Paper short abstract:

Unable to foresee a desirable future in their home countries and unable to achieve their goals in Europe, North African unaccompanied minors (NAUM) embody a transitory period up to the age of 18. They go into a state of hypermobility to counter the waiting and free themselves from feeling stuck.

Paper long abstract:

The inability to create a desirable future for themselves has pushed many North African unaccompanied minors (NAUM) to leave their home countries. Upon reaching the Netherlands, most of these youth are told by youth care institutions that there is no future for them in Europe. This statement reflects the fact that North African countries are seen as safe, but it also takes away youths’ sense of a future. They feel forced into a state of limbo, wherein the caregivers see them as people in waiting, bound to leave when they turn 18.

Based on 15 months of in-depth ethnographic fieldwork I conducted among 23 NAUM and 38 caregivers in The Netherlands, I argue that although they are waiting, they are not immobile. The youth inhabit a temporal space that they and the caregivers consider transitory. They embody the experience of the ‘meanwhile’ by going into a state of hypermobility in an attempt to free themselves from the feeling of being stuck.

Being stuck has an impact not only on the present but also on the perceptions of a future. The NAUM continue to pursue the dream they left their homes for as an idea of the future without being able to take concrete steps towards achieving it.

In this paper, I challenge the idea that migration regimes slow down mobility or limit it either to a geographical location back home or in the receiving country, and I bring forth mobilities that have remained unaccounted for in times of waiting.