Counter-archive: Reflections on the (Im)possibility of Migrant Heritage

The following text is an attempt to reflect on the counter-archive^[1] 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 reflections^[2] 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 criticality^[3] (Rogoff 2006) as a guiding principle for the discussion.

Thinking about counter-archive, first, we have to reflect on its counterpart, the archive. An archive is a place as well as 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 called archives. As such, they connect the past with the future in the present (usually in certain places). Suppose archives shelter in themselves the notion of commencement and the commandment, as suggested by Derrida (1995), the counter-archive seems to lack these two qualities – the possibility of commencement – be it physical, historical, or ontological (having no place to stand on and to evolve to), and tending to disappear when taken into a commandment (lacking those who command). Counter-archive thus finds its home in a place full of absences, that are revealing themselves through ephemeral traces and in ever-changing situations. It is made up of things, contents, memories that have been – intently or accidently – blocked, erased, and forgotten, “evicted” from the collective consciousness, or which only made it into the archives as pathology or unintelligible and excessive “noise”. As we will propose in the conclusion, sideways glances and stepping aside (as methodological practices) and metaphors (as representations) might be of special importance considering the fleeting and vulnerable position of counter-archives. Namely, if we embrace 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 especially relevant considering ethical questions related to counter-archives.

When thinking about a (non)possibility of migrant heritage related to the Balkan migrant route, one has to consider two interconnected yet different modes of being – a turbulent stillness (Martin 2010) and a turbulent mobility. Both are important for our discussion on the heritage of the Balkan migrant route as traces of both modes are being erased, demolished, purposely hidden, or removed, leaving behind empty places full of stories. If the possibility of exposure does emerge (e.g. art exhibitions, scientific conferences…) the vulnerability of traces, the notion of commandement (who curates?) and commencements (what kind of ontology stands behind?) as well as the consequences of the exposure has to be considered.

WEAPONISED LANDSCAPE, OBJECTS, SETTINGS, AND EXPERT STORIES

Walking through the area where the northern sections of the Balkan migrant route(s) pass (appear, disappear, and re-appear), we reflected on the counter-archives’ place(es) and the (non)possibility of migrant heritage by observing 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 as well as for deterring and expelling (deporting) irregular migrants (Hameršak, Pleše 2021). As observed by Hameršak and Pleše, such landscapes are “[t]urned into places where people get tired, are injured, captured, humiliated, tortured, hurt and subjected to suffering” (ibid). Could such weaponised landscapes represent a home of a counter-archive? Could settings and objects scattered along the Balkan migrant route be considered counter-archive’s artefacts? If so, who are the experts who would recognize, use, select, categorize, filter, and study the items? Could such items be assigned the “untouchability” status, with limited access assigned only to counter-archive experts? Walking across the area between Buzet (Croatia) and Trieste (Italy) with a group of artists, researchers, and an asylum-seeker currently living in Ljubljana^[4], the latter somehow spontaneously took the role of an expert. He was able to contextualise object and settings along the route and help us understand them. It was his stories and our curiosity that transformed objects into artefacts. But his stories also turned away or took a sideway glance moving above, below, and away from objects, into the (better) future.

We observed razor wire, panel fences with razor wire on the top, cameras, auxiliary roads built by the Slovenian army for easier access with vehicles, mowed grass and bushes near the fence, lockets on water sources (on cemeteries, churches…) binoculars, walkie-talkies and more. We saw remains related to different “games”^[5] – taxi game (one doesn’t need walking shoes), walking game (good shoes!), ticket game (torn tickets), solidarity game (things left behind for those who will come next). All these different tactics of crossing Slovenia and reaching Italy left traces behind. Without stories, they were objects, with stories they became artefacts.

Our interlocutor spent three years “in games” before finally getting a chance to seek asylum in Slovenia. He developed an “involuntary expertise” in different tactics for games. He pronounces the importance of understanding the natural environment which was high on the agenda in his stories. What we learned walking through Istria is that the most northern Mediterranean peninsula is quite specific for bipedal activities. Walking is often exposed (no dense forests), water is difficult to find, Karst phenomena and steep slopes make walking difficult, and one is tripping over rewilded layers of forgotten human labor (former agricultural terraces for example that make running difficult). Here you have to walk fast and during the night^[6], he explained.

We also observed traces revealing practices linked with the autonomy of migration. As stressed by various researchers, migratory movements temporarily precede the attempts to control, regulate and valorise them (Scheel 2021). People on the move build razor wire crossings, and “road” signs, they dry sleeping bags on bushes and leave them behind for others to use. An expert made us understand traces as maps for other migrants to read, as signs aimed at misleading police, and also as acts of solidarity. That made us think about how a victimizing discourse erases migrants’ capacity to subvert border controls, which in turn enables 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, De León also stressed that “people develop and/or repurpose counter-infrastructures to avoid resist or subvert structures of power and authority” (2021: 469) – in this case the EU militarized brutal border regime. As they further stressed, they are vital to migrants navigating the fields of in/visibility imposed by infrastructures of border security (ibid). These tactics also include tools, techniques, and practical knowledge needed to survive the desert, forests, Karst regions, and evade border surveillance (De León, Gokee, Schubert 2015).

Walking nowadays in Istria one also encounters different settings encompassing objects and stories. Based on location, site features, artefact inventories, and migrants’ knowledge we were able to distinguish between border resting areas, camps where people gather and rest for a few hours, rest areas where people stop for a very short time, and assembly points. Border resting areas were simple places (containing only a few empty cans and bottles of food) or more elaborate, with fireplaces, sheltered places to sleep, and large amounts of clothes, cans, and plastic bottles. Once I traveled 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^[6]. Migrants may spend an hour to several days in these locations, depending on the group, waiting for the right moment to cross (reconnaissance De León 2015). Camps where people gather and rest from a few hours to all night were marked with small fireplaces, discarded equipment, T-shirts, socks, raincoats, and sleeping bags. Furthermore, rest areas are places where people stop for a short time to eat and drink, where one can encounter bottles, cans, and energy drinks. Assembly points are places where migrants leave their Game equipment. They are taken onward by smugglers in vehicles (De León 2015) or they continue on foot or by public transport. There was a small pool close by the assembly place, used for people on the move to clean up and remove signs of the Game from themselves and establish rather a look of an inconspicuous passer-byer (traces like toothbrushes, deodorants, clothes, and all kinds of shaving tools could be found there). By leaving behind worn clothes, backpacks, and documents, they are trying to get rid of any incriminating evidence that would point to someone being a migrant on their way to Trieste. One can also encounter torn and stitched backpacks and demolished and repaired bags, knotted straps, and sneakers tied with shoelaces – witnesses of human suffering being discussed by De León (2015) through an idea of use wear referring to modifications of objects that occur when people use them in various ways. Such objects were scattered across different sites we encountered.

From the perspective of the national states engaged in border regimes along the Balkan migrant route, the ”migrant’s disposal sites” correspond to areas where the police set up operational tactical measures to protect the national border, so information about them is usually kept as a secret. However, after the site is revealed, the route changes and sites re-appear elsewhere. As researchers noted, migrant routes are deliberately being pushed towards difficult terrains, so nature can play the role of a gatekeeper, performing “natural accidents” (Hameršak, Pleše 2021, Hameršak 2022, De León 2015). The abandoned and revealed sites undergo further procedures. Police inspect the “garbage”, identifying it as “migrant garbage”, and inform a municipal policeman and the municipality. Municipal waste disposal company then recycles and disposes of the “garbage”^[7]. The sneakers tied with shoelaces are being mixed with sneakers that are out of fashion, sneakers worn from soccer, and other usual local garbage. What stays behind and before are past stories, painful and heavy, and the future ones, stories yet to happen even though nobody wants to imagine or have them. That makes a counter-archive truly sustainable, a self-reviving present thing, robbed of past and future, an empty place, full of hidden stories, waiting to be narrated and heard. Where can we place the 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^[8].

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 (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 (Bateson 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?” (Rogoff 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 openspace for visions of a better future, for stories to be told differently and, above all, stories worth living.