Paper short abstract:

This presentation addresses the question, “How have Brazilian migrants dealt with border controls in London in the aftermath of 9/11?” The empirical focus is how Brazilians from Alto Paranaiba have journeyed through both airports located in the Schengen area and in British territory to London.

Paper long abstract:

This presentation addresses the question, "How have Brazilian migrants dealt with border controls in London in the aftermath of 9/11?" The empirical focus is how Brazilians have journeyed through both airports located in the Schengen area and in British territory to London. As a main research orientation, I draw the theoretical framework from the concepts of mobility, borders and places as approached by scholars who reflect on the movement of people through an interwoven perspective, where places are connected in the migrant journeys not as arenas of fixed rootedness, but as flexible spaces which have also been transformed and shaped through mobility (Cresswell 2006, Ingold 2011, Knowles 2010). In addition, I use the notion of borders and surveillance discussed by contemporary literature focusing on airports and borderlands (Adey 2004, Mezzadra 2007, Ceyhan 2008). According to this, a wide range of technological apparatus known as smart borders has been installed in airports since the events of 9/11. In this process, I explore the idea that the journeys produced by these Brazilian migrants are tactical border crossing movements involving people, places and choices which do not follow a specific path, rather choices and decisions are taken while they are journeying to London. I attempt to reflect on migration beyond the concepts of flows and networks, and surveillance mobility, not in terms of static categories but as a continuum which is present in the movement made buy this kind of mobile people.