Paper short abstract:

In this paper, I will discuss the ways in which the local communities who live at the Italian borderland of Lampedusa, deal with deadly encounters at sea and on land, and articulate potential paths for change, where death can come to dialogue with life through memory.

Paper long abstract:

Has the world ever been well? If we claim to live in an era of unwellness, where we seek remedies to the threats that we see raising around us, how do people deal with unwellness, and learn to live with it, in their ordinary lives? In a time of ongoing war, famine, human rights suspension, climate change challenges, and violence of all sorts, the Mediterranean emerges as a crucial borderland where questions around life and death shall be articulated. Surveilled and patrolled by a growing security and military technology, the Mediterranean Sea is both a bridge and a graveyard which hosts the forgotten victims of deadly border crossings. The sea however gives back what border regimes seek to neglect. Fishermen retrieve dead bodies in their fishing nets at sea, and borderland inhabitants find the belongings of migrants washed ashore. In this intervention, I will discuss the ways in which local communities who live at the borderlands, with the specific case of the Italian island of Lampedusa, deal with these deadly encounters, and articulate potential paths for change, where death can come to dialogue with life through memory.