WHY REFORMS FAIL: THE ROLE OF IDEAS, INTERESTS AND INSTITUTIONS


Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, 13 (1) 2019 
ISSN 2562-8429 

 

 

 

 

 

 

BECOMING EUROPEAN? STRANGERS FINDING A PLACE IN THE EUROPEAN 

UNION 

 

Maricia Fischer-Souan1 

Universidad Carlos III de Madrid 

https://doi.org/10.22215/cjers.v13i1.2550 

 

 

Abstract 

This article addresses the idea of belonging in Europe from the perspective of postcolonial 

migrants settling in EU societies. It draws on over one hundred in-depth interviews with Algerian, 

Ecuadorian, and Indian individuals settled mainly in and around the cities of London, Madrid, and 

Paris. Rather than investigating migrants’ orientations to Europe through a narrow interest in self-

identification (feeling vs. not feeling European), it delves into individual migration narratives for 

evidence of how Europe is imagined (if it is imagined at all) during the migration process and its 

relation to other physical and symbolic sites. As a frame for interpreting individual migration 

narratives, I introduce the concept of ‘migratory rupture’, a dialectical experience of both the 

disorienting and creative aspects of migration.  In excavating some of the reflexive processes 

involved in constructing symbolic geographies of attachment, I find that regardless of the scales 

of comparison used to articulate place affiliation across different contexts, e.g. whether small-scale 

(neighbourhoods or city districts) or larger-scale (supranational or de-territorialized categories), 

symbolic geographies allow migrants to view their transnational life experience on a single, 

coherent plane and express a form of global consciousness. 

 

  

                                                 
1 Maricia Fischer-Souan is a  PhD candidate in the department of Social Sciences at the Universidad Carlos III de 

Madrid 

https://doi.org/10.22215/cjers.v13i1.2550


39     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019 

 

 

Now home to millions of people from non-European backgrounds, and with its many 

religious and cultural dispositions, Europe is a crossing of transnational networks that 

incorporate almost all its citizens and residents. It is as much a space of longings rooted 

in myths of origin and tradition, as it is a space of cosmopolitan identities and attachments, 

and hybrid geographies of cultural formation. 

-Ash Amin 

1. Introduction 

There is ample public and scholarly interest in the ways native-born and ‘majority’ segments of 

European populations experience and position themselves in relation to interrelated globalization 

and Europeanization process. Recently, greater attention is being paid to the ways in which ‘people 

on the move’, including immigrant minorities, view the global processes in which they are 

enmeshed. Migration is thus seen as the ‘human face’ of globalization and the migrant as the 

‘figure of our time’ (Nail 2015). Contrary to what one might expect with the advent of European 

citizenship, European Union (EU) movers are not the most emblematic of these processes. Though 

intra-EU mobility has been on the rise since the turn of the new millennium, third-country nationals 

and individuals born outside of the EU make up a larger share of the European population than EU 

movers (Eurostat 2017; Recchi 2015). To be sure, much of the geographic mobility in European 

societies (not to mention human and cultural diversity) is associated with ‘non-European’ migrants 

and their descendants, a label which can obscure the many cultural and historic ties the latter have 

to Europe since many of these migration flows are in some way related to colonial and postcolonial 

contexts. 

With respect to the different cultural and social processes that shape the experiences of non-

European/postcolonial migrants in the European Union, the specifically European dimension of 

experience has sparked some scholarly interest. There is growing research into how non-European-

origin populations relate to the added European dimension of political and cultural membership. 

Studies of European identity and support for European integration are increasingly interested in 

the perspective of minorities (Agirdag et al. 2016; Cinnirella and Hamilton 2007; Dowley and 

Silver 2011; Erisen 2017; Roeder 2011; Teney et al. 2016; Vieten 2018), as well as the potential 

significance of ‘Europe’ in processes of migrant integration (Sperling 2013). Survey research on 

these issues indicates that minorities support European integration more than non-minorities. The 

former are less likely to see European integration as a threat to national identity (Cinirella and 

Hamilton 2007; Dowley and Silver 2011; Roeder 2011). Minorities may also be more likely to see 

EU law as a potential arena for supranational human rights claims-making when faced with 

discrimination at the national level (Dowley and Silver 2011). On the other hand, the possibility 

that EU policy discourse may reinforce perceptions, especially among Muslims, of the EU as a 

‘Christian club’ may lead to more ambivalent relationships with the idea of Europe (ibid.). 

Qualitative studies on non-EU migrant identification with and understandings of Europe illuminate 

some of the ambivalence in these attitudes. Experiences of discrimination or marginalization vis-

à-vis dominant groups and the increased politicization of migration across Europe may limit the 

sense of belonging to Europe (Vieten 2018). At the same time, the freedom of mobility associated 

with the European Union can offer a potentially more ‘open’ space of belonging and foster 

cosmopolitan and post-national understandings of membership as well as opportunities for 

individual growth and freedom (Sperling 2013; Vieten 2018). 



40     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019  

 

 

Yet, relatively little is known about the ways in which understandings of and identifications with 

Europe (understood loosely) are articulated in migrants’ narratives of mobility and settlement, that 

is, how Europe is imagined (if it is imagined at all) during the migration process and its relation to 

other physical and symbolic sites that structure the migratory experience. By approaching the idea 

of Europe from postcolonial migrants’ perspective in a roundabout away that considers Europe as 

one of several potential spatial referent points, I try to glimpse into the dynamic process of place 

affiliation in European migration contexts.  

This study considers international migration as an intense life experience with the ability to alter 

one’s identity, potentially casting it against a global frame of reference (Savage, Bagnall, and 

Longhurst 2005). It should be noted that the postcolonial relationships that have significantly 

shaped migration processes in Europe (and which are investigated in this study) have global 

reflexivity built into them, leading to a degree of familiarity among North African, South American 

and South Asian individuals with their European societies of destination (and vice-versa). 

Elements of cultural and linguistic proximity are reinforced by contemporary mediascapes 

(Appadurai 1996) and other global processes. Yet, postcolonial migrants are equally cast as distant, 

unfamiliar, and other – as a result of international migration regimes, cultural boundaries, and 

racializing ideologies. Through this dialectic of ‘familiarity and unfamiliarity’ and ‘nearness and 

farness’, non-European postcolonial migrants settling in Europe can be understood in terms of 

Simmel’s figure of the ‘stranger’ – “the one who comes today and stays tomorrow” (Simmel 1950) 

as well as more contemporary accounts of ‘strangeness’ under conditions of globalization (Amin 

2012; Rumford 2013). The North African, South American and South Asian (mainly first-

generation Algerian, Ecuadorian, and Indian) participants in this study are not considered 

‘strangers’ merely because they are migrants, newcomers, or minorities in European majority 

contexts, however. Rather, their accounts of affiliation to place that frequently draw on hybrid and 

reflexive geographies are relevant to some of the key qualities of the Simmelian notion of the 

stranger-as-outsider – notably, creativity, improved perspective, and the ability to be a catalyst for 

change (Coupland 1999; Rumford 2013; Simmel 1950). 

Contemporary theorizations that build on Simmel’s account emphasise the blurring of lines 

between ‘strangers’ and ‘neighbours’ and associate the global era with a generalized condition of 

‘strangeness’, as argued by Rumford (2013). Through this understanding, the condition of 

strangeness applies to migrants and non-migrants alike and involves a “sense of disorientation 

resulting from […] an experience of globalization in which previously reliable reference points 

have been eroded and we encounter strangers where previously we encountered neighbours” 

(Rumford 2013, 7). How postcolonial migrants deal with processes of ‘disorientation’– both 

pertaining to the life-changing intensity of migratory experience and to becoming embedded into 

social worlds that are themselves “on the move” (Bauman 1991, 97) is what this study is about.  

As a way of connecting both the classical properties of ‘strangerhood’ and the contemporary 

condition of strangeness in an international migration experience, I present the concept of 

‘migratory rupture’. Through a dialectical experience involving personal rupture engendered by 

migration and the need to re-establish a sense of continuity during settlement, the concept draws 

both on the potentially disorientating aspects of the lived experience of migration as well as the 

creative potential of migrants to regain control of their life-narrative. As a frame for interpreting 

individual migration narratives, the migratory rupture concept allows me to excavate some of the 

reflexive processes involved in constructing symbolic geographies of attachment. Regardless of 

the scales used to draw spatial comparisons or bridge the distance between distinct places, e.g. 



41     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019 

 

 

whether small-scale (neighbourhoods or city districts) or larger-scale (supranational or de-

territorialized categories), I argue that symbolic geographies can serve at least two functions. First, 

they articulate a migrant’s transnational experiences on a single plane of existence and second, 

they express a form of global consciousness. 

 

2.  Theoretical framework 

 

2.1. Spatial consciousness and identity formation in migration contexts 

How do individual understandings of and attachments to place change in the context of migration 

and settlement experiences? Specifically, in international migration processes between a non-

European country of origin and a destination society in the European Union, how does the 

supranational European category intermingle in one’s expanding spatial consciousness and post-

migration identity formation? This study considers international migrants settling in European 

societies as particularly interesting subjects for investigating: a) how one’s geographic imagination 

expands to incorporate a growing number of potential place attachments; and b) how different 

scales of attachment, ranging from neighbourhoods, cities, states, and supranational categories, are 

articulated in these changing geographic imaginations. 

Human geographers have developed several conceptual tools for thinking about the meaning 

people attach both to everyday practical and more abstract spatial forms. The geographic or spatial 

imagination refers to the ways in which individuals understand and classify places and the 

connections between them (Agnew and Duncan 1989; Gregory 1994; Harvey 2005). Closely 

linked is the concept of mental maps which can refer both to processes of storing and extracting 

meaning from concrete experiences in space as well as imagining unknown places (Tuan 1975). 

These concepts view human spatial consciousness as shaped by both the material and symbolic 

realms of personal and collective experience and as relevant to sociological concepts, such as the 

social imaginary (Taylor 2002). Through a multidimensional understanding of place as constructed 

by location, social interactions and identifications, Agnew and Duncan (1989) argue for a more 

systematic focus on the simultaneous engagement between the social and geographic imaginations. 

Linking the social and geographic imaginations is also crucial to Harvey (2005), who draws 

attention to the specific role of space and place in shaping individuals’ understandings and 

experiences of their own biographies and their relationships to the world around them. He writes 

that the geographic imagination allows the individual to 

recognize the relationship which exists between him [sic.] and his neighbourhood, his 

territory […]. It allows him to judge the relevance of events in other places […] – to judge 

whether [these events] are relevant to him wherever he is now. It allows him also to fashion 

and use space creatively and to appreciate the meaning of the spatial forms created by 

others (Harvey 2005, quoting Harvey 1973). 

For Harvey, investigating the relations between social processes and spatial forms is essential in 

order to develop a fuller understanding of complex global processes, including regional integration 

and migration. Harvey’s emphasis on “consciousness” and “imagination” as well as his references 

to “geographical knowledges” and mental maps are particularly relevant to the cultural focus of 

this study. He understands mental maps as repertoires of spatial concepts and geographical 

understandings shaped by an individual’s surroundings, which vary greatly across different spatial 

and cultural environments. “Such mental maps, once formed, tend to be stubbornly recalcitrant to 



42     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019  

 

 

change and ill-adapted to the heightened fluidity demanded by contemporary processes of 

globalization” (Harvey 2005, 236). This relatively static view of mental maps is surprising given 

Harvey’s frequent emphasis on dynamic processes such as relational space. It is also a departure 

from Tuan’s (1975) multidimensional definition of mental maps that includes a highly projective 

and aspirational element through “imaginary worlds that depict attractive goals that tempt people 

out of their habitual rounds” (Tuan 1975, 210). Harvey nevertheless challenges overly 

deterministic notions of the geographic imagination by highlighting the diversity of specialized 

geographical knowledges, even within a single locality: “the nature of experience as well as of 

socialization guarantees considerable variation in geographical perceptions according to class, 

gender, age, ethnicity, religion and lifestyle dispositions” (2005, 236). The emphasis on the 

complex relationship between individual-level and external factors that shape spatial 

consciousness is highly relevant to the research at hand, given the multiple spatial and cultural 

realms of socialization and individual experience that international migrants ‘cross’ along their 

journey. 

Building on the sociological relevance of this geographical scholarship, Recchi (2015) offers the 

concept of space-sets: “the complex of physical sites where individuals spend their social 

existence, stemming from past and present practices, unified by remembering ‘togetherness’ in a 

geographical location” (Recchi 2015; Recchi and Kuhn 2013, 192). Similar to Harvey’s 

understanding of the geographic imagination, Recchi and Kuhn (2013) underline the variability of 

space-sets and liken them to ‘personal maps’, the components of which differ in terms of width, 

interconnectedness, and salience (ibid.). These three properties endow the space-sets concept with 

a more dynamic and context-specific definition than the geographic imagination. Both objective 

and subjective processes distinguish the characteristics of space-sets, as width is concerned with 

the totality of places encountered at multiple scales, so that the experience of geographic mobility 

expands the width of one’s space-sets. Recchi and Kuhn’s understanding of the interconnectedness 

and salience of sites, on the other hand, can be likened to the symbolic aspects of the geographic 

imagination, based on the extent to which one perceives different places as separate or connected 

and the affective meaning conjured by each. They explore this in relation to the political legitimacy 

of the European Union in the minds of EU citizens but trace the relevance of the concept to other 

historical moments of social transformation, such as industrialisation, “which unleashed workers 

from the countryside and brought them to cities, expanding their space-sets significantly” (Recchi 

and Kuhn 2013, 192).  

The dynamic and interrelated properties of width, interconnectedness, and salience that make up 

an individual’s space-sets and shape the geographic imagination are thus of specific interest to the 

study of migrant subjectivity and identity formation. Drawing on Gregory’s (1994) Geographical 

Imaginations, Robins (2019) emphasises the identity processes that are at stake in the geographic 

imagination beyond the perceptions and behaviours that shape and are shaped by our spatial 

consciousness. Individuals and collectives also use the geographic imagination “to imagine and 

negotiate their identities in relation to wider national and cultural ones” (Robins 2019, 730). In his 

study of Brazilian migrants in London, he highlights the significance of interconnected frames of 

reference that define a migrant’s spatial consciousness and belonging: “the way the places of origin 

and destination are imagined occur in reference to each other” (ibid.). 

 

2.2. “Migratory rupture” and the dialectics of belonging 



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Three aspects of these different theoretical contributions are particularly significant for the study 

at hand. First, our geographic imaginations, mental maps, and space-sets refer both to our objective 

spatial knowledge and experience as well as the individual and collective meanings attached to 

them. Second, these objective and subjective processes not only shape our orientations to spatial 

forms but also our identity work and other imaginaries (e.g. social, cultural, and political). Third, 

we mobilize both objective experience and subjective meanings of space inter-temporally and at 

multiple scalar levels (e.g. neighbourhood, city, state) in connecting or distinguishing physical 

sites in our personal mental maps. Moreover, though mental maps and geographic imaginations 

are essential to most human experience, the theories discussed thus far suggest the act of migration 

and the ‘migrant condition’ as particularly revealing of the complexity of these processes. 

The authors dealing with various aspects of spatial consciousness seem to differ when it comes to 

the malleability of mental maps and geographic imaginations. Whereas Harvey suggests that one’s 

mental maps, born of context-specific spatial and social experience, are not particularly well 

equipped to deal with changing circumstances and environments, Tuan (1975) and Recchi and 

Kuhn (2013) are more inclined to view mental maps or space-sets as continuous processes. The 

latter approach seems the most appropriate for addressing the geographic imagination and 

belonging in migration contexts as it puts the migrant actor in a position to take stock of 

accumulated experiences and desired outcomes related to multiple spatial and social contexts. But 

how might some of the building blocks of mental mapping - in Tuan’s words, the combination of 

“memory-images and imaginary-images” (1975, 211), or for Recchi and Kuhn (2013), width, 

interconnectedness, and salience – be felt and experienced by migrants as changing, expanding, 

and potentially challenging their previous orientations to space? Specifically, if our mental maps 

are complex by nature, as this conceptual framework suggests, how does the added complexity of 

socialization in multiple societies – as one becomes dis-embedded or ‘uprooted’ from one (non-

European) society and embedded into another (European, urban one) - affect our spatial 

consciousness?  

If we consider the lived experiences of international mobility as fundamental aspects of a migrant’s 

biography, then the dialectical relationships that inform processes of dis-embedding and 

embedding – involving both personal rupture and continuity – deserve special attention. Whether 

we are more inclined to follow Harvey’s understanding of recalcitrant mental maps or a more fluid 

approach to the geographic imagination, the spatial consciousness that informs our identity work 

does not simply stay put nor expand on its own. Especially in a migratory experience, one is 

confronted with new social and geographic circumstances which will inevitably lead one to reflect 

on and question one’s understanding of and attachments to place. 

The rupture-continuity dialectic can be used as a frame for better understanding some of the 

particularities of migrant biographies as well as the connected concept of evolving mental maps. 

As a way of assembling together the different subjective and objective components that give 

personal meaning to the migrant biography, I offer the concept of “migratory rupture”. This 

concept is based on the premise that the migration experience represents a significant life-event 

which may cause one to re-evaluate the self-concept in ways that other ‘milestones’, more in-line 

with social expectations related to the life-course (e.g. education or fertility decisions), do not. 

Thus, moving to and settling in an EU context, regardless of one’s desire to do so, can be 

experienced as a form of rupture, both in space and in the life-course. I use the concept of migratory 

rupture to highlight the feeling of fragmentation of the self in the context of migration and the 



44     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019  

 

 

subsequent effort to re-establish personal continuity that is coherent and ‘makes sense’ in the 

individual biography. 

2.3 “Elective belonging” and expanding European space-sets 

Research on how the idea of belonging in urban contexts is changing through globalization 

processes highlights the importance of reflexivity and symbolic geographies. The concept of 

“elective belonging” developed in Globalization and Belonging by Savage, Bagnall, and 

Longhurst (2005) suggests that individual narratives of settlement may have greater significance 

than local historic ties in contemporary urban contexts. As a core idea in the empirical study on 

globalization and local belonging, elective belonging 

articulates senses of spatial attachment, social position, and forms of connectivity to other 

places. […] Individuals attach their own biography to their ‘chosen’ residential location, 

so that they tell stories that indicate that their arrival and subsequent settlement is 

appropriate to their sense of themselves. People who come to live in an area with no prior 

ties to it, but can link their residence to their biographical life history, are able to see 

themselves as belonging to the area. This kind of elective belonging is critically dependent 

on people’s relational sense of place, their ability to relate their area of residence against 

other possible areas, so that the meaning of place is critically judged in terms of its 

relational meanings (Savage, Bagnall, and Longhurst 2005, 29, emphasis added). 

The role that critical reflection plays in connecting place to biography – the conscious effort to 

achieve a coherent sense of self in the context of geographic mobility – is illustrative of the link 

between our spatial orientations and our identity work. Savage and his colleagues’ emphasis on 

both meaningful and relational senses of place reinforces the theoretical material discussed 

previously. The multi-scalar interconnectedness and salience of sites (Recchi and Kuhn 2013) and 

interconnected frames of reference (Robins 2019) that come to structure one’s self-understanding 

are intimately related to the experience of geographic mobility and to the way we imagine and 

relate our departure, arrival, and settlement stories. 

Though Savage, Bagnall, and Longhurst’s concept of elective belonging draws principally from 

findings on internal mobility in Britain more than on international migrants, it is relevant to any 

analysis of the agentic capabilities of newcomers in their own social integration, embedding and 

emplacement in their new society (Wessendorf and Phillimore 2019). The latter authors have 

drawn attention to the role of ‘superdiverse contexts’ (such as the European capitals in this study) 

as highlighting the still unresolved public and scholarly debates around ‘migrant integration’ by 

begging the question of which spatial unit migrants are supposed to ‘integrate’ into. The study at 

hand suggests that postcolonial migrants settling in European cities develop symbolic geographies 

of their settlement contexts that are not necessarily congruent with official spatial units. As will be 

shown, they develop their own accounts of settlement or ‘integration’ into the spatial units that are 

most appropriate for their self-understandings, based on a relational and interconnected sense of 

space. 

Exploring the meanings and salience of Europe in connection to other spatial categories in the 

context of these processes of elective belonging and changing geographic imaginations allows us 

to consider the multi-scalar and interconnected properties of these processes to a greater extent 

than a focus on national or local place attachments would. To what extent do the mental maps of 

newcomers in European societies, reveal a ‘European imaginary’ of sorts, whether spatial, cultural, 

social, or political? The European Union, especially through its regime of free cross-border 



45     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019 

 

 

mobility, has potentially set the stage for an increased “internationalisation of Europeans’ space-

sets” (Recchi and Kuhn 2013, 202). Similarly, for Harvey (2005), the political transformations 

related to European integration have led to a progressive transformation of nationally based 

geographical outlooks into a more European-wide perspective. It is beyond the scope of this 

investigation to ask what the effects of citizenship status of non-EU migrants might have on their 

potential for developing European space-sets, and how these space-sets might be constituted 

compared to those of ‘native’ EU citizens. However, given the cross-country comparative research 

design, it is possible to explore the differences across groups when it comes to the cultural 

resonance of Europe. The European Union as the common denominator among all possible spatial 

categories of reference adds an additional layer of complexity to the question of expanding 

geographical imaginations in the migration context, while at the same time allowing for more 

robust comparisons of migration narratives. 

 

3. Research design and analytical approach 

The theory of elective belonging, put specifically in an international migration context, would 

suggest that newcomers to Europe – as ‘strangers’ – understand their biography and their sense of 

belonging in relation to multiple spaces, both in practical and personally meaningful terms. In-line 

with research on migrants’ integration into social networks in the ‘new’ society, I find that the 

boundaries between the functions of instrumental and affective relationships (in this case, to 

space), are fuzzy, rather than fixed (see Wessendorf and Phillimore 2019). I suggest that the 

comparative evaluation of both the instrumental and affective meaning of different spatial 

categories encountered during migration and settlement (no matter how directly or indirectly) 

constitutes a dynamic process through the dialectics of migratory rupture discussed previously. As 

an interpretative approach to my interview material, I pay special attention to multiple spatial 

scales and environments as well as the social and cultural imaginaries connected to them, through 

which the sense of place attachment and belonging is articulated. These include towns, 

neighbourhoods and districts, landscapes, national territories and supranational categories. The 

focus is on the way these categories are mobilized in individual migration narratives to make sense 

of the individual biography in a context of migratory rupture. It should be noted that many of these 

spatial categories have cultural resonance in one’s spatial imagination, without necessarily 

constituting the most relevant sites of belonging, however. They represent the multiple places and 

spaces that individuals reckon with and negotiate as they engage in processes of elective belonging 

and become embedded in their new society. 

As will be seen in the findings, many questions that probe for images and understandings of spatial 

forms and cultural configurations associated with urban, national or supranational categories can 

take respondents off-guard. During the first and most lengthy part of interviews, migration 

narratives unfolded more on informants’ own terms and resembled biographical narratives. In the 

second phase of the interview, I steered narratives into more specific spatial and cultural units. 

Moreover, many questions on distinct categories (e.g. France, Madrid, Europe) were formulated 

in intentionally vague terms. Though this often disrupted the fluidity of the exchange and could 

even cause confusion or discomfort in some respondents (e.g. “What comes to mind if I say 

‘Europe’ to you?” Or, “Is there something about Europe that distinguishes it from other parts of 

the world?”), it was important not to overly ‘correct’ such situations, even where they provoked 



46     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019  

 

 

silences or reluctance to engage with vague concepts. Such reactions in themselves can be 

revelatory of how spatial categories are understood and constructed. 

3.1 Sampling and fieldwork in cross-country context 

This study draws on over one hundred in-depth semi-structured interviews on different aspects of 

migration and settlement experiences, including identity formation and place affiliation. Three 

main groups of research participants were selected: individuals born in Algeria, Ecuador, and 

India2 who had been living for at least five years in the regions of Paris, London, and Madrid (as 

well as a few other cities in the UK and Spain). Fieldwork was conducted between 2014 and 2016 

and involved a range of participant recruitment methods in each context with the help of the 

researcher’s personal and research network, religious, cultural, and professional organizations, 

local journalists and ‘lucky encounters’ during civic and cultural events.  

Some key aspects of the cultural and political backdrop at the time of the fieldwork which often 

shaped the narratives obtained are related to the 2008 Eurozone crisis and its aftermath, the 

European ‘migrant crisis’, and the calls for a UK referendum on EU membership. The three 

principal migrant groups were selected on the basis of their historical and cultural connection with 

one of the three European contexts under investigation. The sampling logic in each national context 

was based on the relevant postcolonial migration relationship. Thus, the principal sampling pairs 

are Algerians in the French context, Ecuadorians in the Spanish context, and Indians in the British 

context. However, to enhance the comparative dimension of the study, a sub-sample of each 

migrant group was also constructed in a second context so that roughly ten Ecuadorians were 

interviewed in London, ten Indians in Paris and ten Algerians in Madrid as well as Valencia. 

Interviews were conducted and transcribed by the researcher in English, French, and Spanish 

according to the national context. Interview excerpts in French and Spanish presented in this essay 

have been translated by the researcher. The names of participants have been changed in order to 

preserve their anonymity. 

3.2 Interviewing strategies: ‘Spontaneous’ Europe vs. Probing for Europe 

About three quarters of the interview schedule was designed to encourage biographical migration 

narratives (as far as 2-3-hour semi-structured interviews can allow for). Where the sections on the 

pre-departure and settlement stages of the narrative were concerned, I avoided direct references to 

specific locations in my questions (e.g. using the names of cities or countries relevant to the 

migrant’s trajectory). I tended more to frame questions on relevant spatial categories using deixis 

adverbs such as ‘here’ and ‘there’ (e.g. “Tell me about your life back there,” or “before you came 

here…”). Only towards the last quarter of the interview were respondents ‘led’ into specific spatial 

categories relevant to the specific migration context, with questions such as, “What is the first 

thing that comes to mind when you think of Paris/France/Europe? What are the main challenges 

facing the UK today?” Thus, as a typical interview progressed towards the end, the narrative style 

became less biographical in scope. My questions became narrower and focused on perceptions of 

national societies and politics as well as European integration. 

Although it was not disclosed to participants, I was constantly “on the look-out” for mentions of 

Europe, among other supranational constructions. Informants only became immediately aware of 

                                                 
2 With the exception of a few respondents from other countries in North Africa, South Asia and South America, 

including Colombia, Venezuela, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Morocco and Tunisia. 



47     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019 

 

 

this when I deployed the second strategy and narrowed the geographical scope of questions to fit 

with existing or potential institutional and territorial configurations (e.g. “Can you imagine the 

countries of your region of origin establishing similar integration patterns as the EU? or “Is it a 

good thing that Spain/France/UK is in the EU?”). In contrast, as mentioned, the first strategy was 

concerned with obtaining spontaneous spatial references (potentially, more salient ones). During 

this phase of the interview, participants would develop different scalar or cultural meanings 

associated with abstract spatial adverbs (usually at local or national scales). Instances in which 

respondents spontaneously referred to ‘Europe’ (e.g. “I came to Europe…”, “the European lifestyle 

is very different from ours…” etc.) gave me the opportunity to probe deeper on the topic of Europe 

(e.g. “You just mentioned that you had a long interest in moving to Europe. What was your image 

of Europe at the time of your departure?”).  

As fieldwork progressed, it became clear that spontaneous utterances on Europe, although not 

exactly rare (they concern just over one-third of participants), had little to do with a clearly 

articulated orientation to Europe as a spatial category or as a source of belonging. Still, the relative 

frequency of spontaneous references to Europe is noteworthy. They were usually located in the 

context of comparative talk on lifestyles and values between the country of origin and country of 

residence, or in referring to a European space-set associated with progress, culture, and prosperity. 

Probing directly for Europe towards the close of interviews was therefore necessary in order to 

develop a more complete picture of the various orientations to different spatial categories and how 

they relate to one another. As my findings suggest, questions on European integration and images 

of Europe could shed light on respondents’ orientations to spaces and sites of collective belonging 

related to both European and non-European spaces, including places related to the countries of 

origin and residence. The ‘direct probing’ strategy was especially relevant in the context of the 

comparative nature of the study. Putting a common referent ‘Europe’ to the test in different 

national contexts among different groups of migrants actually revealed little in common at all. Not 

only does this reinforce previous research on the particular national frames of interpretation of 

European integration (Díez Medrano 2003), it also suggests that unique understandings of Europe 

are emerging among migrant populations as a result of multiple socialization processes related to 

the country of origin, European societies, and personal experiences of migration. 

 

4. Findings 

I offer two contrasting scales through which to consider the interconnectedness of spatial reference 

points articulated as meaningful in individual migration narratives. First, a small-scale, which is 

developed through emphasis on belonging to specific local or urban settings and conceptions of 

community as well as distinct physical environments as opposed to more extensive ones. Second, 

a large-scale, which shifts the focus of the study exclusively onto the Algerian/North African group 

of research participants based on their extensive mobilization of frames related to the 

Mediterranean Sea in articulating feelings of belonging that connect contexts of origin and 

residence. I cannot, within the scope of this essay, explore all of the relevant spatial categories that 

seem to shape informants’ geographic imaginations (whether smaller or larger scale) nor examine 

in-depth the boundary-drawing and distinction processes that often accompany work of 

constructing meaningful places of belonging.  



48     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019  

 

 

However, by presenting a selection of spatial motifs relevant to respondents’ discourse on 

belonging, I hope to achieve two things. First, to shed more light on how migrants experience their 

own integration, or embedding, into European societies through interpretative ‘comparative work’. 

Comparisons between the different places that have shaped one’s biography inevitably draw 

sending and receiving country-contexts onto the same plane of experience and existence. Thus, 

whether or not as migrants, we are conscious of the concrete acts or symbolic processes through 

which we become ‘embedded’ into the new society or psychologically attempt to resolve the 

experience of migratory rupture, any perception of the ‘new’ place is built in relation to perceptions 

of ‘other’ spaces of experience, and vice-versa. Thus, and as discussed in the theoretical section, 

migrants construct spatial categories with cultural and personal resonance through relational 

processes. 

Second, I argue that this emphasis on relational spatial constructs needs to be taken into account 

in investigations on non-EU migrants’ orientations to Europe, no matter how diverse, vague, or 

ambivalent they may be. To be sure, there are few participants across the three-country study who 

articulate strong attachments to a supranational European category (whether spontaneously 

evinced or directly probed for) in the absence of other contexts (social, spatial, cultural, 

institutional). However, when probed for in relation to other categories (e.g. multi-scalar 

conceptions of sending and receiving contexts), or simply, by paying attention to how 

mobilizations of Europe occur in participants’ narratives, the category can take on unique 

significance in conceptions of belonging and expanding geographic imaginations. 

4.1 Small-scale constructions of salience and interconnected spaces: “le bled”, “el pueblo”, 

“mini-India” 

One of the more striking aspects of the findings is the multi-scalar, comparative, and relational 

shape that answers to direct questions on spatial categories of belonging take. Indeed, responding 

“yes” or “no” to a question on “feeling European” or developing more or less positive or negative 

orientations to Europe can reveal ambivalent and even contradictory attitudes if not contextualized 

against specific cultural and social fields. When probing for the degree of relevance of specific 

spaces to daily life and belonging (whether or not I had mentioned names of cities, countries, or 

continents in questions) it is remarkable how talk of one’s relationship to a place conjured talk of 

other places and spaces. Reflections of this sort drew equally on material and symbolic realms of 

experience.  

Several respondents claimed a sense of belonging, familiarity or relative ease of acculturation in 

the host society by mobilizing comparative frames drawing their place of origin and place of 

residence closer together, suggestive of processes of commensuration (Espeland and Stevens 

1998). These instances are illustrative of a degree of global reflexivity, which, in its weaker variant, 

is identified by Savage, Bagnall, and Longhurst (2005) as the ability to draw comparisons between 

one’s city and other cities (nationally or internationally), reinforcing the notion that globalization 

fosters the “comparative interaction of different forms of life” (the authors citing Robertson 1992, 

27). The following interview excerpts focus on the relation between the European capitals under 

study and how they can be experienced as similar to meaningful places in the sending country (to 

the extent that the meaning of European places can be quite transformed in a migrant’s symbolic 

geography). These are not meant to be taken as the basis for a general schema of interpreting the 

relation between distinct spaces in migration narratives. However, the following quotes 



49     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019 

 

 

demonstrate that the relational nature of place interpretation can be particularly strong in the 

context of postcolonial migratory processes. 

 

Case Study 1: Spatial continuity across disparate geographies (small-scale) 

 

“When I saw Paris, I saw Algiers” Moussa, Paris 

 

What is the first thing that comes to mind when you think of Paris? 

When I think of Paris? What do I think of? I don’t know how to answer that…in terms of what? 

 

It’s up to you. 

The first time I came…when I arrived in Paris [after having crossed from the south of France and taken 

a train] … when I saw Paris, I saw Algiers. 

 

Yes? 

I saw Algiers, directly. 

 

Are you talking about buildings? Architecture? 

It’s the same. The architecture. The same, the same. They [the French] have left their mark [in Algiers]. 

[As Algerians], we can’t get lost [in Paris]. Very quickly, it’s as if…we know the streets [of Paris]. It 

was not a shock [coming here] … Paris, the first time I saw it, I saw Algeria. It’s Algiers. The capital. 

The same. 

“The way we live in London, it’s like mini-India” Abbigail, London 

 

[When you arrived,] Was there anything about life here [in London] that seemed different, new, strange 

to you? 

[No.] Because the way we live [in London], it’s like mini-India. I don’t know whether you noticed it […] 

East Ham. It’s like mini-India. So, you don’t feel lost at all [as a recently arrived Indian] until you go 

outside East Ham. Other than East Ham, Manor Park…You have to go outside [of those areas] to know 

what London is. […] When we visited [family] in Oxford, [I understood that] THAT was English 

countryside. 
“I think in terms of India. We can’t say that this is Europe…” Balavan, London 

 

When you think of your daily life, on what scale are you thinking? For example, are you thinking more 

in terms of London, the UK, Europe…? 

I think [in terms of] India. (Laughter). We can’t say that this is Europe […] or the UK […] or, London 

or anything. […] If I want to feel that this is London, I have to travel from here [East Ham] to… at least 

to Tower Bridge. (Laughter). I think like... this is South India. And if you go to other side, in Upton Park, 

it’s North India. If you go to Southall, we think like…we are in Punjab! (Laughter). 



50     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019  

 

 

Arriving in Madrid was like being in Quito” Santiago, Madrid 

 

What felt different and what felt familiar when you arrived in Madrid? 

Let’s see, what was familiar is that Madrid looks a lot like the capital of Ecuador. […] When I was 12 

years old, I moved [from the countryside to Quito]. So [arriving here in Madrid] was like being in 

Quito. Even the bridges […] the streets are the same, the architecture and everything is the same as in 

the centre of Quito. 

[…] 

 

You said earlier [that when you travel to other parts of Spain], you tend to miss Madrid… 

[Yes] And whenever I return [I notice how Madrid] looks a lot like the part of Quito where I used to live, 

so I feel very close to Madrid, I identify with it and I feel very good. I walk around the streets with ease, 

I move around with ease, I know Madrid very well. 

 

The passages in Case Study 1 are not merely an illustration of the comparative thought-processes 

through which migrants arrive at elective belonging across disparate geographic contexts. They 

are equally revelatory of a pattern in strategies for embedding oneself in the new society 

(Wessendorf and Phillimore 2019) and may be connected to the psychology of easing the sense of 

migratory rupture. Indeed, mobilizing comparative frames through figures of speech that establish 

equivalence or similarity between disparate places seems to be a way of transforming and 

appropriating local spaces. This is accomplished by drawing on both tangible and symbolic 

experience relevant to postcolonial legacies. Though many research participants would reject the 

notions of equivalence between places like Algiers and Paris, Quito and Madrid, or the re-drawing 

of the map of London based on Indian geography, comparative frames, though not always as 

striking as those presented above, are ubiquitous in migration narratives.  

To the extent that the testimonials in Case Study 1 illustrate a degree of global reflexivity that can 

be likened to Savage and his co-authors’ account, the ‘comparative work’ of postcolonial 

international migrants settling in Europe seems to have a stronger impact on their identity 

formation than that observed by the authors of Globalization and Belonging who studied (mainly) 

British internal movers. Though the latter were frequently able to extract meaning from the city of 

Manchester against a global context of other cities, these comparisons more often reinforced their 

local identities and attachments to the Manchester area. Indeed, the authors point out that most of 

the respondents in their study “did not develop the kind of reflexivity which indicated that their 

own identity was placed in a global context” (Savage, Bagnall, and Longhurst 2005, 191). The 

comparisons drawn by participants in the study at hand instead suggest that the sense of belonging 

integrates multiple contexts understood as central to the individual migration story. Indeed, rather 

than fostering a stronger attachment to one place or another, the global reflexivity of the sort 

developed in Case Study 1 (and in the section below) can transform the nature of the attachment 

altogether along the lines of one’s symbolic geography. 

Even participants who tend to highlight more differences than similarities across spaces of 

experience and belonging are engaged in processes of social commensuration, through which they 

are constructing unique scales of value. This is evocative of Boltanski and Thévenot’s notion of 

grandeurs (1991) – the common reference points that structure actors’ understandings of and 

justifications for their and others’ actions.  Talk on tangible experiences in different and multi-

scalar environments can provide insights into how one constructs personally meaningful spatial 

categories of attachment. The extended cases presented below highlight the discursive use of 



51     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019 

 

 

comparative frames as central to accounts of belonging to particular spaces understood in 

connection to specific social groups. Whether they span both sending and receiving country 

geographies or are more restricted to a single territory, what is seen as constituting the most 

important unit of belonging is articulated in relation to another unit – both socially and spatially 

constituted.  

 

4.1.1. Merging social and geographic imaginaries 

 

Fadéla, a woman born in 1961 in rural Western Algeria who grew up in the city of Oran, was one 

of the few Algerians interviewed who struggled with the French language. Coming from a 

traditional low-income family, she completed only three years of primary education and explains 

her decision to move to France around the age of thirty in terms of her inability to find work, to 

marry, or to become emancipated. She settled in the Paris suburb of Argenteuil after having 

married a Moroccan man she had met during one of her previous family visits. Fadéla, though she 

displays a great interest in one day acquiring French nationality for practical reasons, but also 

given her belief that “as Algerians, we are a little bit French,” develops a decidedly local-level 

account of her place attachments. Though our interview generated few rich accounts due to our 

communication difficulties, she does not limit her responses on identity questions to simplistic 

national territorial spheres. Though she feels strongly Algerian and not French, she nevertheless 

distinguishes between multiple scales of belonging in France that have differentiated meanings to 

her. Crucially, through frequent references to the bled3, she mobilizes a single unifying frame that 

focuses on her most salient attachments in both France and Algeria. 

What is the first thing that comes to mind when you think of France?  

I don’t understand [the question] … France? That’s where I got married, where I live 

freely. It’s calm. It’s normal…I live just like in the bled. I haven’t changed. 

Do you feel at home here, in Argenteuil, in France? 

Yes, yes. 

More than in Algeria? 

Here in Argenteuil, I feel like over there in the bled. Paris is different. In Argenteuil, the 

people are like [those] in the bled. It’s a lot more working-class. It’s a quartier populaire 

[working-class district]. In Paris, I feel a little bit like it’s something else. More like 

France. 

A strikingly similar focus on working-class districts as offering the most meaningful and authentic 

sites for belonging across both sending and receiving societies is offered by Santiago, an 

Ecuadorian migrant in Madrid who is deeply attached to his rural and indigenous roots in the 

region of Cayambe. Similar to Fadéla, whose understanding of the bled and quartier populaire 

bridge the space between France and Algeria, Santiago offers the pueblo4 frame as an important 

                                                 
3 Bled is a noun with multiple meanings used in both French slang and North African Arabic. In French, it means 

‘small village’ having pejorative or affective connotations (e.g. a ‘hole’ in the middle of nowhere). In North Africa, it 

often denotes the country-side. North African migrants in France specifically use bled to refer to the country or the 

village of origin (Cambridge online dictionary 2016; Centre National de Ressources Textuelles et Lexicales 2012). 
4 There are three general meanings of the noun pueblo. It can refer to a ‘people’ or ‘nation’ in the political sense; to 

the ‘plebe’ or ‘common people’ in terms of social class and to a ‘small town’, ‘village’ or ‘countryside’ from a spatial 

and cultural perspective (Collins Spanish-English online dictionary 2019). 



52     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019  

 

 

reference point that transcends the distance between Ecuador and Spain. When asked about which 

spatial scales between Madrid, Spain, and Europe are the most relevant to his daily life, like many 

research participants, Santiago chose the local (Madrid) scale. He accounts for this choice drawing 

on both symbolic and tangible experiences. 

Why is Madrid the most important level for you? 

Because it has been 16 years… that I have imbibed, as one says… [the surroundings of 

Madrid] … 21 years in Ecuador, in Cayambe especially, you know? I’ve spent 16 years 

here [Madrid]. I’ve spent almost equal parts of my life in the two cities, in the two pueblos. 

Because this is also the pueblo of Madrid. I really like that word, I identify more with it. 

When asked to explain his unusual use of the term pueblo to make sense of a capital city like 

Madrid, he specifically emphasizes the working-class sense of the term (rather than the political 

or geographic sense). That is, his identification with both Madrid and the Ecuadorian city of 

Cayambe springs from an attachment to places he associates with ‘common people’. In contrast, 

he creates a socially-differentiated map of the city of Madrid when I ask him what comes to 

mind if I say the word ‘Europe’ to him: 

I think of London, of Switzerland, of those places. For me, that’s Europe. 

Why? 

I don’t know…because…You see those people standing out there? [Motioning from the 

window of the café we are seated at toward the crowd in the Puerta del Sol square]. They 

look more like common people (más de pueblo). I’ve always thought, since they say that 

the [typical] European is blonder, taller… Even when I find myself in the barrio of 

Salamanca [affluent district of Madrid], I tell myself, “Now, this is Europe.” 

Thus, Santiago develops a class-based understanding of what distinguishes the European and non-

European sides of Madrid as well as an ‘ethnic’ component of Europeanness that intermingles with 

geographic distinctions. The unpretentious and ‘common’ spaces he associates with the working-

class barrios of Madrid – decidedly ‘un-European’ ones –constitute his primary spaces for 

attachment in the Spanish context. The previous passage, in which he explains his attachment to 

Madrid in terms of accumulated life experience, as well as the pueblo common denominator to 

express his relationship to the Spanish capital and Cayambe, illustrate the possibility of 

experiencing the two spaces as continuous in spite of the distance that separates them. 

As a result, both Fadéla and Santiago effectively transform the spaces they inhabit by positioning 

them in relation to other (socially-differentiated) ones encountered throughout the migratory 

experience, both European and non-European: Argenteuil as the bled vs. Paris as France; the 

district of Salamanca as ‘Europe’ vs. the pueblo (spanning both Madrid and Cayambe). These 

individuals are examples of participants who, through their discourse on belonging and various 

aspects of the migratory story, reveal themselves as ‘small-thinkers’ when it comes to the 

construction of socially and spatially meaningful places. It is not that Fadéla and Santiago display 

limited consciousness of inhabiting potentially larger spaces or develop one-sided orientations to 

territory (e.g. sending- vs. receiving-society). Indeed, they actually consider the multiple units of 

space relevant to the migration experience and develop unique interpretations of them through 

comparative frames of analysis. ‘Thinking small’, for these participants, is the means through 

which the continuity-rupture dialectic is resolved. For Fadéla and Santiago, ‘small-thinking’ puts 

greatest value on local-level working-class spaces of experience in a way that guarantees 



53     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019 

 

 

continuity of the sense of self across disparate geographies. For other participants that can be 

described as ‘small-thinkers’, the value of local and small-scale spaces is not necessarily 

understood in terms of class. One’s attachment (or lack thereof) to local spaces can also be 

explained in terms of topographical characteristics. Nabil, for instance, an Algerian participant in 

Paris explains his lack of strong attachment to the French capital in terms of the value he places 

on a rural existence compared to an urban one. He coins the phrase “topographical exile” to depict 

his transition from his mountain-top village in Kabylie, Northern Algeria - ma montagne (“my 

mountain”) as he calls it, to the Parisian metropolis. The two are inherently incompatible. Unlike 

for Fadéla and Santiago, who can connect the bled and the pueblo to specific parts of the regions 

of Paris and Madrid, ma montagne is a contradiction in terms with the French capital. 

4.2 Large-scale constructions of salience and interconnected spaces:  the Mediterranean Sea as 

a ‘bridge’ to Europe and other spaces of belonging 

This section shifts focus toward the construction of meaningful and interconnected spatial 

categories articulated at larger scales. The accounts in this section are germane to Savage and his 

colleagues’ (2005) observations on both the limited and more profound expressions of global 

reflexivity. They illustrate that large scales of comparison can be used to demonstrate an identity 

unfolding together with an expanding geographic imagination (akin to feeling one is a ‘citizen of 

the world’) while still being anchored in a physically and culturally constituted sense of place. In 

other words, articulating larger-scale spatial orientations that draw from experiences and 

perceptions of multiple contexts does not necessarily lead one into abstract notions of 

‘cosmopolitanism’ or rootlessness but in fact can reinforce specific attachments. 

One of the most salient ‘big’ frames for understanding the sense of belonging to receiving-society-

relevant spaces (such as the country of residence or Europe) is the Mediterranean Sea. The 

Mediterranean as a cultural and physical space was remarkably present in the migration narratives 

of Algerian and other North African participants. A total of twenty-seven informants 

spontaneously referred to the ‘Mediterranean Sea’ (or basin) and/or to ‘Mediterranean culture’ 

(roughly one-quarter of respondents), most of them Algerians or other North Africans.5 Indeed, 

out of the 45 interviews conducted with Algerians (in France and Spain), more than half (24) 

mobilized this category. More remarkable is the sheer emphasis that many participants put on this 

category to make sense of the experience of migration and settlement in Europe. Indeed, when 

compared to the roughly one-third of participants in the study who had spontaneously conjured 

more or less vague images of ‘Europe’ in the migration story, the ‘Mediterranean’ category 

emerges as a much more clearly articulated space of reference. 

Apart from a minority of respondents who were self-proclaimed ‘citizens of the world’, few other 

large-scale spatial and cultural frames – apart from Europe – could rival the significance of the 

Mediterranean space-set. Evidence of a globally reflexive cultural imagination for South American 

and South Asian participants that could have been used as a bridge between the place of origin and 

destination, are la Hispanidad, the Commonwealth, or other referents that emphasise cultural and 

historical ties in postcolonial contexts. Such referents were virtually non-existent in testimonials, 

however. Instead, the spatial and cultural imaginaries of South Americans and South Asians that 

indicated a large-scale or global consciousness at work in the rupture and continuity dialectics of 

                                                 
5 The only other references to the ‘Mediterranean’ category were by two Ecuadorian participants in Spain and two 

Indian participants in France. 



54     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019  

 

 

belonging tended to be assembled in a more dispersed fashion rather than through a single unifying 

frame. I cannot present this evidence in a detailed manner within the limits of this study but provide 

a brief depiction in the following paragraph. 

Examples of large-scale articulations of belonging include, for South Americans, transnational 

Evangelical Christian communities as crucial in their understanding of their own social and 

cultural embedding in Madrid as well as developing or reinforcing their South American/Latino 

identity as a result of migration and settlement in Europe. For Indians and other South Asians, a 

large-scale articulation of belonging could emphasise their feeling at home within the Indian and 

South Asian diaspora in Britain and abroad, including Canada and the United States. Moreover, 

though the Commonwealth did not appear explicitly in testimonials, it seems to influence some of 

the boundary-work through which several Indian respondents in London questioned both the moral 

and historic legitimacy of EU migrants that they saw as displacing the more ‘appropriate’ 

relationship of postcolonial migration to the UK. Finally, a number of Indian respondents – both 

in the British and French contexts – evinced a particularly interesting form of global reflexivity in 

endorsing the project of European integration specifically in terms of their Indian spatial 

imaginaries. Indeed, some participants explicitly framed their desire for more integration and a 

‘truly’ borderless Europe in terms of their commitment to Indian nationalism. By comparing the 

territorial, cultural, and linguistic diversity of India with that of the European continent, they 

articulated an almost common-sense desire for European federalism based on their strong 

attachment to the Indian state project. 

Turning back to the significance of the Mediterranean for situating North African migrant 

identities into a large-scale more globally reflexive context, the significance of this particular 

space-set may lie in its ability to conjure multidimensional imaginaries pertaining to culture, space, 

power, and history. 

Figure 1.  Different frames of the Mediterranean referent 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The interview data offer four broad articulations of the Mediterranean as a meaningful category 

(see Figure 1). One is constructed as an adjective for a (spatially situated) common culture – e.g. 

a Mediterranean culture, lifestyle, climate, family structure, etc. A second meaning is constructed 

in reference to the Mediterranean as a physical space, e.g. direct references to the sea and the 

geographical context that connects the different points of the basin. Third, the Mediterranean 

emerges as a historically situated concept, through references to Mediterranean civilizations and 

different periods of conquest and colonization (and their legacies) that have shaped the region. 

Finally, the Mediterranean is frequently mobilized as an image of (unequal) spatial distributions 

of power. The Mediterranean in this context becomes a frame to symbolize uneven power and 

status that distinguishes one side of the sea and the other, frequently illustrated by the figure of 

Culture Space

Power History

Mediterranean



55     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019 

 

 

harragas 6  or the migrant dead at sea. Each category is expressed along different degrees of 

‘harmony vs. contestation’ vis-a-vis more ‘official’ and existing organizations of culture and 

power through space and alternative or normative ones. 

Figure 2. The Mediterranean as ‘bridge’ to other spatial categories 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

With respect to the cultural resonance of the Mediterranean for North African participants, it seems 

to act as a vehicle to maintain an attachment to their native culture while simultaneously facilitating 

the opening up of the self towards other identity spaces, such as the country of residence and 

Europe, among others (see Figure 2).  Regardless of the specific parameters with which 

respondents associate Mediterranean culture (or dissociate it from) - e.g.  Southern Europe, 

Europe, Northern Europe, Maghreb, Marseilles, Valencia, France, Spain, etc., claiming a 

Mediterranean identity is equivalent to establishing oneself as a ‘big thinker’ or as having 

developed an extended geographic imagination. To signal the salience of the Mediterranean 

throughout the migration narrative is to assert that one’s geography of belonging extends beyond 

specific nation states or sub-national regions. In addition, it also allows North African migrants to 

endorse alternative visions of the spatial and cultural limits of Europe and/or to claim moral 

legitimacy of belonging to existing organizations of culture and space related to the country of 

residence and Europe.  

As the case studies below illustrate, the Mediterranean as a common culture is located frequently 

in discourse to establish cultural similarities (or few incompatibilities) between Algeria and the 

country of residence, in this case, France or Spain, e.g. “I’m very Mediterranean, so I felt right at 

home in Spain,” or, “As an Algerian, I feel completely at home whenever I visit Marseilles.” 

Another frequent use of the Mediterranean as a container of common culture occurs in relation to 

what participants consider as distinct pockets of larger spatial categories. For instance, associating 

Southern Europe and/or North Africa with a common Mediterranean culture at times presented in 

conjunction with larger spaces that extend beyond the basin “e.g. I relate to people in Spain and 

Italy because we are all Mediterranean. I am Algerian, I am African!” But just as it can signal the 

experience of commonality, it can also be mobilized as an emblem of institutionalised inequality 

between inhabitants of the Northern and Southern frontiers, resulting in differentiated and 

fractured cultural and geographic imaginaries. In other cases, the Mediterranean as a common 

culture can be used to establish continuity and compatibility across different identifications 

through an extension of scales, including a European level, e.g. “I prefer to consider myself as 

Euro-Mediterranean rather than Franco-Algerian.” 

                                                 
6 Clandestine migrants, see Abderrezak (2016). 

France/Spain/  
Algeria

Europe/EU

Southern 
Europe

Maghreb/North 
Africa/Africa

Mediterranean



56     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019  

 

 

Case Study 2: The Mediterranean vis-à-vis Europe: contesting boundaries and 

unequal status 

Europe as a “great wall” Touraya, Madrid 

 

Now for an ‘out of the blue’ question: What do you think of if I say the word ‘Europe’ to you? 

…A great wall. […] When I came of age and began to dream about travelling, and all young 

people [in Tunisia] were dreaming of travel, [I realized that] […] one must line-up and request a 

visa, […] the Schengen visa for Europe. It felt like you were about to enter a perfect world and 

that you need to be screened in order to enter this perfect world. So, if you don’t have the means, 

the education, if you’re not the son of…or the daughter of… [someone with means], all you see 

is this great wall. So I saw this from the perspective of my generation, of [Tunisian] youth. If I, 

as a student, can go on [a single] trip, Europeans [on the other hand], they have seen all of Europe, 

they have the Erasmus scholarship, they have all these possibilities. And we [North Africans] 

have all the languages of the world, but we are faced with this big wall. A Tunisian like me who 

has always lived in an environment that’s very close to the Francophonie, if not 100% 

francophone, must request a visa to enter France, whereas a Spaniard, who may not know any 

languages, is a European citizen, he can enter [France]. … So there is this big wall…so the only 

thing that’s left for you is to look to your right and to your left onto the Arab world …And now 

that I’ve crossed this wall, I keep telling them [Tunisian youth], “Don’t be fooled. Don’t dream 

about crossing or climbing that wall, because it’s all a big lie! Life [on the other side] is not as 

amazing as you think!” … 

So, as a result of this understanding of Europe [as a ‘wall’] should the EU expand to include a 

country like Tunisia? 

We are in Africa. I am African. I have become increasingly conscious of this and I assume my 

African identity and origins because my country is located in Africa. Clearly. But there is 

something very important, very influential in the history of the world – the Mediterranean [sea]. 

And I think that a French [person] is closer to a Tunisian than…a person from Norway. One, there 

is the language, the history. We overcame a history of war and colonisation and we were able to 

have friendships or marriages or cultural exchanges between France and Tunisia. When France 

recognized that one of the main dishes of the French family is couscous, this means that we have 

overcome the negative part of our relationship. We have this exchange. Even in Tunisia…we 

make quiche…because it’s a very good dish […] We have this exchange, which begins with 

culture, with tastes, with smells, with colours, with artistic expression, with the [French] language 

that brings us closer together. And this wall called Europe has been created. This geographical 

division that completely refused Turkey […] It isn’t advantageous to create a barrier between the 

countries of […] the Northern Mediterranean and of the Southern Mediterranean. We cannot build 

Europe while forgetting the Mediterranean.  

Stigma and “the other side of the Mediterranean” Bariza, Paris 

[Talking about perceptions of racism as an Algerian physician in the French healthcare sector] 

There is clear racism in the French medical establishment. […] The difference of treatment toward 

my [foreign] colleagues [who, unlike myself are not white or have an accent] is very clear. There 

is a huge difference. […] Though [the racism] is never directly expressed. But I think that amongst 

themselves [native French physicians], they speak about us [non-European physicians] in a 

different way. They don’t have the same rapport with a Polish [physician]. […] The Polish or the 

Hungarian [physician] with her little accent [in French] …she is a part of Europe. But for someone 

who comes from the other side of the Mediterranean, they [French] talk about ‘blacks’! The 

medical establishment by definition is a right-wing milieu. 



57     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019 

 

 

Case Study 3: The Mediterranean vis-à-vis Europe: reconfiguring identity 

horizons 

“I feel Mediterranean and I feel European…I even feel international” Hakima, Paris 

[Talking about the experience of becoming naturalized as a French citizen] 

I am Algerian and I am French. I have the two cultures in me because when one lives in a 

country…any country […] no matter where I go, I don’t think I would ever ask myself the 

question of whether I belong or whether I am Algerian or something else. […] [I am drawn to the 

idea of] the Euro-Mediterranean because I think it is a new identity space. Because I feel 

Mediterranean and I feel European. […] I cannot say that I am only Algerian or only French. 

Honestly, I even feel international at times. I would have no problem living elsewhere. In fact, I 

travel a lot. And wherever I go, I feel at home. I don’t know why.  

“I am African, you see. I am Mediterranean” Lounès, Paris 

You have mentioned you are intending to apply for French citizenship. What might be the 

advantages of becoming a French citizen? 

[…] I want to live here [France]. I do exactly the same things as anyone one who is here. I mean, 

can a nationality really reflect what I am from an identity perspective? There is no nationality in 

the world that could summarize who I am. Even Algerian nationality. [Even] when one speaks of 

the three identity dimensions in Algeria: Arab-ness, Islamic-ness, Berber-ness (l’arabité, 

l’islamité, la berberité) … But I feel very close to…I am African, you see. I am Mediterranean. 

You see, Italians, Spaniards, I really feel very close to their way of being. […] 

 

 

Case Study 4: The Mediterranean vis-à-vis Europe: Bridging 

 
“The Maghreb is Mediterranean” Hosni, Paris 

 

[Talking about regional integration processes] 

Where do you see Algeria in the midst of these processes [of integration]? Closer to Europe or 

closer to the Maghrebi countries? 

Both, in fact. Algeria…the Maghreb is Mediterranean. We are Mediterranean. […] [Regional] 

integration in North Africa would have to be based on [shared] principles. It could be [based] on 

the land, on language, on history. […] The Maghreb shares the same land, the same history, the 

same language, the same religion. We are Berbers. […] A strong, united Maghreb […] could 

become integrated into other groups [in future]. In Europe, in Africa…in the middle. […] If [the 

Maghreb] had been strong, it could have been a bridge between all of that [Europe and Africa]. 

Unfortunately, it [Maghrebi integration] is not working and we have many problems. So…And 

also, the Maghreb is Mediterranean. When you go to Marseilles, or you go to Algiers, it’s the 

same thing. It’s the same thing. 

“On which side of the sea…?” Malika, Paris 

If you have children one day, where would you like to raise them? 

Not in Paris. I mean, if it’s in France, it would be [somewhere else, where life is easier, less 

stressful, more affordable]. […] Ideally, I don’t think it will be in Paris. Ideally, it would be by 

the sea. I think that [the sea] is a reference point. A visual reference point, for me. I mean, I always 

grew up by the sea. I would love to live by the Mediterranean. Now, on which side [of the sea 

would I be living], that I don’t know. In which country, I don’t know. But the Mediterranean 

basin is sufficiently large to… [choose]. To be able to see the sea, I would love that. I think it’s a 

lovely thing for children to grow up by the sea, it’s a nice horizon. 



58     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019  

 

 

Thus, the Mediterranean frame allows many Algerian and other North African participants to 

establish themselves as simultaneously ‘close’ to both ‘European’ (Valencia, Marseilles, Southern 

Europe…) and ‘non-European’ (e.g. Maghreb, Berber, Africa, North Africa…) space-culture 

configurations, as well as de-territorialized global reference points. In addition, by establishing 

proximity to certain notions of Europeanness and distance from others, North Africans are 

contesting dominant and mainstream understandings of Europe and European integration. 

The fact that the Mediterranean and its connection to Europe resonates almost exclusively among 

North African participants and is conspicuously absent in the narratives of Ecuadorians settling in 

Spain, for instance, reinforces the significance of the dialectical relationship of rupture and 

continuity in the context of migration and settlement. Objectively speaking, the Mediterranean 

coast is closer to Madrid (303 km via Valencia) than to Paris (660 km via Marseilles). Yet, the 

Mediterranean as a meaningful way to articulate spatial reflexivity scarcely surfaced in narratives 

of migration and settlement among Ecuadorians interviewed in Madrid, in contrast to Algerians in 

Paris (and Valencia). Therefore, my findings provide some support to Harvey’s understanding on 

the ‘stickiness’ of mental maps and can be connected to Savage, Bagnall, and Longhurst’s 

conclusions on the nature of global reflexivity – namely, that it “does not seep into people’s lives 

because of the pervasive power of global idioms and cues, but rather it depends on particular, 

indeed local and personal circumstances” (2003, 202).  

Perhaps the desire for continuity, after all, overpowers the experience of rupture in the migration 

experience, as ‘strangers’ categorize their new experiences in ways that are legible from the 

perspective of previous spatial orientations. Algerians’ frequent interpretation of France, Spain, 

and Europe through the Mediterranean lens may be more illustrative of the current stakes 

surrounding Algerian and North African identity formation7 than of French, Spanish, or European 

identity construction. Other spatial themes that emerged frequently in Ecuadorian participants’ 

migration narratives, though not explored in this study, may also lend support to the recalcitrance 

of geographic imaginaries. They invite us to reconsider the theme of ‘topographical exile’ used by 

an Algerian Kabyle respondent to describe his experience in Paris. Indeed, the discourse on roots 

(raíces) and land (tierra) that surfaced frequently in the accounts of Ecuadorians is evocative of 

certain aspects of the geographic imagination that may not ‘travel’ as well as others, especially 

where the journey begins in a rural and developing space and ends in a major European capital. 

For Ecuadorians intent on returning to their place of origin, the use of such vocabulary illustrates 

both the distinction between one’s ‘true home’ and the place of residence as well as the salient 

markers of Ecuadorian geography – highland and coastal regions – that shape their sense of self. 

 

5.  Conclusion: Toward a migrant’s cartography of Europe 

My use of the ‘thinking small’ vs. ‘thinking big’ trope should not be seen as an assumption on the 

limited cognitive resources for spatial abstraction of some research participants. I am not making 

an argument premised on cognitive mobilization theory (Inglehart 1970) that would assume lower-

                                                 
7Algerian research participants draw attention to the multiple and often conflicting identity narratives in contemporary 

Algerian society that have to do with French colonial legacies (e.g. the continued relevance of the French language in 

national administration and education as well  as the cultural  divisions between more Arabic/Islamically-oriented and 

French/secularly-oriented segments of society); the status of Berber languages and culture marginalized by the state, 

as well as a general sensation of Algerian culture and civil society being stifled by heavy emigration trends and a 

political regime dominated by an elite and military caste. 



59     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019 

 

 

educated participants are less inclined than higher-educated ones to perceive the relevance of 

becoming embedded into larger socio-spatial categories. Indeed, the cases discussed in some depth 

as well as the interview fragments presented in the case studies find that small-scale motifs are not 

synonymous with limited spatial imaginaries. Instead, participants who make use of smaller spatial 

frames are simply emphasising the higher degree of relevance of these spaces, both in material and 

symbolic terms, to their daily lives and migratory experiences, compared to other, often larger 

spatial categories. 

Articulating notions of belonging, membership and identification in the context of different spatial 

scales, whether small or large, seems to bridge distance between distinct spaces and may ease the 

multiple transitions inherent in migratory rupture. For example, talk on the transformation and 

appropriation of official units of urban space in the country of residence (using vocabulary such 

as mini-India, bled, or pueblo to make sense of attachment vis-à-vis London, Madrid, and Paris) 

reflects perceptions of shifting multi-scalar boundaries. Whether between diaspora and 

‘mainstream’ society or between working-class and affluent urban and sub-urban spaces, the 

process of appropriating local spaces, even from a small-scale perspective, involves the blurring 

of boundaries between sending-and receiving-societies. Thus, migrants are able to re-draw 

boundaries in the receiving society (through expanding spatial consciousness) in a way that 

nevertheless preserves elements of the mental maps acquired prior to migration. With respect to 

understandings of the physical environment, such as architecture that reminds individuals of 

former colonial relationships (e.g. Paris=Algiers, Quito=Madrid) or topographical characteristics 

which act as evidence of the disjuncture between one’s life pre- and post-migration (e.g. ma 

montagne≠Paris), migrants frequently judge the relationship between distinct spaces when they 

provide accounts of acculturation processes. This alerts us to the significance of connecting 

multiple urban and physical environments as Savage et al.’s work on elective belonging and global 

reflexivity already suggests. 

In Globalization and Belonging (2005), Savage, Longhurst, and Bagnall remarked on how the 

minority of research participants they interviewed in the Manchester area who were not brought 

up in Britain or whose life experiences abroad were not limited to the beaten track of the ‘white 

British diaspora’ seemed to possess the most developed forms of global consciousness. Though 

the authors effectively challenge abstract notions of cosmopolitanism that have tended to confuse 

global cultural processes with the de-territorialization of attachments, they nevertheless view the 

‘strangers’ in their study as the most authentically cosmopolitan. These are the only individuals 

who “place their identities in some kind of explicit global frame” (Savage, Longhurst, and Bagnall 

2005, 197), compared to the majority of respondents for whom global reflexivity is more limited 

to understanding their urban environment (and their attachments to it) in a broader context of 

national and international cities.  

My findings to a certain extent challenge the assumptions these authors make about global 

reflexivity – both in its more limited and profound versions. I do not view small-scale reflexivity 

(e.g. comparing neighbourhoods or cities in different places) as reinforcing a primary local 

attachment, as may be the case for non-migrants. Rather, I show how drawing these comparisons 

allows migrants to: a) create symbolic geographies that bridge the distance between ‘here’ and 

‘there’, and b) convert these symbolic geographies into the basis for belonging. This inevitably 

leads to an extended form of global awareness, even if one does not proclaim oneself to be a citizen 

of the world. The ability of international migrants to set their place of settlement in Europe in a 

broader context that is significant to their sense of self, whether this occurs at a small or at a large 



60     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019  

 

 

scale, need not result in strengthening one local attachment over another. Instead, this reflexivity 

is what allows them to ease the migratory transition and draw together multiple spheres of 

experience into a coherent life-narrative. 

With respect to reflexivity through larger-scale forms of bridging, my exploration of the 

Mediterranean frame of reference highlights how extending one’s spatial and cultural imaginary 

is nevertheless rooted in a particular sense of place. Moreover, my findings suggest that the 

migratory experience, though it constitutes a form of “extreme life experience”, in the words of 

Savage and his colleagues, is not on its own what “recruits” individuals into developing more 

global awareness (2005, 202). Though I have argued that the act of migration certainly contributes 

to expanding and unsettling previous orientations to space, my findings emphasise the important 

role of previous imaginaries and the embodied cultural capital that migrants ‘carry’ with them 

along their journey.  

This essay stops-short in developing an account of the degree to which non-European migrants 

understand themselves as ‘becoming Europeans’ as they settle in the different EU cities under 

study. Though the European category is the focal point of the investigation, it is premised on the 

idea of connecting images and experiences of Europe to other geographies and spaces of 

belonging. Since the interviewing and data analysis approach paid attention to both ‘organic’ 

(spontaneous) constructions of meaningful spaces as well as reactions to spatial categories that 

were ‘forced’ upon participants, the question “to be or not to be European” altogether loses 

relevance, compared to: To what extent is there a place for Europe in your geographical 

imagination? As I have tried to show, asking postcolonial migrants about their relationship to 

Europe is a loaded question. International postcolonial migrants are not ‘clean slates’ or ‘complete 

strangers’ to Europe, contrary to what one might expect. Rather, they are strangers in the 

Simmelian sense of embodying the synthesis of proximity and distance relationships. Multiple 

processes of socialization that occur at different space-time junctures (before and after the act of 

border-crossing) and the will to re-establish internal consistency in what may be a radically 

different environment turn migrants into cartographers of sorts. More than constructing unique 

cartographies of Europe, however, the accounts developed in this study speak to a broader research 

agenda that questions implicit spatial assumptions in concepts such as ‘culture’ and ‘society’. 

Following Gupta and Ferguson (1992), in an effort to de-naturalize cultural and spatial divisions 

across peoples, this study reinforces the need for further research into 

the ability of people to confound the established spatial orders, either through physical 

movement or through their own conceptual and political acts of re-imagination, [which 

means] that space and place can never be a ‘given,’ and that the process of their 

sociopolitical construction must always be considered (1992, 17). 

  



61     Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies, Vol 13 (1) 2019 

 

 

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