant trash” and inform a municipal police officer and the municipality. The municipal waste disposal company then recycles and disposes of the “garbage.”9In 2020, 233 dumping sites were discovered in Slovenia, 41 more than in the previous year. The municipality of Koper destroyed 1,660 kg of “migrant trash” in 2022 and 1,260 kg in 2021, while the municipality of Ilirska Bistrica destroyed 7860 kg in 2022, and 12,630 kg in 2021. (The data was provided by the Government Office for the Support and Integration of Migrants, which is responsible for financing the removal of “migrant trash.” The data was provided at the personal request of the researchers). Demaged sport shoes mended with laces are being mixed with out-of-fashion sneakers, worn-out soccer shoes, and other common local trash. What’s left behind are the stories of the past, painful and heavy, and the stories of the future, which are yet to come, even if no one wants to imagine them or live them. This is what makes a counter-archive truly sustainable, a self-renewing present bereft of the past or future, an empty place full of hidden stories, waiting to be told and heard. Where is a place for good stories? Stories of hope. Slovenia is a good place to raise a child. That is why I am still here. I want to bring my child here.10 Records of the fieldwork of Nataša Rogelja Caf (September 2023).
Epilog to the ethnography. An expert who accompanied us often chose a scenic route even if he was telling stories from dark forests. He took photos of a horse, a flower, and a valley ahead. Still, he eagerly talked about the sleeping bags that the migrants hung on the trees to dry, waiting for those who needed them, and the techniques of shoe repair. During the walk, some of us mentioned the stories of our grandparents who were partisans, as their stories were in a way similar to the migrants’ stories. What can we learn from this experience about the idea of the counter-archive? How can we curb the desire to catalog, collect, and classify, and leave the doors open for new possibilities?
STORIES WORTH LIVING
If we embrace the notion of criticality, we might imagine a counter-archive as a gesture that departs from (rather than opposes) the structures of power and authority and moves away from the authoritative writing, categorizations, classifications, and cataloging embedded in the “expert discourse.” The latter, even when it attempts to resist authority, all too often supports colonial and other hierarchical power relations. We could also pause with Adrie Kusserow (2017) and ask ourselves, the writers – what realities and insights into human life do we leave out when we remain faithful to the intellectual tone of writing?
Such an act would change the meaning of the commencement and the commandment (which Derrida assigns to archives) in the following way. The commencement related to the counter-archive would not be vertical, linear, and essentialized, but horizontal and rhizomatic, constantly sprouting new beginnings, telling the story from the outside (counter-archive). Such a story would consciously preserve astonishment and naiveté and allow for new endings, new midpoints, and unexpected beginnings. The commandment on the other hand, would be dispersed and relational, rather than focused and closed, and would bring together two interrelated urgencies – the urgency to be heard and the urgency to listen. A counter-archive would therefore not be possible under the existing conditions or in opposition to them, but only as a gesture of departure.
But could we – through this departing, relational, and horizontal gesture of the counter-archive – rethink migrant heritage in general? A relational understanding of migrant heritage would not be structured around notions of us versus them or here versus there, but would have the quality of circulating, juxtaposing, and adding (and, and…), privileging relations over essentialized particles. Parataxis over hypotaxis. We have lived and loved and left. As such, it would follow the famous metaphor proposed by Gregory Bateson that the relationships between fingers are more important than the fingers themselves (2019). What the counter-archive could embrace are relational stories of those who need or are willing to speak and those who are willing or need to listen. In this circulating, relational, and departing space of a counter-archive, both listeners and narrators are experts, while their roles are constantly changing and producing new counter-solutions. Echoing Rogoff’s thoughts on criticality, the counter-archive would also be a place where we might ask what comes after, “beyond the celebration of emergent minority group identities, or the emphatic acknowledgment of someone else’s suffering, as an achievement in and of itself?” (2006). It seems that certainty is not a quality in this place, and a sideways glance would have the potential to reach further. Metaphors would be added to concepts, while roles would constantly circulate, for who can say with certainty what kind of experiences will be needed in the world to come? Finally – without commandment over commencement, the counter-archives would open space for visions of a better future, for stories to be told differently and, above all, stories worth living.
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